"Terri! Quit it!" My twin brother, Alex knocked the soccer ball out of my hands for the 3rd time that afternoon.
"You quit it! I'm trying to learn how to balance it on one finger!" I spat at him. Alex huffed. "Well you suck. It keeps hitting my arm!" In his defence, we were stuck in the back seat of our Uncle Jim's car. Even as 2 slim 9 year olds, there wan't much room for the ball to go but fall onto Alex.
"Would you two brats shut up for once!" Uncle Jim growled back at us, his eyes little beads of hatred. I sunk back in my seat and Alex followed suit. Uncle Jim never picked us up from soccer practice. We only ever saw him once a year on Christmas, and that was only because our dad forced him to. Alex piped up. "Why haven't you told us where our parents are?"
I perked up at the question. Uncle Jim had barely said a word to us when he pulled up to the park instead of our parents, 2 hours late. I was especially upset, seeming how they were supposed to take me, Alex and our little brother Kyle to Chuckie Cheese that night. But instead we got our grouchy uncle who only pursed his dry, cracked lips in response to us asking about the 3 missing Coleson's.
Uncle Jim cleared his throat. "I'll tell you when we get to where we're going, boy." I rolled my eyes. Stupid, old man. "Whatever", I mumbled under my breath. He whipped his head around to glare at me. "You better watch your tone with me! I don't have the patience for you two right now!" His breath reeked something sour and old. He swung his head back to the road and let out a curse. Alex glanced at me with wide eyes. I shrugged my shoulders and started playing with my soccer ball again.
Not 20 minutes later we finally arrived at our destination. Alex was the first to say something. "Uncle Jim... why are we at the hospital? I thought we were going home?"
Uncle Jim didn't say anything, just kept tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. "Where are our parents? Where's Kyle?" I asked, a little louder than Alex had. A little more demanding.
Uncle Jim scoffed. "Why the hell do you think we're here?" He turned around again to look at me. "There's only one reason people go to the hospital, genius. When people get hurt. So you tell me, Terri. Why the hell are we here?" His voice was cold and full of anger.
My head started to spin. What did he mean? Was he saying our family was in there? Why was he being so cruel? "Uncle Jim, please! What's going on?!" Alex could tell something was very wrong. Uncle Jim scoffed again. He got out of the car and started walking towards the entrance. Alex and I scrambled out of the car to follow him.
None of us said anything as Uncle Jim led us around the hospital until we reached a room with a large wooden table and lots of chairs. There was a doctor and a lady in a suit waiting there for us. They gave us pitiful, solemn looks and explained that our parents and little brother had been in a car accident on their way to pick us up from soccer practice that evening. "They didn't make it." "I'm so sorry for your loss." They took Uncle Jim aside to discuss the gruesome details but we still heard. Their minivan was struck head on by a semi truck. "Trauma too severe." "Dead upon arrival." Alex tried to hug me but I jerked away. This couldn't be happening. We were supposed to go to Chuckie Cheese. We were supposed get sick from eating too much pizza and ice cream. We were supposed to go home and our parents were supposed to tuck us into bed and Alex and I were supposed to get annoyed at Kyle for sneaking into our room to play, just like every night. We weren't supposed to be in a hospital listening to how our family was dead and had to stay with Uncle Jim now.
I turned and ran out of the room. I ran up and down stairs until I finally found the exit and took off running down the road. I could hear Alex behind me yelling my name but I was too fast. I kept running until everything turned black.