Chapter 8
"Oh my God!" Emma said, crying. Her hands were shaking as she tried to dial the numbers on her phone. She was crying and crying hard. "Somebody PLEASE help!" She pleaded quietly inbetween tears. She'd already tried calling home, but her mom, Snake and Jack had gone out for the evening, and when she tried calling their cellphones all she got was voicemail. She tried calling Joey, but he wasn't answering, either.
"One last try!" She said as she dialed Wheels' number. "Please answer, PLEASE!"
***
"Yeah, well you weren't so hot yourself!" Heather said inbetween bites. She and Wheels had just gone miniature golfing and he was making fun of the way she golfed.
"Yeah, but at least I managed to get the ball through the windmill!" Wheels said, laughing. He heard his phone start ringing, so he took it out of his pocket and looked at the caller ID. It was Emma.
"It's Emma!" He said with a confused look on his face. He had Emma's number and she had his, but they hardly ever called each other. They more or less had each other's numbers just for emergency purposes.
"Em?" He said as he answered the phone.
"Good, you answered!" Emma cried into the phone. "I need help! I called my mom, I called Snake and I called Joey and I called you and you're the only one that's answered and I really need your help! I don't know what to do, the police are here and. . ."
Wheels was getting worried. Emma was scaring him. He'd never heard her like this before, and it was like she was going hysterical.
"OK, Em, calm down! Breathe, OK? Take a deep breath!" He heard Emma heave a big, deep breath on the other end of the line. "Now tell me what's going on." He said.
Emma cried even harder.
"Emma! You're scaring me!" He said. "What's going on?"
"The police are here," she said, "And Mike and LeeAnn. . ."
"What about them?"
". . .Were in a really bad accident. The driver of the other car had been drinking and he ran a stop sign at a four-way intersection and hit them. They're DEAD!"
Wheels dropped his fork on his plate and it made a loud clink as it hit, startling Heather, who was sitting across from him.
"Oh God!" He exclaimed as he fumbled around in the pocket of his jeans looking for his car keys, which he couldn't find, his voice panic-stricken. He finally managed to find them. They'd gotten caught up in the material in his pocket.
"Where is Maddie?" He asked Emma as he tried to remain calm.
"She's in bed." Emma said as she cried into the phone. "She doesn't know what's going on."
"Uh, OK." Wheels said as he thought out loud. "Stay right there! I'll be right there, OK? Don't move!" He jumped to his feet and pushed the "Send" button on his phone.
"What's the matter?" Heather asked, looking alarmed.
"I'm really sorry, Heather, but I've got to go!" He explained. "There's been a terrible accident involving Mike and LeeAnn!"
Heather grew concerned.
"They're OK, right?" She asked.
Wheels shook his head no, and right about that time his eyes started tearing up.
"They were hit by a drunk driver." He explained. "They're dead!"
"Oh no!" Heather exclaimed.
"I have to go home and help Emma!" He said just before leaning in for a quick kiss. Heather shook her head, indicating that she understood.
"If I get a chance to I'll call you tomorrow and let you know what's going on!" He exclaimed as he headed toward the door.
Once he was out in the parking lot, Wheels ran to his car, unlocking the doors with the keyless entry remote as he ran. He jumped in the car with his heart pounding so hard it felt like it might just jump right out of his chest and fall out on his lap. He drove home using the quickest route that he knew of to get there. As he was pulling into the parking lot of his apartment building, he noticed two police cars parked outside in front of the building. He ran from his car to the building, and once he was in the building he ran to the elevator. Once he got off the elevator, he ran down the hall to the Hoecklinson's apartment, where he was met by two police officers.
"Good evening, sir." One of the officers said as she extended her hand out to Wheels to shake. "Are you the friend of the family the young lady called? Derek Wheeler?"
"Yeah," Wheels said, tears streaming down his cheeks. "I am."
"Do you of any relatives the family has in this area?" She asked.
"I don't think they have any around here." Wheels said as he tried to remember what little he had learned about the family. "They just moved here from Winnipeg a little over a month ago. I know LeeAnn said she has relatives that live in Halifax and in B.C. in Vancouver, but that's all I know."
"We have to temporary emergency housing for the two children." She explained. "If reasonable accommodations cannot be made, they'll have no choice but to go into foster care."
"It's OK." Wheels said after thinking for a moment. "They can stay with me for awhile, as long as they have to. I live right next door."
"This is only temporary." The officer replied. "The kids will have to be assigned a social worker who can help them deal with the changes they're going to have to face. It may be deemed by Children's Aide that it would be in their best interests to live with relatives or be put into foster care."
