Stories from the Back of His Motorcycle

“There’s been an incident,” Mr Hart spoke suddenly, stealing back the breath I had just managed to tame.

I blinked at the man who had seemed so strong and collected, who had only a week ago clasped his wife into his side and grinned at me as Vaughn’s hand inched into my own. His whole body sunk into my kitchen chair, the world no longer at his feet but so far above his head. I was caught feverishly in the need to go back to that night. I would tell him that everything was going to be okay, and I would hold Vaughn close to me just in case he decided to let go. It was written all over Mr Hart’s face that I shouldn’t have ever let him leave.

The old movie star charm in his smile was washed away so it looked like the defeated man would never smile again. His grey eyes were sad as they fell back to the ground, heavy with weariness. Those laughter lines I had thought told a long story of lifetime happiness were mocking now, everything that had been stolen from him. My hand crept up my wet cheek to feel the smooth skin there. And know I may never have what he did.

Time didn’t stand still, nor did it speed up. I wasn’t allowed a single extra second to understand that our lives were about to be turned upside down. I wasn’t allowed the reprieve of rushing over the terrible mind numbing pain. I stared at Vaughn’s father with all the terror I had anticipated would crush me at this moment. This moment. No amount of planning or knowing had helped.

“I came here as soon as I heard; I know Vaughn would like you to be with him. There was... Vaughn seems to have been in an altercation with another boy and some serious injuries have been sustained. He’s in the hospital with his mother at the moment...”

I closed my eyes, just for a second, and heard the blood pumping around my body so loudly in my ears. It drowned his words out even as I strained to hear more. A roll of breath escaped my lips, something akin to a sigh, as the thunder from outside let me know it would always be there. It had lost the usual comfort though; I was stilled with too much shock.

“Alice!”

I wrenched my eyes open and peered up at my brother rushing across the kitchen. He was all action then. He was all four of my brothers and their concern and their need to protect me. He was the only stable thing I could focus on.

When he knelt down in front of me to clasp my shoulders, I realised I was sat on the kitchen floor, legs sprawled out around me, telling me that they had just forgotten how to hold me up. I was shaken by my brother softly and then brought right into his arms. It smelt of warmth and guitar picks there on his shoulder and I had to close my eyes again, not quite able to block out what had just been spoken out loud but trying anyway.

“I came to take you to the hospital with me, Alice. I don’t want to rush you, I know that what I’ve just said is a shock, but we need to leave. Vaughn’s surgery will be happening soon, much too soon, and I want to see him before that. I guess you do too since...”

I felt Nick move and assumed he’d shot Mr Hart some look. Either pleading with him to stop or daring him to finish. I clung to him tighter, so out of my league that I had lost where exactly I was.

Since he might not survive. That was what he was going to say. I felt everything dissolve around me at just thinking those horrible words. He couldn’t leave me now. I wasn’t ready. We hadn’t had enough time to do all of the things a young couple should do, I’d only just told him I loved him, we were moving fast but not fast enough.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” Nick said softly into my hair.

It was so strange for him to be this, the supportive and caring one after a lifetime of standing aloof and playing his guitar loudly enough to drown out everyone else’s problems. Any other time I would have wondered who he was supposed to be. My father? Ross? But it was Nick knowing we were all each other had.

“Just...” I struggled to find the right words, struggled to find any words at all. “Just help me up and give me a second.” My head snapped to face Mr Hart over Nick’s shoulder “I’ll meet you out in your car.”

I couldn’t have an audience, not right now, I had never experienced such an intimate moment with anyone other than Vaughn. And he wasn’t here with me. He was the whole reason the world had fallen out of its perfect orbit, or maybe it was just my world. I needed to regain my head if only to remember how to stand up.

The two men took my directions in silence, scattering and cautiously helping me up, wearing faces of pity and worry and sadness. I steadied myself to find my legs as hard as stone, their momentary weakness forgotten. Nick was still there though, just waiting for me to fall again.

“I swear if that boy wasn’t already hurt I’d kill him for getting himself into such a situation – fighting of all things – and putting you through this. I’m sure he’ll be fine Alice. And I’m sure the other guy looks a hell of a lot worse,” he murmured softly, hovering behind as I walked determinedly towards the door.

“I wouldn’t be that sure,” I whispered.

