“I hate you!”

My mom knows I don’t mean it. The words just came out; I’ll apologize later. I just don’t understand why I can’t go to Ashley’s house. It’s her 16th birthday, which is an important one! Who cares if it’s a school night? It’s only 9:00 p.m., but since I can’t go anywhere, I might as well go to bed.

I wake up and drive to school; it’s a typical Thursday morning. I’m actually having a really good day. My hair was curled perfectly, my favorite song was on the radio on the way to school, and Mr. Jenkins didn’t give us any homework. I see Ashley walking down the hallway.

“Hey, Ash! I’m sorry I couldn’t stop by last night. My mom was being difficult. How was your birthday?”

Ashley smiled warmly, “Don’t even worry about it, Emma. Connor came over instead. We just watched some movies and ate dinner. He was incredibly sweet to me last night! Well, I mean, he always is but especially last night. He’s just the best boyfriend ever.”

“Good, I’m glad it went well. I’ll see you after third block; maybe we can grab some pie after school or something.”

“That sounds perfect. See you later.”

I will give Ashley her present after school today. I wish I could have given it to her last night, but it’s not the end of the world. Maybe I was a little rude to my mom last night. The teenager in me emerges, and I become a snob. I always seem to blurt insults I don’t mean when I don’t receive everything I desire. I’m still a child in that sense. I should text her and see how she’s doing.

Hi Mom, I’m sorry for last night. I didn’t mean what I said. Hope you’re having a good day at work. Love you.

Maybe I’ll rent a movie and ice cream on the way home. Nothing says, “I’m sorry” like a pint of Ben and Jerry’s and Ryan Reynolds with his shirt off. Thank goodness it’s lunch time though; I need to tell Rilee what Mackenzie told me this morning. Gossip time!

“Emma, report to the office please. Emma.”

That’s weird; I’m never summoned to the office. Can’t it wait until I’m finished with my lunch? Whatever it is, it’s going to have to wait because our gossip session isn’t done.

“Emma report to the office immediately. Emma.”

Oh, come on! This is an outrage. I know that someone will eat my breadstick while I’m gone. Breadsticks have become a rare treat during lunch ever since Michelle Obama decided school lunches need to change. My irritation dwindles when I see my dad at the office counter. What is he doing here? He’s normally at his office, in The Cites, right now. He looks upset. I can see wrinkles in his forehead; he’s rubbing his hands together and pacing back and forth. As I approach him, I can see that his eyes are red and swollen behind his glasses, as if he’d been crying. I’m slightly worried because I don’t remember ever seeing my dad like this.

“Dad, what’s going on?”

“Nothing, Emma. Come with me; we’re leaving.”

My dad begins to start hurrying me out of the school. “Wait, just let me collect my homework from my locker.”

“No, just leave it,” my dad says, and he continues to usher me out of the school. Why is he acting so strange? Why are we in such a rush?

“Can you tell me what’s going on? Have you been crying?”

My dad doesn’t respond. We climb into the car and start driving toward Dick’s Market. We take a right onto the road leading to the new hospital. As soon as we turn onto the road, I see blue and red flashing lights. My dad slows down. Police cars, ambulances, and fire trucks are blocking the road. Dad rolls down his window and looks at one of the police officers, as if they’re having a silent conversation with their eyes. The police officer looks at me sympathetically, then looks back at my father and nods. We drive closer to the scene and park on the side of the road.

“What’s going on? What are we doing?” I ask my father. I stare at him; my eyes pleading for an answer.

