Pieces of You (13 page)

Chapter 16

It takes an hour for me to feel comfortable driving. The feeling is odd and I don't know if I will ever get past this. I will most likely move on, but just can't forget. I roll down the window and let the wind whip me in the face, dancing across my body to tease Riley's ponytail.

Dropping my hand from the wheel, I take her hand in mine and make long strokes with my thumb. Glancing over, I see the hint of a smile as she watches my thumb on her skin. Taking my hand from hers, I reach up and brush the stray tendril of hair from her cheek and she leans into my hand.

"You sure are beautiful, Ri." I express to her. Checking my mirrors, I pull off the interstate and onto the shoulder. I can't wait another minute. Turning off the car, I undo my seatbelt and lean over the console taking her mouth with mine. She gasps at the sudden attack but doesn't attempt to thwart it.

Unbuckling her seatbelt, she climbs up on her knees while her mouth never once leaves mine. Her hands take my face and her thumbs brush at my beard. It's arousing, and I know that neither one of us could wait another moment.

Sliding my seat back as far as it will go, she climbs over the console and straddles my lap. Her arms encircle my neck as my hands find her breasts. Together we rock, fully clothed in the front seat of the car on the side of the interstate. Nothing has ever compared to this moment. No sex. Just feeling, exploring, and showing affection for the other.

The kisses are delicate but needy. The rubbing is gentle but frantic. We barely take time to breath. Her body causes mine to awaken and my desire to ignite, but neither of us would do that on the side of the interstate, we can wait until tonight.

Caught up in our thoughts and our actions we are both startled when there's a knock on the driver's side window. Riley jumps back, and my head snaps in the direction of the glass to find a state trooper leaning over and looking in with a smirk on his face.

Riley quickly wipes her mouth and jumps back into her seat on the other side of the vehicle, while I roll down the window.

"Good afternoon, officer."

"Afternoon." He sucks his teeth and looks around the vehicle. "I'm glad to see you're fine and you will be moving along now?"

"Yessir." I agree as does Riley. We both reach for our seatbelts and cross our bodies with the straps before I start the engine.

"You've got yourself a good girl there, sir. She was willing to risk what people thought she was doing to give you mouth to mouth. You have a fantastic girl."

Puzzled I look at Riley, who shrugs her shoulders.

Turning back to the officer, I offer a small head shake. "Sir, I did not need…" I begin but he cuts me off and holds his open hand up.

"I saw a woman providing mouth to mouth for her choking partner? It's nice to see First Aid still being practiced." He lowers his aviator sunglasses. "Move along, sir."

The trooper smiles and tips his hat at Riley before stepping back and walking slowly back to his cruiser. We can't help it, the moment he gets in his car, we drive off laughing. No one would ever believe this to be true. No one.

Riley takes my hand and kisses my knuckles. We'll finish this at the motel later on." Her promise is felt all the way through my body. I might be falling for her.

The landscape whizzes past the window and the yellow line continues to be my guide on this journey. Fields of yellow and green pass us, blurring past our vision. But through it all, she has most of my attention. Her voice sings to me when she speaks. She fills me with joy and feelings I haven't felt in a really long time.

I turn down the radio slightly so I can concentrate on what I want to say, but no words come easily to me. I thought they would since I know what I want to say, I just can't find them.

"What's going on?"

I sigh and chew on the inside of my lip for a moment, pushing my bottom lip in with my thumb, while pulling my top lip out slightly. I blow out a sharp puff of air and shake my head. I can't go through with it. I don't want to say anything stupid. Anything I might regret. Anything I really don't mean.

"When did you move out of the S-L-C?" I ask and drag my right hand to the top of the steering wheel, placing my left elbow up on the door resting against the window. I glance to her direction and see her expression fall slightly.

Looking down at her lap, she folds her hands together and picks at her thumbnails. Taking a deep breath, she releases it nervously and forces a smile. "I moved when I was twenty-one. I just didn't want to be there anymore. I bought my first house and boom, here we are." She looks out the window. "I told you the story before haven't I?"

"You told me about buying your first house and how you started flipping, but I don't know anything about your parents or why you left."

Hanging her head, she sniffles and nods. "My upbringing was good. Salt Lake City was good for me for the time I lived there. I couldn't stay for much longer than I needed to. I outgrew it, I guess you could say." Riley shrugs and for some reason, I get the feeling that she's hiding something from me. I don't want to pry. I don't want her to think she needs to tell me so I move on.

"Well I can't wait to see the room you lived in when you were a teen." I wink at her and turn the curve in the road. We have passed only a few cars this past hour, not many cars have been on the road today and now that we are almost at our stop there's suddenly a line of cars ahead of us slowing us down.