Wheels nodded in agreement. He knew all about that kind of stuff from when his own parents died.
"We're working on contacting the rest of the family to let them know of this unfortunate situation." The officer said. "You may also ask the children to contact any relatives they know of and let them know what's going on, too."
"Yeah. I'll do that." Wheels said as he lifted off his glasses and wiped away some tears.
"Mr. Wheeler, I am very sorry for your loss." The officer said. "If there is anything else we can do for you or for the kids, please let us know at the station."
"Thank you." Wheels said before turning to go into the apartment. The officer walked away.
He turned the knob on the door, knowing Emma probably hadn't locked it since the police were there. He opened the door to see Emma sitting on the couch, a glazed look over her eyes and her face pale white. Her eyes were puffy and red from all the crying she'd been doing. Emma looked up and saw him, and she got up from the couch and walked over to him.
"Are you OK?" Wheels asked her as he embraced her in a tight bear hug.
"Yeah, but I've been better!" She replied. "What about you?"
"This brings back a lot of horrible memories for me, Em." He replied as he let go of her. "I wouldn't wish this upon any kid in the world! What's worse is that I know what it feels like to be on both ends of the situation." He said, referring to how he felt when he lost his own parents and how he felt after he'd been told he killed a kid after his accident.
"I wonder what's gonna happen to Ty and Maddie?" Emma asked as she walked around the living room, almost in a trance.
"Well," Wheels said as he dropped his hands down to his sides, "I just got done talking to one of the cops outside, and they're gonna come stay with me for awhile. I figured that might be the best thing for them right now, that way they won't have to change schools or anything again, and they can live semi-normal lives. It's not going to be easy for them, though!"
Wheels took a seat on the couch.
"I really don't know what's going to happen, Em!" He took his glasses off and started crying hard.
Emma went and sat down next to him, this time hugging him instead.
"I'm really scared for both of them because I know what it's like, and I don't want either of them to make the same kinds of mistakes I made!"
"And that's why you need to help them through this." She replied. "Because YOU know what it's like to be in their shoes, and YOU can help them not to make the same mistakes you did!"
"I guess so." He replied, trying to compose himself. "Uh. . .Do ya know where Ty is?"
"Mike said he was over at Craig's when they left. I tried to call his cell just before you got here but I couldn't get him."
"Oh." Wheels replied quietly.
The two of them sat quietly together for a few minutes.
Wheels looked at the clock on the wall. It was almost eleven.
"It's late, Em. Why don't you pack your stuff up and go home? Your folks are probably starting to get worried." He said.
"Are you sure?" Emma asked.
"Yeah. Why don't you go ahead and go. I'll stay here. I'm gonna try to call Joey and see if he knows where Craig and Ty are and let him know what's going on."
"OK." Emma said as she got up from the couch. She picked up the duffle bag with the games and toys she'd brought with her and headed to the door. "I know how much it sucks," she said, "But everything's gonna be OK."
"I hope so." Wheels said, giving her a half-cocked smile.
After Emma closed the door, a familiar feeling crept over Wheels' body. It was kind of an eerie feeling. He suddenly felt like he was the only person in the world, that he was all alone, and it scared him; it REALLY scared him! He really wished he hadn't told Emma to go home!
He took his phone out of his pocket and speed-dialed Joey's number. Joey answered.
"Wheels?" Joey said, sounding confused. "Do you know what time it is? Man, it's almost eleven thirty!"
"I'm sorry!" Wheels said as he started to softly cry again as he got up and paced around the room.
"Are you OK?"
"Uh. . .no. I need to find Ty, and Emma told me he was with Craig. Do ya know where they're at?"
"Yeah, they're still here, they're in the garage. What's going on?"
"Emma was babysitting for Maddie tonight and she called me when I was out with Heather. She tried calling home and she tried calling Snake and Spike, but nobody would answer so she called me. The police were here and everything, and she didn't know what to do and. . ." He said as he sat back down on the couch, taking a deep breath.
"And. . .?"
Wheels took a deep breath again.
"And Mike and LeeAnn, Ty and Maddie's parents, were in an accident. They died, Joey, just like my parents died and that kid I killed died; from a drunk driver!"
"Oh God." Joey said. "I'm sorry to hear that!"
"When Emma called, I explained to Heather what was going on and I left and came back to their apartment. The cops were here and everything."
"What's going to happen with Ty and Maddie?"