My dad looks at me for several seconds and says nothing. His expression blank, as if he’s searching for the right thing to say but can’t think of anything. He starts to crawl out of the car so I follow him. We shuffle toward the bridge, and as we come closer I can see that there has been an atrocious car accident—the kind of car accident that one rarely sees in a small town.
There’s a red pick-up truck on the edge of the road, just before the bridge. The front of the truck is utterly destroyed; the lights are smashed, the windows are shattered, the hood is ripped off, and the engine has almost made its way to the passenger seat. This is not a car I recognize. To my right there’s a man who looks to be about 30 years old sitting in the back of a police car. As I walk by him, with my father, he mouths the words, “I’m sorry” through the window, tears in his eyes. I stop, perplexed as to why he’s saying that. I don’t even know this man. Does he know me? Thoughts begin racing through my head. Why is he sorry? Why won’t anyone tell me what’s going on? What’s the big secret? Why did Dad bring me here? How come everyone seems to know but me? Dad clutches my shoulders and turns me away from the man. I turn away reluctantly.
We continue walking down the road and we stop at the bridge. There are tire tracks on the road. I follow them and realize that they lead to the left side of the bridge. Where the tracks stop the rails on the bridge are ruined. The short, flimsy wooden fence was demolished. I walk over to that portion of the bridge. My dad grips my hand and murmurs, “Emma, stop.” I break away from his grasp and keep walking, ignoring him. I know that a car went over this bridge, but I refuse to accept it until I see it for myself. My heart pounds faster and harder the closer I come to the bridge. Everything around me is silent—the sirens, the conversations, the telephones, and Dad calling for me. I peer down into the river, and there is a small, charcoal black car at the bottom. A small, charcoal black car that appears identical to the one my mom drives. It is no longer silent; someone is screaming. A few seconds pass by before I realize that the person screaming is me.
I sprint to the first ambulance I see. I push the assistant out of my way and quickly glance inside, desperately hoping to see my mother receiving a few bandages over some scratches and scrapes. No one is inside. I run to the next ambulance. Where is she? “Momma, Momma, Momma!” I race from ambulance to ambulance searching for her face—searching for her jade green eyes, her wrinkles from smiling so much, her sunspot on her forehead, her short, brown hair. I’m waiting to hear her loving voice, saying my name. Waiting for her to hug me from behind and tell me she’s alright. Everything I’m waiting for isn’t happening.
I run back to the bridge. I begin to climb over the wooden fence and guard rails. I’m about to jump down and see my mother, when my dad snatches me from behind. He lifts me up and carries me away, cradling me in his arms. I break down and begin to wail uncontrollably. My gushing tears prevent me from seeing anything; my shrieks prevent me from hearing anything. I can’t stop screaming, and I can’t stop crying; I can’t breathe.
No one has to tell me what happened; I don’t want to hear the words. It all makes sense now—the office not letting me finish my lunch, my dad not letting me retrieve my homework, the sympathetic police man, the man apologizing. This cannot be happening to me. This only happens in movies. This isn’t real life.

But it is. I awaken drenched in sweat. I trudge upstairs to grab a glass of water. I sit in the kitchen a moment, sipping on my water while I stare at the portrait of my mom in the living room. She is a beautiful woman, inside and out. In this particular portrait my mother is wearing an extravagant rose-colored blouse that contrasts her green eyes perfectly. In most of the pictures I’ve seen of my mom, she displays a fake smile, but in this picture it is truly genuine. Her shoulders are back; she looks confident, strong. This is my favorite picture of her, other than the picture by my bedside. The picture by my bedside is one of my mom holding me on the couch. There’s nothing extraordinary about this picture, in fact, it’s a poorly taken picture. I’m about six years old, and I have Hello Kitty pajamas on, my hair is mess, and I have the goofiest smile on my face. But that’s just it. That’s what I love so much about it—that smile on my face, the smile that only my mom can give me.
The connection I have with my mom is one that I’m positive I will never experience with anyone else. She’s my mom, but she’s also my best friend. Perhaps, that is why this is so hard. Although, I try to feel nothing at all; I try to shut out the pain, pain is an emotion that demands to be felt. I wish I could simply wake up from this nightmare. Every night I fall asleep and relive that horrid day. Every day I wake up hoping the nightmare was not real, but every day I wake up realizing that it was. I never experience the relief after waking from a nightmare and returning to a happy life. I want nothing more than to be able to say, “It was just a dream.”