"Where did they come from?" Riley asks as she looks ahead to the crowd of cars. We follow the vehicles until we reach our destination. Our motel is on the left. It's nothing special, just over halfway there and we need the break from the road. We break free of the line of traffic and pull over to the motel.

Riley runs in and checks us into our room, coming out she shakes the keys at me and points to where we're supposed to park walking to meet me there. I park in our stall as she climbs the stairs to unlock the door. I take our bags from the trunk and follow her into the room. The moment I step inside she closes the door behind me and meets my lips with hers.

"Where were we?" she asks against my lips and pushes me to the bed, straddling my body with her legs.

* * *

The morning comes too soon after a night of making love. We OD'd on each other, seeking, yearning and pleasing each other. Taking our time, we explored each other's desires finally collapsing in each other's arms. We drag ourselves from the bed and take our sweet time together in the shower. Picking up where we left off. The motel has a small truck stop diner attached to it, and we run in for breakfast before we completely check out.

The coffee is stale. The toast is soggy with butter and the scrambled eggs have shells, but it's filling and clean. After we finish our meals, we leave the money on the table before heading back out to our car to hit the road. Riley is glowing as she jumps into the driver's seat, and I walk around to the passenger's seat. Smiling to myself, thankful for the contagious afterglow.

Looking in all directions she winks at me and steers us onto the interstate for the final stretch to Salt Lake City. Like yesterday there's not much in the way of traffic, but it will still take us time to get there as long as we stick to the speed limit and the road we're taking.

I turn up the radio when I hear one of my favorite songs.
Sweet Home Alabama
has always been one of my favorite driving songs and this is no exception. Riley's eyes light up as much as mine do and the two of us start singing. She leans to the center of the car, and I do the same leaning into her the two of us sing together off key to the chorus.

We both are so caught up in the song, singing the notes at the top of our lungs, that neither of us hear horns honking. Then time to stands still, and I hear the sounds of the crash. I grab for Riley, but she's suddenly so far from me. We spin and spin and flip five more times and the sound is deafening, until I can hear it no more.

She's held into her seat with her seatbelt, the car crushed all around her. Tiny shards of broken glass surrounds her body and dust her skin, so she shimmers. The horn is sounding continuously and the radio is crackling in the background. And I realize we're on the roof of the car.

My arms hang in an awkward position above my head and then the only thing I can hear is her voice, getting farther and farther away from me. It's happened again, and there's not a thing I can do.

"I love you, Riley. Please come back."

Chapter 17

Riley

No. No. NO!

Please God no!

The car flips and flips, over and over again and again and there's not a thing I can do to stop us from this marathon of somersaults. My head hits the glass in the window and the edges of my vision blurs.

I barely hear him calling out to me. Ty! I can't hear you! I yell out, but I don’t think the words actually make a sound, instead they echo in my head as I painstakingly attempt to find him and make sense of our situation.

I reach and reach for him but with all the banging around I can't grab onto anything. My fingers won't hold and everything keeps getting jerked out of my reach.

The crashing sound stops suddenly but the engine continues to run and the smell of dust and blood rests in my nostrils. I scrape frantically at my seatbelt, scratching and reaching trying to get free. I'm hanging upside down, locked in at my hips. I can barely move.

Turning my head, I see Ty. Hanging there. Lifeless.

"TY!" I start screaming. "TY. MY GOD. TY!"

I try harder to reach him, but we're so messed up in this heap. I couldn't reach him if I tried. I scream and weep, but no one can hear me. The only noise that can be heard is the sound of the horn and the radio crackling. I close my eyes so tightly and ball my hands into tight fists and continue to scream his name until my voice goes hoarse.

Feet shuffle the gravel outside my window in quick succession. The sound of glass and rocks popping between feet and asphalt stops when the man drops to his knees just outside my mangled door with shattered glass. He has to bend at an awkward angle just to get a look inside the vehicle, and he barely gets low enough for me to see him.

"I'm going to get you out of here," he confirms. "I promise." His panicked voice tries to comfort me, but it doesn't stop my body from shivering and my lungs from tightening. "Are you bleeding or is anything broken?"

Sobbing uncontrollably, I can barely voice an answer. Instead I offer a panicked head shake. I have pain but I don't know where my pain is coming from.

He reaches in and touches my shoulder with his fingertips. "Help's coming. I'm going to go check on your friend. Are you okay for me to leave you?" I can't see him. My vision is blurry from tears. My ears are ringing, and I'm shaking violently as shock sets in. I nod hoping my body is doing what I want it to do. I try to look around and follow his feet as he rounds the vehicle, but I lose them when he reaches the front of the car. Panicking I turn my head back and forth quickly trying to find him.