"They're going to live with me for a little while until something else can be figured out. I don't think they have any family around here, and seeing how as I've been in this situation myself I really don't want to have to send them off to live in foster care or anything like that. I sent Emma home and told her I'd stay here with Maddie, since Maddie's in bed and has no idea what's going on."
"Well I'll send Ty home, OK?"
"OK." Wheels said quietly, almost in a whisper.
"If you need anything just call me, OK? That's what I'm here for!"
"OK. Bye, Joey."
Wheels hung up the phone. He got up and started pacing around the room again. He was so frustrated and angry!
"Kids their age shouldn't have to worry about this kind of stuff!" He thought to himself. "They're supposed to be kids! Maddie should just have to worry about playing with her friends and having fun and Ty should just have to worry about going to school and hanging out with his friends and going on dates and just being a teenager!"
He stopped pacing when he came to a wall where a family portrait had been hung. Mike, LeeAnn, Ty and Maddie were all happily smiling. They looked so happy and carefree, like nothing bad could ever happen. Feeling the anger and frustration build up inside of him-and forgetting that Maddie was asleep-he punched the wall, and punched it hard. The thud of his fist hitting the wall was just enough to wake Maddie, who got out of bed to see what was going on. Wheels turned around to see her standing in the middle of the hall rubbing her eyes.
"What's going on?" She asked.
Wheels walked over to her.
"Where's my mom and dad? Why are you here?"
"Here." Wheels said as he extended his arms out to her. He picked her up and carried her into the kitchen. He was going to have a lot of explaining to do to her and he knew she was going to have a lot of questions, and he wasn't quite sure how he'd answer them. "Want a glass of water?"
Maddie nodded her head yes, so he carried her into the kitchen, got a small cup out of the cabinet and filled it with some water and handed it to her. She took a drink out of it and he carried her into the living room and sat down on the couch with her.
"I really don't know how to tell you this." He said. "Have you ever had a pet that died?" He was trying to make this easy for her to understand.
"I had some fish that died." She said as she situated herself on the couch. "Mommy told me that when things that are really good die, they go up to this really nice place in the sky called Heaven. She said that as long as you're good and don't do mean things you'll go there."
"Good." Wheels thought. "She understands death. . .a little." Still, that wasn't going to make telling her any more easier!
"Do you remember what happened when your fish died?"
"Yeah. My daddy scooped them out of the tank and put them in the toilet. He let me say good-bye to them and then he flushed them down the toilet."
"Maddie," Wheels said "Tonight after you fell asleep, there was an accident. Your mommy and daddy. . .they aren't coming home. I'm really sorry, Kiddo!" He said as he hugged her really close and squeezed her tight as he cried. "They died."
"No they didn't!" Maddie said, smile creeping up on her face. "They're coming home!"
"No they're not. They went to Heaven.""
"NO!" Maddie screamed at him. "THEY'RE COMING HOME!"
"Maddie. . ."
Maddie started crying, which made Wheels cry.
"I wish they were coming home, Maddie, but they're not."
Wheels heard a key turn in the lock on the door. He'd locked the door after Emma left, so he knew that Ty must've been home.
Ty flung the door open to see Wheels sitting on the couch with his arms wrapped around Maddie.
"Joey told me you called." Ty said as he walked in and put the case containing his bass down in a chair. "He said I needed to go home and it was important. What's going on?"
"Sit down." Wheels said as he patted the seat next to him on the couch. Ty sat down there.
"This is really hard for me to tell you this." Wheels said with a distant, far away look in his eyes. "There was an accident tonight. They were at a four-way intersection and the driver on the opposite side of the road ran the stop sign and hit them head on. The driver of the other car was drunk, and your mom and dad. . ."
"They're OK, right?" Ty said.
Wheels shook his head no and looked down, then back up. "They didn't make it, buddy. I'm sorry!"
"No. No, this isn't happening!" Ty said as he got up and paced around the room, much in the same fashion Wheels had done earlier. "They're gonna come home! They're gonna come walking through that door any minute! That car that was hit, that wasn't theirs! It was just a car that looks like theirs!"
"Ty, believe me, I know this a lot to handle right now and it's hard to believe, but. . ."
"No!" Ty yelled as he headed off to his room. "This isn't happening!" With that, he slammed the door.
