Chapter 5
The only other time we strayed from the Sunday calls was a Tuesday in February. I was on my lunch break at the daycare when I got a call from Charlie.
“Can you come get me?” He said before I could even say hello. “I know you’re at work and you probably can’t but-”
“What happened?” His voice was shaky, so I knew something was wrong.
“I- I can’t. Not right now. Can you just come get me? I’ll explain when you get here.” I sat there for a little bit, trying to figure out how I could get off work.
“I’ll tell them it’s a family emergency,” I decided; if Charlie was calling me when he knew I was at work, it had to be. “I’ll be there soon.”
“Thank you. And be careful. Please.” There was a deliberate pause before he said please, and it sent my mind running.
“Always am. Be there soon.” I hung up, told my manager who was more than happy to accommodate for my quick departure.
When I got to the store Charlie worked at, his manager took me to the break room, where he was sitting at a table, trying not to completely fall apart. I thanked the manager and sat down in the chair next to him. I put my hand on his back and looked at him.
“Hey,” I began. “What’s goin’ on?”
“They were supposed to be at work,” he said quietly.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, they were supposed to be at work, but they weren’t. They were driving, and they hit a patch of ice, and they-” I took a deep breath and pulled Charlie into a hug as he broke down into tears.
“Where are they?” was all I could manage before I had to choke back tears of my own.
“H-hospital.” He turned and started crying into my chest. I was trying to hold myself together and be the strong one, but I was crumbling; at this point, I had lost my parents and my aunt and uncle, and now I lost the two people who essentially became my second set of parents.
We sat in the break room until I was calm enough to drive and Charlie was calm enough to walk to my car. I drove us to the hospital, trying to get him to say something.
“I might call Clint tonight or tomorrow, if that’s okay.” I glanced over to Charlie, who stared out the window and shrugged. “You don’t have to join if you don’t want to. I just wanted to give you that option.”
“Go ahead.” I sighed; when my parents died, he was there for me just the way I needed him to be. But, I didn’t know how to be there for him the way he needed; I didn’t even know how he needed me to be there.
When we got to the hospital, I asked Charlie if he wanted me to come with him or wait in the car.
“I need you with me. I don’t need you to say anything, I just need you with me.” I looked at him and nodded. We walked in together, where we were immediately escorted into a private room with a social worker and a police officer. I think Charlie and I were both completely numb; I know I was, and he looked like he was. I don’t remember anything that was said in that room.
When we got back home, we stayed up most of the night on the phone with Clint. Charlie just sat and listened, and Clint and I talked about anything and everything, trying to get Charlie to either fall asleep or smile. Charlie finally fell asleep around 2:30 in the morning, leaving Clint and I alone on the phone. We stayed up for about an hour, talking about losses, before I finally decided to try and sleep.
A few weeks later, things started to go back to normal; Charlie and I returned to work, and we started to fall into a new routine. I would cook dinner for us on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and he would cook dinner on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. We would go out to eat for either lunch or dinner on Saturdays, and have leftovers for the other meal as well as all of our lunches. Sunday afternoons never stopped being free to call Clint. It was hard, but we tried to keep any shred of normalcy that we could.
Towards the end of May, we decided to take a few days off work to go camping. We just needed to get away for a few days. We made sure to let Clint know where we were going, in case we weren’t back in time for our weekly phone call.
“What do we need to do when we get there?” I asked. I glanced at the passenger seat, but I didn’t see Charlie. I looked for a little longer, and he was gone. “What the fuck?” I pulled off to the side of the road and shakily pulled out my phone. “Clint, please pick up,” I whispered as the line rang. There was a crunch of metal right as Clint picked up.
“Alex? What was that? ALEX?”