I hadn’t told Nick about Vaughn’s illness. It must have looked like one big over-exaggeration to him, finding his sister’s boyfriend’s Dad in his kitchen looking like death, saying that his son was about to go into surgery because of some stupid fight. It was so much more than a fight though, it was the thousands of possibilities which could have happened while those fists were flying. It was his heart beating irregularly in his chest, surrounded by such fragile ribs. One could have been pushed just a little too far; his breath could have run just a little short.

My stomach twisted at these thoughts. I wasn’t supposed to be running over these worst case scenarios; I was supposed to be clearing my head. This was the calm before the storm, ironic really as a real life storm raged just outside my front door.

I opened it to feel the typhoon’s force hit me, lashing my body once again with warm rain. Squeezing my eyes into slits, I turned to give Nick a quick, bone-crushing hug before I detached myself completely into the unknown. I wanted to feel safe for a second. I wanted to remember that no matter what I still had him, waiting for me in this house, making up a broken-but-still-intact family.

Slipping into Mr Hart’s large car, I didn’t even have the energy to feel bad about dripping all over his plush leather seats. I sat rigid and waiting as we all but skidded off to the main road. My hands gripped the seatbelt so hard my knuckles began to ache. And Mr Hart’s eyes were zoned to the road ahead as if scared to acknowledge anything else for the time being. I understood how he felt. I wished I was behind the wheel if just to have something to do with my stiffening hands.

The windscreen wipers thrashed around violently as the thunder broke over our heads. I hadn’t seen the lightning this time but that was okay. I would look for it next time just to count down the elapse between the two, just to try to do something other than sit and think about Vaughn’s funeral. I was tearing myself apart from the inside. I was holding it together by a thin thread.

The drive to the hospital wasn’t long, eighteen minutes at most, but the weather was slowing us down. Vaughn’s father raced every yellow light before it could turn red, he accelerated at times when he probably shouldn’t, but the rain was too thick. He had to slow just as he had to take corners carefully. He knew having his son in hospital was bad enough without adding more incidents on top of that.

The roads around us were clear, a feat unheard of in our large town’s history. Warnings about the storm had been circulating everywhere for hours and just looking up at the sky was enough to have most sane people curling up under thick bed covers. Here we were though, speeding along a highway almost alone, watching for the signs to the hospital as if we hadn’t known where it was our whole lives.

I half shouted when I spotted one through the sheets of rain and Mr Hart swerved in a highly illegal move closer to it, taking the next exit. We were running on adrenaline, pure terrifying adrenaline. His hands were shaking on the wheel now and my breathing was spiking. I was jittery just waiting until I could storm into that hospital and pull doors off hinges to get to Vaughn.

He had gotten into a fight, that idiot had put himself in even more danger. Not only was he out in this weather but he had fallen into something which was only ever going to end up hurting him. Somewhere inside I was furious with Vaughn for being so foolish, for letting his pride and head get clouded enough to end up in a fight. I could remember the bruising along his face, the dried blood under his nails, the moment I had realised this was a side of him I would never change.

The phone call. Vaughn had phoned while I was outside maybe an hour ago. Good news, Nick had said, he sounded excited. All of that felt frivolous now as they were nothing but more memories. What if I had heard the phone ringing? What if I had talked him out of coming over? What if I had let him know that if he ever got into a fight again I would never forgive him?

Maybe the news had been about a donation, maybe not. Maybe speaking to him would have made a difference, maybe not. I was torturing myself thinking these things through. I was sitting in his father’s car, worrying myself to death.

We finally pulled up in the hospital parking lot. Mr Hart had barely stopped the car before I was out of the door, and the man wasn’t too far behind. I followed him when we got to the maze of white walls and stricken-looking people. He seemed to know where we needed to be, his stride ploughing right through everyone else, families and patients and staff alike. Even defeated he was still somehow in charge. In control. A parent on a mission.

He stopped walking suddenly; taking me so much by surprise that I let out a small yelp. He turned to me as if only just remembering my presence before his eyes flickered to the door he had stopped in front of. I read it all in that gesture. Vaughn was right there, in that room, and he didn’t know whether he was strong enough to go in.

“You go, I’ll wait here for you to come out,” I found myself saying in a trembling voice.