I can't breathe. Air is escaping my tightened chest before it can completely fill my lungs. Whimpering joins the forced breaths, and my face tingles from the lack of oxygen.

"It's okay, lady. I'm right here. I'm just going to check on your friend." His voice is calm but determined. He makes various noises as he attempts to reach Ty.

"How is he? I can't see him. He's not answering me." I keep calling out to him. "Sir. How is he?" I ask again between sobs. The pain is starting to fill my body. My chest hurts where the seatbelt has held me back, and my head throbs where it hit the window. I don't know how long I can stay like this. My head is starting to get dizzy.

"Sir! SIR." He stops momentarily but continues with a couple of light face slaps. I hear him mutter under his breath, but the words don't make sense to me. It's undecipherable and all too quiet.

Sirens are in the distance. All the chaos and panic and sounds are voiding each other out, and I feel as though I am going deaf. The hiss of the radiator, the whirr of the motor. The pounding of my head and the whooshing of blood in my ears.

"HOW IS HE?" I try calling again and no one answers. "ANSWER ME DAMMIT!"

My door is finally pulled open by men in black boots, and they place a brace around my neck. There's not much room between my head and the crushed roof of the car, and I have no clue how they are going to get me out of here. All I can think of is flipping the car back the way it's supposed to be. Sparkles. I see sparkles everywhere. On their boots. On the pavement outside. On my hands. Shimmering in the sun, in the light from their flashlights as they look into the car.

"Help him please. Help him." I beg the people trying to help me. Talking amongst themselves, they ignore my pleas and cut me free of my seatbelt, cradling my body, they gently but forcefully remove me from my prison and quickly strap me to a board.

Lights shine into my eyes, a million questions get thrown at me, and I can’t concentrate. Where's Ty? I want Ty. "Is he okay? Please help him," I continue to beg.

"Ma'am, we're getting the two of you to a hospital. There's another team with your friend right now. Where do you hurt?"

"Where am I hurt? I want my boyfriend. I want my Ty." I can't even attempt to turn around to see what's happening. I hear the sound of saws and more sirens near. So many voices.

"Ma'am, what's your name?" A female attendant asks as I am pushed into an ambulance.

I'm shivering, and I can't concentrate enough to speak. A large silver sheet is pulled out and placed over my body.

"Ri-Ri- Ril- ey. M m m my name isss Ri-ley," I say through my shivers.

"Hi, Riley. My name is Ann. We're taking you to the hospital and getting you some care. Right now, I am going to look over your body and make sure you are okay. Please don't be scared, we're here to help."

Her voice is kind and her hands start working over my body, cutting my clothes away. She starts using medical words that I don't understand. Contusion. Hemorrhage. Fibula. C-spine. It's confusing and scary. Tubes are placed around my ears and into my nose while a cuff is wrapped around my arm. I continue to shiver even under this blanket.

The doors slam shut, and we start driving away. We're moving further and further away from Ty, and my tears begin again. "Where's Ty?" I ask the attendant who told me her name is Ann. "Where's my Ty?"

"Shh. He'll go in another ambulance. They will update you at the hospital. I'm sorry I can't help you. I don't know anything. But you will find out once they check you out."

The tears roll down my temples and come to rest in my hairline. Being strapped down I can't brush the tears away, or even wipe my nose. I see the cold steel interior of the ambulance and pray so hard for Ty.

In an attempt to tune everything out, and I just think about last night, and the things we did together. The way we touched each other. The quiet whispered exchanges. It's my fault. Whatever happened it's my fault. Oh God. I wrecked the car and my parents don't know yet, and they are expecting us in a few hours. I have something new to panic about, and it's doing me no good. My chest feels like an elephant is sitting on it, and the beeping of the machines is going faster.

"You need to calm down, Riley. Breathe slowly," Ann instructs me and touches my arm. "We're almost there."

The driver calls out a whole bunch of numbers and letters that make absolutely no sense to me.

Pulling into the ambulance bay, the chaos continues as more bodies from inside the hospital rush to the sides of my gurney, and they roll me in while Ann rattles off all of those numbers and medical terms that I don't understand to them. The doors open automatically and all I can see is tiled ceiling panels and nurses faces as they quickly rush me into a room for an examination.

"I remember that day like it was yesterday. Ty and I wish it never happened." The tears roll down my nose and drip onto the sleeve of my jacket. I can't even wipe them away. Licking my lips, I can still taste the metallic taste of blood. I can still smell the blood in the car, the sterilized hospital room.

I raise my head up as far as I can and look at the sky allowing the warm sun to heat my cold skin. I know I'm alive. I know I'm alone. My legs are going numb from the angle I'm sitting on them. They're bent below me on the grass. I'd probably be better off if I moved to the bench three feet from me, but I need to be close to him.

