"Okay, kiddo. Ready?" Aunt Sarah said, putting the car in park and facing me.
"No. I mean, yes. No. Yes. No, nope," I said.
Aunt Sarah laughed.
"We're not doing this again, are we?"
"No, but I am a little nervous about going back," I admitted.
Suddenly there was a knock on the window. I jumped and turned around, stunned. I was expecting it to be Brandi at first. She'd been the one to welcome me to Mulholland High on the first day of school. Obviously, it wasn't her.
"Ambrose! Carli!" I exclaimed, opening my door and giving them both hugs.
"Hey, Sam! Welcome back!" Carli said, hugging me back. "You ready?"
"I think so," I said, looking to the front doors of the school. And at the press across the parking lot.
"Big news, you coming back to school," Ambrose said, nodding his head in the direction of the press. I sighed.
"It's not that interesting," I fumed. "Bye, Aunt Sarah. See you later!"
"I'll be here for 2:30," she said through the window she'd opened when I got out to greet my friends.
"And I'll be here," I smiled at her. She laughed, shook her head, waved to my friends and drove away, closing the window.
I turned to my friends.
"It is so great to have you back," Carli said. "We've really missed you. Even though you can't play the rest of the season."
I shrugged. My coach had been by and said my coach in Ohio had called her and suggested keeping me on as an assistant coach. And she'd agreed. So I was still part of the team and my doctors had said I could practice with them as long as I was feeling okay, but they stressed I definitely could not play in an actual game until they gave me the go ahead. And that was probably a good month away. What sucked is I knew college scouts were coming to the games. Coach had told me she would be talking to them and there's plenty of footage of me playing. Plus my coach in Ohio said she'd sent some tapes to schools that had inquired.
But first, I had to make it through my second first day of school. The plan was I was going to try three days a week at school, with an online tutor on the other two days, and my teachers would send the lessons as they were able. I could talk to them about any issues on the days I was in school. But, I was also told I could come to school as often as I felt able. The online tutor made that easy because I would just log on and email her if I was home or going to school for the day. She'd come by the house to go over some things and meet me. We'd worked on some things I'd missed in the weeks before I was returning to school. I'd stayed home until the end of January before I got the okay to go back to school. I'd spent that month working on my stamina, being able to stay awake for a full day, and being able to manoeuvre myself around with and without my crutches. I could do alright without my crutches but I still got tired pretty easily, and walking around the house wasn't the same as walking through the school hallways. Part of my PT had been going on walks with Uncle B and/or Aunt Sarah and the dogs. At first, Uncle B had to piggyback me home because I could barely make it to the end of the street. Now, I could make it the whole walk but was exhausted, physically, by the time we got back to the house. I hated it. I wasn't used to not being able go and do for as long as I wanted.
I also spent a lot of time in the pool. It was relaxing as well as great for therapy. My joints loosened up while I floated around. Not that they were particularly stiff, but two months in bed hadn't done me any favours. I also had PT exercises to do in the pool, and Uncle B helped a lot. Sometimes Aunt Sarah, too. And Penny and Bogart were always at the side of the pool, ready with an encouraging bark.
"Excited to be back?" Ambrose asked me as we walked to my locker.
"I guess," I shrugged. "It's just..."
"Yeah," Carli said. "I know."
We passed Brandi's locker on the way to mine. It was decorated and there were flowers and teddy bears all around it. Lots of people had written all over the locker. Messages that Brandi would never see. I looked away.
We turned down the hallway where my locker was and I heard cheering. I looked up and the hallway was full. My team, my friends and even a couple of teachers were standing by my locker cheering and clapping. I teared up a little as shouts of 'welcome back!' rang through the hallway. Ambrose and Carli were smiling at me.
"We all kinda felt like you deserved a hero's welcome," Ambrose said.
"Why? I didn't do anything... heroic," I said, frowning.
"No, maybe not by the exact definition, but you survived a really bad crash. And you're back at school three and a half months later. And we missed you," he said. I smiled.
Dylan came over as I made my way to my locker through all the people who'd come just to welcome me back to school. People who had only known me for a couple of months, but made me feel like I'd been their classmate forever.
"Sam, I'm so glad to see you back at school," Dylan said, leaning on the locker beside mine.
My locker was also heavily decorated. There were all sorts of notes stuck to it. The ones on top, the newest looking ones all said different variations of 'Welcome Back'. The older ones, I peeked at them and saw they said varying versions of 'Get Well Soon'. There were some teddy bears stuck to my locker, too.
As soon as I opened it, however, I was bombarded by even more stuffed animals.
"Oh. Yeah. Uh, we broke into your locker and put those in there," Carli said.
"You two put all these in here?"' I asked.
"No. We, well, actually, we asked the office for your locker combination and when people would leave notes or stuffies for you, we'd put the stuffies in your locker, so they wouldn't get lost or kicked or thrown out by the stupid janitor," Dylan said. "He threw out a few of the ones around Brandi's locker and everyone got pissed. He apologized and people tried to get him fired but the principal put an end to that."
I frowned. Not because people had broken into my locker to put a ton of stuffed animals in it but that people my age would try to get someone fired for making a mistake while doing his job.