***
It was now 3 AM. Not wanting to leave Ty and Maddie alone, Wheels had decided to spend the night at their apartment. Maddie had finally cried herself to sleep on the couch, and he'd taken her and put her back in her own bed. Wanting to try and get a few hours of sleep himself since he knew the next few days would be extremely busy and grueling, he decided to convert the couch into a bed. The couch itself was actually a sleeper couch, so all he had to do was pull the mattress out of it from the bottom. He went back to his apartment and grabbed a blanket and some pillows and he tried to sleep, but it was hard. What sleep he did manage to get wasn't good, and he kept waking up, so he gave up. He watched TV for a little while, but he got tired of it, so he went back to his apartment to try and find something he could do that might help him fall asleep. He managed to find his old high school yearbooks and a photo album full of pictures of him and his family from when he was a kid. He took those back with him. Now, here he was, sitting at the Hoecklinson's dining room table, sipping warm camomile tea from a coffee cup and looking at old pictures.
Those old yearbooks brought back a lot of bittersweet memories of high school. Some of the pictures made him smile as he remembered the good old days at Degrassi High, and some of them made him sad as he remembered how he'd screwed things up and was continually blaming everyone else for his problems instead of taking responsibility for the stuff that actually was his fault. Then there were those family photos. He couldn't remember the last time he'd looked at those. They brought back lots of good memories, memories of just being a kid and feeling safe and secure in the world.
Wheels stopped when he got towards the end of the album. The pictures that he was looking at had been taken the summer just before his parents died, when they were on vacation in Wasaga Beach with is grandparents from his dad's side. He stopped to look at one in particular. It was of him, his mom and his dad. They were standing on the shore of the beach in their swim wear with the water behind them.
He remembered that day. It was hot out and they'd decided to go swimming. He'd spent most of the day in the water and ended up getting a killer sunburn. Still, it was worth it. They had fun together, and there were also several cute girls in bikinis there!
He was still staring at that picture when he heard footsteps coming down the hall. He looked up to see Ty standing there, looking quite worn and ragged.
"Hey." Ty said, forcing a smile on his face even though there wasn't much to smile about.
"Hi."
"I couldn't sleep." Ty said as he pulled out one of the chairs from the table.
"That's understandable." Wheels said as he drank from his mug.
"What'cha lookin' at?"
"Old pictures of my family. Boy, they sure do bring back some memories!"
They sat in silence for awhile.
"What's it like, not having a close family?" Ty asked, finally speaking up.
"It sucks." Wheels replied. "That's the only way to describe it! To me, my family is my friends. I spend all major holidays with them, celebrate birthdays with them, go out with them. They're all I have."
"Guess that's what Maddie and I have to look forward to, huh?"
"At least you have Maddie! When my parents died I was all alone!"
"How did your parents die, anyway?"
Wheels looked up at him. He had never told Ty how his parents died, he'd just told him that they'd died when he was about Ty's age. It was still painful to talk about.
"The same way yours did. They were hit by a drunk driver one night when they went out to see a movie."
Wheels started crying again.
"I remember feeling so. . .guilty! I'd been fighting with them because they wouldn't let me hang out with Joey, and the night they went to go to the movie I snuck out of the house after they left to go to Joey's. Snake walked me home, and when I got home there was a squad car sitting outside my house. I was late getting home, so I thought that maybe they'd called the cops when they'd got home and realized I wasn't there. Then my grandma got out of the car and told me what happened."
Ty looked down at the table.
"I was fighting with them this morning." He said. "If I'd known this was going to happen I never would've fought with them!" He cried.
"They didn't die because you had a fight with them, Ty." Wheels said, trying to console Ty. "It took me a long time to realize that myself."
"I'm really scared, man!" Ty said, inbetween tears. "What's going to happen to me? What's going to happen to Maddie? I barely know my aunt and uncle in B.C., and most of my dad's family lives in the States! I don't want to live with strangers!"
"You guys are gonna stay with me for a little while, just until something else can be figured out. I figured that way you can still go to school and try to maintain a semi-normal life, and you won't have to live with strangers. You'll be OK, I promise! I just need you to promise me a few things."
"Like what?"
"You'll go to school like you're supposed to. No skipping classes or anything like that! You can stay out next week until you feel ready to go back and while you're out you can have your friends bring you your homework, but you must go back! You'll be assigned a social worker, and I want you to talk to them. Be respectful to your friends, because you're gonna need them! Take it from someone who's been there and done that that you don't want to screw that up! Trust me!"
"I can do all of that." Ty said.
"The last thing is really important. I want you to promise me you'll talk to me. I know what you're feeling like and what you're going through and I want to help, but I can't help if I don't know what's going on. Even if I don't fully understand everything that's going on, I promise I'll try to. I don't want to take the place of your parents, but I really do want to help."