His Best Friend

Chapter 31- Canceling the Tour

I stood there and stared at the officer until he began,
"Mrs. Hayes?"

"Yes, I'm Ryleigh Hayes. What can I do for you?"
"Well, I believe this is your husband," He handed me a photo. I took it and choked out,
"Hunter?! Yes, he is, what happened?"

"There's been a car accident. He's at the hospital now. I don't know exactly what happened but I was sent to bring you and the rest of his family to the hospital."

I stood in shock until finally my father-in-law nudged me, saying,
"Ryleigh? Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I just... I can't believe it, Emmy was right. Something was wrong. That has to be why he didn't answer when she and I called."

The officer waited while I gathered up my daughter and a few things to keep her entertained and then he escorted us and Hunter's parents in the Land Rover to the hospital.

I thanked him as we headed inside. Once we were at the nurses' station, I saw Sarah who was my nurse when I was here.
"Sarah, what happened?"
"What I know for now, is that he was on his way back here to Lafayette, when he was hit the driver's side of his car."

"Oh, my, is he all right? Still alive? Awake?"
"He's alive, yes, but still unconscious right now. Right now we're trying to reduce some swelling on his brain. Aside from that, he's got a broken leg."

"Can I see him?"
"Absolutely. I can't guarantee he'll know you're there. He may or may not be able to hear you." As soon as we walked into the emergency room suite, Emmy ran right over to his bed. She reached to slide her small hand into his, while her head turned to look at me and said,
"Is Daddy going to be ok, Momma?"

"I hope so, sweetie, I really hope so." I stepped behind her to hold her against me, so she couldn't see the tears forming in my eyes. Lynette must have seen them though, cause she said,
"Emmy? Why don't you come with your Grampa and I down to the cafeteria. We'll get something to eat. Maybe even some dessert?"

She ran to her Grammy as I looked at her and mouthed, "Thank you." As the three of them walked out of the room, I pulled a chair over to Hunter's bedside. I sat for a while just holding his hand until tears starting running down my cheeks. Finally, I couldn't keep anything in anymore.

"I don't even know if you can hear me or not. I can't lose you, Hunter, I just can't. I don't know what Emmy or I would do without you. You've been my best friend for as long as I can remember." I could barely talk now. I was crying too hard. I wiped the tears out of my eyes and took a few deep breaths to calm down. As soon as I had calmed down, Lynette walked back into the room saying,
"Are you doing ok?"

"As well as can be expected, but yeah. I'm fine."
"Oh, wait, wasn't Hunter supposed to have a show in 3 days in Lafayette?"
"Ooh, you're right, it was at the Cajundome again. I wonder if the label has any idea what happened." I pulled out my phone to call his manager. I talked to her for about 20 minutes before we finally hung up.
"What did she say, Ryleigh?"

"She said she would contact this venue and any others that we need her to, to let them know that he wouldn't be able to do the show. I told her that we should cancel all upcoming shows for the foreseeable future, since we don't know when he'll be recovered. But that I should be the one to let the fans know what happened. So, yeah, I'm going to make a video to post online."

I pulled out my phone, got it ready to video myself and tried to decide how to start telling the fans that the current tour was on hold.

'Hello, everyone! You're probably wondering why I'm making this video and not Hunter, and why it looks like I'm in a hospital. Well, that's because Hunter was in a car accident on his way back home to Louisiana. He is currently stable and resting here in the hospital.'

Right here I turned the phone to show him resting in the hospital bed before continuing,

'Unfortunately for all of you, we are going to have to cancel all upcoming concerts that are planned now and there won't be any plans for new shows anytime soon. If you have already bought tickets, you will be able to get a refund. Just give us about a week to get in touch with all the venues and then get in touch with your local venue and they will be able to get you a full refund. If you purchased a meet and greet 'Coffeehouse' package, please keep any merchandise that has already been sent to you as our gift to you from the whole Hunter Hayes team. If you haven't received your merch yet, please let us know by sending a private message to either the official Facebook or Twitter pages and I will personally make sure you receive a personalized gift. Thank you for all of your continued support for Hunter. We hope to see you on stage again soon.'

A/N: A car accident? Will he wake up? When? What will happen next?