"Hey I'm gonna go call Charles," Gia said once we were at her place.
"Ok," I said.
She left the room. My phone rang. I dug it out of my purse and pushed the talk button.
"Hel hello?" I asked taking a shaky deep breath.
"Stephanie," my dad said.
"Hi Dad."
"Hi honey. I'm afraid I've got some bad news."
Oh no not more bad news. I took some more deep breaths and braced myself for what was to come.
"Stephanie? You there?"
"Yeah. I am."
"Ok."
"Well Joey and Jesse are in the hospital. Becky and I are going to stay here overnight as is Vicky. Alex, Kaitlin, Nicky, Rachel, Lila, Elizabeth and Michelle are back at the house. We need you to come home as soon as possible. It's ok if Gia comes too. Oh Claire is also in the hospital."
Claire's Gia's mom.
"Omygod what what happened?" I asked.
"There there was an accident. 2 actually."
"Oh."
"Jesse was in a motorcycle accident and Joey and Claire were in a car accident."
"Oh. I'll tell Gia."
"Ok. Bye."
"Bye."
We hung up and I sighed. In the kitchen I heard gia talking on the phone.
"Smoking, makin tea for Steph and coffee for me………..what? oh……….I don't know what she'll think of that. Ok. Yeah me too. Hey listen I've gotta go. Thanks. Um maybe. We'll see. Bye."
I stood up and walked into the dark kitchen.
"Hey Gia," I said.
"Hey Steph what's wrong?"
"Well I got bad news."
"Eric again?"
"No. no."
"Ok."
"Your mom. Um she's at the hospital. With my uncles."
"Shit. What happened?"
"Jesse was in a motorcycle accident. And your mom and Joey were in a car accident."
"Omygod."
"Vicky, my dad and Becky are there overnight with them. Dad says he wants us to go over to my house as soon as possible."
"Ok."
I breathed in and smelled the smell of smoke, coffee and green tea.
"Why is it so dark in here?" I asked.
"Oh, Mom and I, we're trying to save money on the electricity bill."
"Oh ok."
"Yeah."
Gia turned the stove burner down a bit.
"Hey whats in the oven?" I asked smelling something that smelled good.
"Oh brownies. Damn I almost forgot. Could you get those?"
"Yeah I'll get those."
"Ok thanks."
"Mmhmm. Scuse me."
Gia moved to the side. I put some oven mitts on and opened the oven to get the brownies out. I took them out and set the pan on the dying rack that was on the counter then closed the oven. I then took a knife out of the silverware drawer and started cutting the brownies.
"God," Gia said.
I looked at her.
"I can't believe he did that to you," she said.
"Who, Eric?"
"Yeah."
"Yeah I know. He tried but…………god. I mean what did I do?"
"Steph. You did nothing."
I sighed and popped a brownie into my mouth.
"Mmm these are good," I said.
"Well I would hope so. We made them," gia said.
We went over to the living room with our beverages and the brownies and sat down on the floor.