“I...” he ran a hand through his hair “I think I’ll go get some coffee for all of us. You go in; I’m not ready for that just yet.”

I grimaced, confused as to whether I should be grateful or alarmed. It fell onto my shoulders to go first, a responsibility I hadn’t known would be so heavy, or be a problem at all. But I steeled myself anyway because that was all I could do. Mr Hart gave my shoulder a comforting squeeze before he carried on his striding in a different direction. I watched him for a minute. The man had a whole world as a chip on his shoulder and, if I wasn’t so distraught about where I was and what had happened, I would have felt for him.

Turning to the door which suddenly seemed larger than life, I placed my trembling hand on its handle.

I never thought a smell could be so horrible. That’s what hit me first. The smell. Before I saw him and before the notion of what was happening completely caught up to me, that’s all there was.

My nose crinkled up, rejecting it, but it still managed to seep in through my pores. I didn’t know what death smelt like, but if I had to guess I would have said it was that – in the hospital just before I entered Vaughn’s room.

It was hard to keep my feet in line. They wanted to turn around, run for the exit, and then keep running until things started to make sense again, or at least until that smell disappeared. Nothing compared to the feeling of being torn in two by my insides. One part was begging to leave while the other part knew that if I left now I would never be able to return. Never be able to be with Vaughn again.

But really, there was never any doubt in my mind about what I was going to do. Of course I pushed open the door and stepped inside as if it were the easiest thing, like I was only breathing. I pretended the smell meant nothing and the white white walls meant nothing. Because they weren’t important – not compared to the sight of him lying there.

That was all it took, just seeing him tucked up so neatly under crisp white sheets, folded so tightly it looked impossible to move. I choked up. His eyes were closed almost serenely, surrounded by pale skin that looked ghostly under the powerful hospital lights. I couldn’t even tell if he was breathing. I couldn’t see much after the onslaught of tears started.

My whole body slumped forward as if the world had suddenly fallen onto my shoulders. My mouth twisted like a newborn baby’s, my arms wound around me to try to keep every limb from falling apart. The tearing didn’t even hurt – I was already broken – but I’d promised Vaughn that I’d keep it together. I’d hold it together.

Yet the horrible mewling escaped my mouth, the disgusting jagged breaths that just wouldn’t die. I took a heavy step towards him and found that I was terrified to get closer in case just one whisper of air hurt him. I couldn’t be the reason he was in pain. I couldn’t do anything for him but I was determined not to hurt him anymore.

“Oh Vaughn,” I whispered “God, Vaughn.”

Nothing prepares you for seeing a loved one like that. Vaughn was always so strong and tall and powerful, he was always moving and smiling and annoying me. In motion. Even when it hurt he pushed through and came out on the other side. But he was just laying there. He was just dying. And I stood beside him and watched.

I would have traded anything to have taken his place. I would have changed everything just so he could be the one standing. He didn’t deserve what was happening to him, nobody did, but especially not Vaughn.

My body hovered right beside the bed, still unsure about whether I was too close. The tears clouded my eyes but I could see him clearly, the image of him burnt so deeply into my eyelids. The very depths of my insides were in turmoil, the whole world was burning and I wanted him to just open his eyes and see me. See that I was there for him. See that I wasn’t running from it any longer.

“It’s okay to touch him,” a woman’s voice drifted across the room “he’s just sleeping for now.”

I didn’t look up at his mother, too ashamed and too consumed by myself, but I reached for his hand. It lay limply on the sheets and was cold when I placed mine over the top yet it eased the gnawing dread slightly. It reminded me Vaughn was still with me, no matter how much it looked like he wasn’t.

I bent down, resting my head on the mattress by his head and closed my eyes for a moment. Tears collected and fell, sticking to my skin and then running down my cheeks. I was terrified and confused and so young right there, I was nothing but a child who had no idea what to expect anymore, grasping someone else’s hand as if they had all of the answers.

But I was ripped away when the steady heartbeat monitor jumped to life, spiking and falling like the beginning of some song. I was pushed and pulled away from Vaughn as doctors piled into the room, cramping a suddenly tiny space. More hands guided me out of sight of these strangers savagely tearing the sheets from his chest. I didn’t turn away once, though, not even when the alarmed shouts and blurs of cold coats were shut out behind too many closed doors.