Chapter 9:

It has been 3 weeks and he is still doing the heartbroken teenage sulk. If now they have been apart the same amount of time they were together, why does it feel so much longer? He is still sad and angry, locks himself away when he comes home from school. The days immediately afterwards had been very odd, his mother freaked out about Bay sleeping over, she had been signing furiously every time she could catch him and she would keep going on and on about it, she even made his father come over and give him the mother of all sex talks, that had them both blushing even hours after it all happened. In fact he hasn't seen his father since, he might be hiding away, unable to ever face him again. No wonder. He looks at the photo that used to be framed, he took it out of the frame and stuck it into his bedside table drawer, pulls it out when he is alone and feels like being melodramatic or just like seeing her. He is such a cliché, he realizes, not for the first time, but so what? He has sent her two messages in the first week, one said "I miss you" and one "Wish you were here" and both times she replied within the hour saying "Don't make this harder." And both times he received a second message later that evening saying "P/s: miss U 2". Things with Daphne suck too, he tried to hang out with her but truth is he keeps blaming her and can't really do the friend thing right now. She behaves around him like she is walking on eggshells, tries to be there for him, cheer him up, but he has been avoiding her. He is now eating lunch with the guys and coming home straight from school or spending the afternoons at Jackson's house, and the hours they used to spend in the library or the little garden area he has filled with speech therapy. Partly because he is just being contrary, to piss off his mom, partly because he is still trying for her, even though she won't know.

He has band practice a couple of times a week at the Kennish house, but Bay makes sure never to be there when he is, which is probably good but still a letdown every time. Toby has been sympathetic, pats him on the back when he sees him look around, shaking his head. He is not proud to admit even to himself that he has driven to her school a couple of times, watched her from afar as she laughed with her school friends and even followed her, saw that she parked herself in front of her billboard and it hurt, but somehow in a good way. She does miss him too. She isn't forgetting him quickly. From what he knows, from Toby, from Daphne, Wilke even made a comment at some point carelessly, she is doing fine, she seems to have forgiven Daphne, is still hanging out with her, in fact more than ever. Then again Daphne has a recent opening for best friend.

His mother comes in and he lets the picture fall, she looks annoyed, as she has been for almost 3 weeks now. "It is enough! Stop playing heartsick and come and help me make dinner" she signs at him but he just turns onto his side, looks at his wall and waits for her to leave again.

Bay is getting better and better at signing, she spends every free minute still learning. She tells herself it is for Daphne, that she will be better at communicating with her, that it is necessary to get their friendship, their sisterhood, working but she knows she is lying to herself. Things are ok now, she misses him but after a few very rocky days with Daphne, resentful and meanspirited she would talk on purpose in the other direction or really fast, she settled down and is now trying. They hang out more than before, now that Daphne doesn't really seem to see Emmett in the afternoons anymore. She mentioned once that he was still mad at her but then stopped talking about it, if out of respect for her or because she didn't want to share, Bay doesn't know. Some days are better than others, when her parents look so happy to have all 3 kids in the house for supper for example, joking, getting along, she goes to bed feeling warm inside and certain that the break up was the right thing to do. Some days suck, she will see a motorbike and just feel like weeping when it doesn't stop in front of her. A few days a week she drives to her billboard to pine in earnest and while listening to Christina Perry's The lonely she cries and cries, then goes back home and puts on a happy face again, plays cards with Daphne, talks about Angelo, mysterious Angelo they share yet know nothing about. She knows Emmett comes over a couple of days a week to play with Toby but she makes sure never to be there, though she has secretly walked to Carlton after school and stood hidden away watching him go to his bike, drive off, always alone, looking a bit crestfallen, though she may be imagining this. And she has been designing a pink dress girl to go on the wall at the end of his road, so he can see it every day. She doesn't know what the girl should be doing… this girl should be even angrier than any of the others, she should be downright horribly rude; she looked up insults in ASL, but they are hard and require movement which is hard to spray into a still picture. Melody may die of a heart-attack if she sees a graffiti girl signing "asshole" visible from the front windows of her house, but Bay doesn't care. It even fills her with satisfaction to think that she would freak out. Regina didn't really say anything to Bay about the 6 am sex talk, she just said something very generic once at Fajita Thursday, along the lines that teens nowadays should really make sure they were being safe if they were sexually active. Her mom had agreed and her father had rolled his eyes, maybe thinking that kids like Bay and Toby weren't like the kids from Regina's usual neighborhood. They would not end up pregnant at 16. There is no danger for her anyway, she has no interest in any boys right now, she thinks, just in one boy and he is unattainable. She sighs and clicks on the next lesson, then shakes her hands out preparing them for another hour or two of intense work.

