Hello, Goodbye

Chapter Thirty-Three

Emersyn couldn't remember ever being more scared in her life. Zeke was wheeled back before she arrived, so she was left alone with nothing but her fears to keep her company. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and searched her browser for anything that could cause randomly going unconscious for an extended period of time. The results were horrifying, ranging from anemia to aneurysm. Tears burned her eyes as she closed out of her browser and tried to call Kiel again. It went straight to voicemail. Not knowing who else to call or what else to do, she called Doris.

"Hello?" the old woman said, and her cheery voice just made Emersyn feel worse. "Emersyn, sweet pea, how lovely to hear from you."

"Doris," she said as she cut the old woman off mid-greeting. "I'm at the hospital. Zeke... he just collapsed. I don't... I don't know what's wrong. He's in the back, and he wouldn't wake up. And I'm totally freaking out right now. Kiel won't answer the phone. I think it's still on airplane mode. What do I do?"

She said all of this so fast that it was a wonder the old woman caught any of it at all. "Emersyn, honey," Doris said, her voice calm but concerned. "Take some deep breaths. In and out. Everything is going to be okay. Now, where is your uncle? You said his phone is on airplane mode?"

Emersyn nodded her head, even though the old woman couldn't see her. "Yes. He went to visit his parents in Spokane this morning. And I'm pretty sure he forgot to take his phone off airplane mode, because when I call him, it just goes straight to voicemail." She sucked in a quaking breath, watching the movement of everyone around her. Everything felt like it was moving in slow motion. People who walked by her looked blurry as they shuffled around. She felt like she wasn't even in her own body. A tear slid down her cheek, and she tried to do what Doris said. She tried to breathe in and out. But she felt like someone had ripped her lungs out of her body. And how do you breathe with no lungs?

"Okay, baby," Doris said, pulling Emersyn out of her head for a moment. "I'm going to call Gabe, and we're going to head down to the hospital to be with you. You call me if you hear anything else, okay? Or if you hear from Kiel." She nodded her head again, inhaling another breath. "Good job. Keep breathing. We'll be there as soon as we can."

She wiped a tear from her eye and opened her mouth to respond. But just as she did, she saw a woman with long dark hair rush into the hospital, her eyes searching around frantically. Emersyn felt her stomach drop as her mom locked eyes with her, and before she even had a chance to respond to Doris, she pressed the hangup button and jumped to her feet to greet her mom. She had no idea what Makayla was doing there. It wasn't like she had asked her to come to the hospital. But she couldn't deny that she was happy to see her. At least she had someone there with her. Someone to help calm her. To maybe take her mind off the worst possible outcome. Even if that someone was her mother.

"Emersyn," her mom called as she rushed over and placed her hands firmly on her daughter's shoulders. Emersyn stiffened at the touch, not expecting it. "What happened? What's going on?"

"I don't know," she replied, still shaking and feeling more tired than she'd ever felt in her life. "He looked kind of sick all day. Like when he came down for breakfast, I noticed he was really pale. And I don't think he ate anything. Something was just off about him all day, and then he just collapsed out of nowhere. And he wouldn't wake up." Retelling the story was like reliving it again, and she shuddered at the thought. It was like a scene out of one of her worst nightmares.

"I don't understand," her mom said, a confused expression on her face. "You guys had breakfast together?"

"That's what you got out of that?" Emersyn snapped, feeling mildly annoyed. Her mom fell silent, but the unasked question lingered in the air between them. "Oh my goodness. Okay, yes. Zeke and I are a thing. He stayed over last night because Kiel went out of town. Is that what you wanted to hear?"