Page 64 of XO

“It is,” I confirm, feeling another pang in my heart.

“Ah… is that your house?”

“Number fifty-six,” I reply, while rummaging through my purse.

“You sure you wanna go home?”

I meet his eyes in the mirror, pulling a face at his stupid question. “Of course, I do.” The driver points ahead, and I follow. “What…?” I ask nobody, panic tearing through me.

“Friends of yours?”

“No! I… ah… I don’t know what’s going on.”

Two police cars sit out front, one with its lights flashing as a paramedic truck pulls back onto the street from our drive.

“Can you stop. Please, just let me out here.” Handing the driver some notes, uncertain if I’m giving too much, I run from the cab and into the house. “Mom! Dad!” I call. A policeman sticks his head around the corner and sees me in the hall. I head to the kitchen feeling like my legs are running in water. “Dad?” I call again, seeing a group of people surrounding the island counter.

“Rosie,” Mom calls, her voice cracking with untold emotion. The police mumble their last words, something about being in touch at a later date, before giving us space.

“Mom, why are they here? Where’s Dad?”

She lunges for me, enveloping me in a tight embrace, stroking my hair while sobbing. “Baby, I’m sorry. Your father… he’s… I’m so sorry.”

Stricken with panic, I try to push her away, but she holds me close. “For God’s sake! What’s happened? Let me go!”

“He’s gone, Rosie. He’s passed away.”

What?

This time successful, I wrench myself free feeling a tightness in my chest. “What the hell do you mean, he’s passed away?” I yell. “Where is he?”

She clasps a trembling hand over her mouth. “They’ve taken him.”

They. The paramedics. The same ones who have already left the house.

I run as fast as my legs can take me, down the hall, down the drive, past the police and down my street. Five houses toward the end, I see the junction, the paramedics long gone and supposedly with my father in the back.

My world as I know it comes crashing down around me. It feels like something circling my throat and choking the life from me. I can’t breathe, and I panic, stumbling back looking for anything to hold. Tears blind me, and my heart shatters into a million fragmented pieces.

Hyperventilating in the middle of the street, I call for my father, but my cries going unheard.

A strange sensation washes over me as if gravity has been sucked clean from the atmosphere, and I’m suddenly falling, the painful thud on my temple knocking me out cold.

17

THEN

“Shh, don’t move,” Mom gently urges, dabbing a cool cloth all over my face.

“What happened?” I ask, groggy.

“You ran out into the street and fell. Banged your head pretty bad on the road.”

Ran into the street…

Dad!

Bolting upright, I throw the cloth away and search the room. “Where’s Dad?”

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