"He didn't know what had happened at first. He felt so bad about it that he actually went and bought replacements," Carli said. "Didn't make everyone happy, but you can't please everyone all the time,"
I shrugged.
"So, Sam," Dylan said. "Friday."
"What about it?" I asked, looking at Dylan as I pulled books out of my locker, once I'd found them behind the stuffed toys. I had to shove a bunch of them back into the locker to close it.
"Well, usually I'd have a party..."
"Oh. I don't think I'm ready for that," I said. "Sorry. I'd love to, but I'm really not ready. Not since..."
"Oh, yeah, no. I get that. I wasn't asking that," Dylan said. It was then I noticed Ambrose and Carli give each other a look, smile and look away.
"Oh," I said.
"I was wondering if you'd want to, I dunno, hang out? Watch a movie or something?"
"Oh," I said. "Um, maybe. I have to check with my aunt and uncle. They're maybe a little more protective than they were after the bonfire."
"I could come to your place, if that's okay. If you want. I mean, no pressure or anything. Just, I thought, well, it was just a thought."
I smiled. I liked Dylan. He was funny, and not too bad to look at. And he was smart, too.
"I'll talk to my aunt and uncle later. I'll text them. Can I let you know later? Like, at lunch?"
"Yeah," he said, brightening up. "Yeah. Okay. I'll talk to you at lunch."
I smiled. Dylan walked with me to our homeroom class.
"Welcome back, Samantha," the teacher smiled.
"Thank you," I smiled.
"Okay, everyone, take your seats! The bell is about to ring," the teacher said.
We took attendance and then were sent to our first class. I had English and headed there.
"Samantha Joseph," Mr. Clark said, smiling as I made my way into the classroom.
"Hi, Mr. Clark," I smiled. He smiled back.
"It's so good to see you back at school. I've been in touch with your guardians checking up on you while you were recovering. How are you?"
"I'm okay," I said. "I'm still working on a few things. Stamina mostly, but otherwise, yeah, I'm okay."
"Good to hear," he smiled and called the class to attention.
He did, however, spend the first five minutes of class letting everyone say 'welcome back' to me. It was getting a little embarrassing.
We started a new novel study and Mr. Clark outlined the expectations for the essay. I wrote them all down, and flipped through the novel. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Attwood. I'd read it last year. But that was okay. It was an amazing book and I could probably use some of what I'd done last year for this essay. Not the whole thing, obviously, but some of my theories might still stand up. I'd rewrite it to fit this assignment.
During the break between classes, I texted Aunt Sarah and Uncle Brendon.
'Hey. School's going fine, so far. I'll tell you about it at home but I have a question about Friday,' I sent.
'Absolutely not,' Uncle Brendon texted back immediately.
'Can I ask my question first? You don't even know what I'm going to ask!'
'If it's to go to a party then no. Absolutely not,' he replied.
'Okay, fine. But I wasn't going to ask about going to a party,' I countered.
'I'd really rather you not have a party here either,' he said.
'Brendon, do you think you could let Samantha ask her question before you completely kibosh any plans she wants to make?' Aunt Sarah texted. I smiled.
'Thanks, Aunt Sarah,' I said. 'Can I get together with Dylan to watch a movie and hang out? He could come to the house.'
The three dots indicating someone was typing were appearing and disappearing. Were they going to say no? I don't even have to go anywhere.
'Sure,' Aunt Sarah responded finally. 'He can come over. No going up to your room alone together, we will be nearby but we won't be on top of you.'
'I will be,' Uncle Brendon said. I rolled my eyes.
'Thank you!' I replied, smiling.
"What's got you so happy, Ms. Joseph?" My biology teacher asked as I sat in my seat, a grin on my face. "And welcome back."
"Thanks. And nothing. Just making plans for the weekend," I said.
"It's Monday," Mrs. Calhoun said, smiling. "And you're already making weekend plans?"
"No rest for the wicked," I smiled. She returned my smile.
Class was fine. We went over the term project and while the class was working on a part of the assignment, Mrs. Calhoun came by my table to go over some of the extra work that was being given to me to catch up with the other units I'd missed.
Dylan was waiting outside my biology class when we finished.
"Uh, hi," I said, as he fell into step with me.
"Hey. Thought, since my math class got out a bit early, I'd meet you here and walk to the cafeteria with you. Unless you want to go for burgers."
"Honestly, I'm already tired. I'll eat in the cafeteria I think."
"Good choice," he smiled. "I didn't drive today, so we'd have to bum a ride from someone."
"Like that would be difficult," I laughed, as we walked through the doors into the cafeteria.
"Sam!" A voice cried out and I was enveloped in a hug by someone much bigger than me. When he finally pulled away I saw who it was. Ashton Bennigton. "You look amazing!"
"You..." I said. "It was you!"
"What?" Ashton said. Everything came back in a huge tsunami. Brandi telling me Ashton had cheated on her in her own pool house. Brandi saying she'd only smoked a little of Dylan's weed. Brandi stumbling through the backyard and saying she wasn't drunk. Brandi screaming at Ashton on Dylan's front lawn. Screaming at me to get in the car and then tearing away so that I had trouble getting my seatbelt on. Brandi driving so fast and erratically that I called 911. The truck. The scream. The crash. The voice of the 911 operator from my phone.
It all came back.
And everything around me pulled away. Everything went black.