Sarah johnson's Arc

Chapter 5 of 7

The blue dot stopped blinking, but the lights two miles away kept flashing. Sarah couldn't stand in the kitchen another second. She grabbed the car keys off the hook. Jake's mother was already at the door, coat half on, her face white under the porch light. The dog, a long brown-and-white thing Jake called his couch potato, barked at their heels. "We're going," the mother said. "I don't care what they told us." They drove fast down the dark road. Neither spoke. The mother gripped the dash with both hands. Her knuckles stood out sharp. This was the same woman who had tested Sarah at her dinner table, who said she didn't tolerate people who ran. Now she stared ahead and whispered her son's name over and over. The lights grew. Police cars blocked the road. An ambulance sat with its back doors open. Sarah saw two men in handcuffs pressed against a squad car. Then she saw the stretcher. She was out of the car before it fully stopped. An officer stepped in front of her. "You can't be here." "That's his mother," Sarah said, pointing. "And I'm the one who called you. Where is he?" The officer looked back at the stretcher. Two medics were lifting it into the ambulance. Sarah saw black hair, pale skin, a face she knew. Jake's eyes were half open. His lips moved, but no sound came. "Jake!" Sarah pushed past the officer's arm. A medic held up a hand. "We're taking him now. Pulse is weak. Head injury." The mother reached the stretcher and grabbed her son's hand. Jake's fingers twitched. His green eyes found her, then found Sarah. The corner of his mouth lifted, just barely, the start of that pig-snort laugh he always gave. No sound came out. His eyes closed. "He knew us," Sarah said. "He saw us." The medic was already climbing in. "One of you can ride." The mother looked at Sarah. For a second she hesitated. Then she pulled Sarah by the wrist toward the open doors. "Both of us. He'd want her there." The medic frowned, then waved them up. Sarah climbed in. The doors slammed. She found Jake's other hand and held it tight. It was cold. The ambulance lurched forward, siren screaming. Sarah watched the medic work. Needles, tape, a bag squeezing air. Jake didn't open his eyes again. But the machine beeped steady. The line on its screen climbed and fell, climbed and fell. She had reached him. She knew now that he was alive tonight. But alive was not safe. The farmhouse, the Sunday dinners, the race he'd dared her to run again—all of it waited on the line that climbed and fell beside her. Sarah leaned close to his ear. "You don't get to quit on me," she said. "We have a rematch." The ambulance raced toward the hospital. She did not let go of his hand.