Daphne knows Bay is still learning more and more signs, she is getting really good at it and she also knows this is not just for her, but Bay spends almost every afternoon at home and she only goes to her friends' house when Emmett is in the garage, drumming away with Toby, so she knows they aren't sneaking around behind her back anymore. If they were Emmett might not be in as foul a mood as he currently is in. She knows that he is still angry at her, but she doesn't know what to do about it. She tries to be as sweet and cheerful as possible when around him but she is afraid of even mentioning her family and definitely Bay. Like when someone's pet dies and you don't really want to say anything pet related yet somehow the word dog seems to have snuck into your vocabulary and be unavoidable constantly. Melody told her he would come out if this funk soon, but it has been weeks and even melody thinks he is just being an idiot at this point. Will he ever go back to normal with her? There are times, as she sits with a couple of girls from her class and watches them chitchat about Justin Bieber, with him sitting on the table at the opposite end, that she wonders if it was worth it. If she should maybe go and tell Emmett to go back to Bay if that means he will be her friend again. But then she pictures them kissing (or worse… more than kissing!) and feels like throwing up. Bay came around quite quickly, except she keeps secretly studying ASL and there has been an evening or two where she went to ask her something in her room in the evening and seen the tear tracks down her cheeks. But that could have been about something else, she tells herself and tries to swallow the bitter taste in her mouth down. A taste she knows is the mix between guilt and regret.

The lack of Emmett in her life feels like when you lose a tooth, a gap that your tongue keeps going to, even though it feels odd and sometimes painful, a gap that makes everything different, smiling, eating, that you can't forget is there. And she has tried to fill the gap with basketball practice, with time with Bay, with one-on-ones with Toby, with occasional afternoons out whining to Wilke. Actually they have been less occasional and more regular as of lately. She knows he fancies her though she never let it escalate again like she did that day in the back of his car, they are just friends who flirt. Sometimes she feels guilty about this, as if she replaced Emmett with someone else who pines after her, but it is nothing like that.

It is late but she doesn't feel like going to bed yet and so she goes up to Bay's room and knocks even though she wouldn't hear an answer if there was one, then goes in and sees her asleep on her bed, fully dressed, her laptop in front of her still playing the ASL tutorial. The bitterness rushes back into her mouth and her eyes fill with tears. She hates that she is doing this to them. But she would hate the alternative too.

It happens so fast that she really doesn't even realize what is going on and then there is just pain and light and dark and sirens, someone shouting, someone yelling at her, blood in her mouth. And someone moving her which causes more pain and then nothing but silence and blackness. Nothingness.

She didn't catch it all the first time around and is still unsure about the details as she sits there, her hands in her lap, being driven faster than is allowed. The phone rang and all hell broke loose, all the adults talking at the same time and she doesn't know which lips to read first, nobody bothering to sign, shock and tears welling up in everyone's eyes. They all ride in one car, crammed in, with Daphne and her grandmother and both mothers sharing the back seat bench, all animosity forgotten, the tragic circumstances binding them together as a family, both moms holding hands. She feels guilty and knows it is silly, that it has nothing to do with her, but she still does. She was so angry with her today when Emmett ignored her completely, hated on Bay for breaking her best friendship and now this. When they get there Toby puts his arms around her while the adults go yelling at some nurse, find out more. They come back and don't know much. The moms hug and cry, Toby moves and puts his arm around her grandma who looks too shocked to cry and Daphne feels an overwhelming need to get away from them. She walks back, inches towards the wall, tries to make herself invisible. And she takes out her phone and writes with slow fingers and a heavy heart.

He is having dinner when his phone vibrates, his mother looks at him angrily when he takes it out. They had this conversation a million times, no phones at the dinner table, but since she is in a pissy mood anyhow, ever since he ignored her yesterday, he doesn't really care. The message makes every hair on his body stand up and he feels immediately sick to his stomach. He stands up and rushes to get his jacket and helmet, handing over the phone to his mother, make her understand. She looks at it and reads

"Bay was in a car accident, are in emergency room, she is really hurt. St Mary's hospital. Come!"