I need to feel him near me. Hear him whisper my name. Feel him stroking my hair.

But instead, when I turn my head back and open my eyes I don't see his face. His handsome face. I don't see the beard I can run my fingers through. No. Instead I see a cold granite marker with his name and date of death.

My shaky fingers come up and trace the letters of his name T-Y-S-O-N. Tyson. T-Y.

Ty.

My Ty.

Gone and all that's left for me is this goddamn headstone.

Rage fills me, and I punch at the sod with my right fist. The left is cradled against my chest in a sling and a cast. The collar around my neck limits my movement, and both the stitches and bruises remain on my head and my face. Every time I look in the mirror, every time I push my hair from my face, I have the reminder.

"Where did you go, Ty?" I whisper to the earth and lay on the mound. "Where did you go?" I lay here for what feels like forever. Feeling the gravitational pull as the earth spins on its axis. Fingering the grass with my fingertips, remembering how it felt when I did the same thing to his hair, his short beard.

"It should have been me," I whisper and give in to my sorrow. Convulsing in sobs I lay here alone on his plot a week after his funeral. A week after everyone stared at me with venom in their eyes.

A week after I said goodbye.

A month since I realized I have to learn to live again.

Without Ty.

Laying in my bed, I stare at the ceiling through fuzzy painkiller fueled eyes. The physical pain is masked by morphine but the mental anguish I suffer while waiting for news on Ty is more than anyone can handle.

I hear nurses talking outside the room as they walk past. I see the looks as they come in to check on me or change my IV bag. Not one of them will tell me anything and I hate them for it. I hate them with my whole heart. Can't they see that I need to know? Instead of asking again, I just push the button on my morphine drip and conceal the agony and ache of my heart breaking over and over again.

I'm remembering the shimmer, the crunch of the glass under foot of anyone who walked by the wreck, and the crunch sound that the car made every time we flipped until we finally came to rest. That sickening sound of steel and fiberglass will haunt me every day of my life.

My thoughts are interrupted by a light knock on the door. My head lolls to the side, and I glare drunkenly at the intruder as the door is opened slowly.

"Miss Jensen?" A soft male voice calls out. His attempt in being considerate is ridiculous.

“What do you waaaaaaaaant?” I whine and purse my lips as the door opens further exposing a state trooper. My heart slams in my chest and I know, I know right now that he doesn't have good news for me. His face is crestfallen as he enters the room. Two nurses follow him in and approach my bed.

"No. Don't you dare tell me." My chin begins to quiver and fresh tears form in my eyes.

"Miss Jensen. I'm Officer Carter. I was one of the officers at the scene of your accident."

He stands at the foot of my bed with his hands clasped in front of his body. His somber expression confirms my fears before his words do.

"I am sorry to have to be the one to inform you, but the man you were traveling with did not survive the crash. He sustained serious injuries that he ultimately succumbed to. He died on scene." His eyes travel to the floor, unable to or not wanting to make eye contact with the sobbing woman on the bed being consoled by her nurses while she waits for her family to arrive.

"I'm sorry for your loss," he whispers and leaves the room. I'm left in a bundle of sorrow with two strangers to console me in the confines of this darkened hospital room.

“We thought you might be here.”

I open my eyes to see Ty's parents standing over me. The look on their face reminds me that I am not alone.

"I had to come see him," I whisper and struggle to sit. Mr. Lorey reaches down and helps me reposition myself. "Thank you. I don't know what I was thinking laying down." I'm embarrassed by my struggle.

"How are you doing, Riley?" Mrs. Lorey asks, with concern etched all over her face. She removes a tissue from her purse and offers it to me.

Blinking away tears, I nervously laugh and roll my lips between my teeth. "I don't know." Taking the tissue, I wipe my nose. Laughing again my saliva is sticky and sticks between my lips. "I don't know what I'm doing. Why am I here?" My hand drops in surrender and I choke out some more sorrow. Mr. and Mrs. Lorey sit on either side of me, allowing me to wallow in my misery. Their arms wrap around me like a warm blanket, comforting me without demanding my apology. The three of us sit on this bench and quietly watch the flowers on his headstone sway in the breeze.

"You're here because you want to do what Ty couldn't with Mel. You're getting closure, dear," Mrs. Lorey whispers. "Soon you will realize you don't need to be here every day, and it won't hurt as much." Her chin quivers slightly and she licks her lip.

Mr. Lorey clears his throat and stands. I watch him as he approaches his son's marker and runs his hands over it. I watch the pain etched in his face as he stares at the name etched in the face of the granite before he walks away, leaving his wife and myself here on the bench. Mrs. Lorey lets go of my hand and walks toward her son's marker. My heart shatters a little more when I watch her lean down and whisper before kissing the stone. She turns to face me.