Crashed CHAPTER 1

Waking up in an ambulance is definitely preferred when the alternative is lying in a death bed.

But that doesn't mean I enjoy it.

Everything around me is blurring, and I have tunnel vision on the EMT in my face. "She's conscious," the blonde feline turns to the others in the vehicle.

I stare as they stick IVs in my arm and check my blood pressure. I feel something around my mouth—

"Don't touch that, it's helping you breathe." Blondie gently nudges my hand away, reminding me not to move too much.

This hard surface under me is hurting my head (along with everything else that hurts), and the straps are making me uncomfortable. The cat starts to question me:

"What's your name?"

"R-Rouge," I stutter. Talking was harder than I thought it was going to be.

"What year is it?"

"2016."

"Do you remember what happened?"

"I-I was driving and s-someone ran a red light and suddenly I wake up here. I d-don't remember anything else."

I hear the doors opening and suddenly I'm being wheeled into a hospital, the ceiling racing above me.

"Get her to Trauma. Hurry!"

So many voices, so many people rushing in behind me.

"We're gonna pick you up and move you to this table, okay?" A female black rabbit with excessively long hair nods at me and gestures to the bed next to me. I nod in response.

"One, two, three—" I'm lifted and moved.

They start cutting off my clothes, revealing all the fresh bruises and cuts. Definitely gonna need stitches.

They notice my eyes rolling back. "Stay with us Rouge!"

They're running their hands on me and putting pressure on my limbs, asking what hurts, and I just have to lay there and let them do it.

This is their job, I have to remind myself.

I'm being pushed around the hospital, taken to various machines and tested and scanned. Eventually I make it to the X-ray machine, and it is the hardest, coldest surface I've ever had to lay on.

Everything is going by in such a blur. There's so much machines, and an abundance of pain.

I finally have a little alone time in my hospital room.

There's so much white bathing this room, with an occasional splash of an ugly shade of green, it makes me uncomfortable. How old is this place?

I spent a while trying to recall the accident, but came no closer than I had been when I first arrived here. Where was I going? Was I with anyone?

What happened to the others in the accident?

Some cops show up in my room. One is a large and muscular mix (looks like a cat, but he has wings) with dragon tattoos snaking up his arm, while the other is much shorter, but still almost as muscular. He looks like an echidna.

"Miss Rouge, we'd like to speak to you for a moment about what happened, if that's alright." The muscular one says in a deep gravelly voice.

"Do I really have a choice?" I say. It hurts my neck to look at them.

The smaller one clears his throat. "Well, Rouge, we would like to let you know that this accident was not your fault, so you don't have to worry about that. Are you doing okay?"

"Well, I'm in a hospital sustaining multiple injuries after almost dying. Don't know if you consider that okay." I roll my eyes, hating the nice and polite façade they have to pull. "Just tell me what happened, I barely remember a thing."

"Miss Rouge,"

"Just call me Rouge, please."

"Alright, Rouge, to put it straight-forward, you were the only one to survive the crash—"

Alright, now I'm crying. I thought I'd be able to handle anything they threw at me, but I was not expecting that.

But why me? Why was I the only one given a second chance? Those people had futures. They had things to look forward to. Me? I lived with my best friend in a dingy apartment and I work as a waitress in a café. I have nothing amazing planned out, I'm not gonna change the world.

What if one of those people were to cure cancer? Do something important?

"Rouge, we had a witness tell us that someone ran a red light, T-boned the person next to you, and they slid into your car. The one that ran the red light was being operated by a drunk driver. You must be aware of how lucky you are Rouge." The bigger one looked me in the eyes, almost ignoring the tears streaming down my face.

"It's just… not fair. Anything else? I don't enjoy crying."

And after a while of talking, listening, nodding, and impatiently tapping the edge of the bed I was stuck in, they finally left.

And my roommate, Blaze, rushed in.

"Oh my god! Rouge! You're okay, thank fucking god. When you never came home I was so worried and—well, I'm here to bail you out. Can you walk? Do your legs work? Are you going to be a cripple from now on?" The purple cat sat on the side of my bed, surveying me.

I couldn't help but laugh. "Blaze, I'll be okay. The car before me took most of the damage…" I cringed. How could I have gotten away with just a few cracked ribs, when the others had to die?

It's not fair; it's not fair at all. I didn't want to know who it was that got killed. I didn't want to know what they looked like, or who would be missing them.

Even though the drunk guy made a huge mistake, he didn't deserve death. The person in the car behind me, who didn't do a single thing at all, didn't deserve that either.

I was trying to fight the tears making their way to the surface.

"Two others died, Blaze. I was the only one who survived the accident."

Blaze's mouth fell open; her pointed tooth gleamed in the light. To say she was big on dental hygiene was an understatement. "Rouge I'm… I'm sorry. But, hey, you're still here."

"Yeah but… Why? What did they do to deserve—"

"No, no, Rouge, no sobbing. Look, you're alive, whether you wanna be or not. Now I'm gonna take you home, and we're gonna watch your favorite movies and eat some ice-cream. I'll even get you the expensive brands instead of the store-brand ones." Blaze grabbed my hand. "You're my best friend, okay? I'm just so happy I didn't lose you."

"Thanks, Blaze."

…

Blaze was pretty disappointed when she was told I was gonna have to stay overnight, but she decided to stay with me, which kept me from dying of the boredom from all the TV re-runs. She was able to make me laugh in what was possibly the worst event of my life.

I apparently got a concussion, so I'm gonna have to go to some sort of clinic that they recommended for this kind of thing. That, I was not looking forward to.

The only thing I gained from this was a break from work, which Blaze told me I was returning from when I got into the accident.

They informed me that making sure I took plenty of deep breathes and laying on my injured side (which made no sense to me) would help my ribs heal, and that they would just have to heal at home.

Blaze listened all the nights after when I cried, feeling guilty for surviving, complaining about how badly my head would hurt, and while I was slowly starting to remember the details of the accident. Flashbacks haunt me, and probably will continue to bombard me for a long time.

Even though I constantly protest it, Blaze won't let me drive.

"You always tense up when we go through traffic lights. The last thing we need is you freezing up and not paying attention to what's around you." She had told me.

I always think back on it. On all the pain, on the lives lost, on their families. I had avoided watching all news stations for a week. I didn't want to ever find out who was involved. I couldn't take knowing that the face broadcasted on the screen would never see another day.

I spend every moment wishing I could take the place of the innocent individual who was killed. Maybe he was on his way home from work as well. Maybe he was going to visit family. A family who would now have to live blaming themselves for the simple act of inviting their family member over. A family that will never hear the person's voice again, will never see their face again, will never feel their embrace again.

I'm normally not someone to dwell on sad things, but this has been driving me crazy.

Will I ever get over this?