Before You Say Goodbye

The whole world was freaking out. I’m not sure what about, but in my fourteen year old brain, it must be pretty bad if mum and dad are running around crazy with the crowds too.

Dad came into my room yesterday and tried to explain it, but ended up in tears two sentences in. I’m hoping mum will come explain tonight. She might, if she hasn’t touched the liquor yet.

My room, usually tidy just how I like it, has become a mess. Mum and dad’s stress has been getting to me. I didn’t realize until this morning when I spilled my cereal on my lap because of my shaking hands.

“Mum!” I call, hoping to hear her heels click on the tile downstairs. She wears shoes in the house on the weekends, I’m not sure why though.

She doesn’t respond, so I figure she’s already hit the liquor cabinet. I sigh and tromp downstairs, my brown hair swinging in front of my eyes. I don’t bother to push it away.

I do when I reach my mum and dad’s bedroom. Dad is at work, so mum must be home, right? They won’t let me stay home alone anymore.

“Mum?” I gently push the oak door open. Mum and dad’s bedroom is a disaster, their prescriptions are spilled all over the floor, as if they knocked over the bottle in their haste to check on me.

Once I finish scanning their room, making sure mum’s not in a puddle of her own blood on the floor, I find her face-down on her bed. Asleep? At two o’clock in the afternoon?

I push aside the piles of laundry and pills on the floor with my foot as I make my way to mum’s bedside.

“Mum,” I say tentatively, “Are you awake?” Of course not Emm, she’s asleep. She would have said something when she heard you in her room. Sometimes, the voice in my head decides to put me down.

Mum doesn’t move. I gently push her shoulder, hoping to arouse her awake. She doesn’t respond.

“Mum!” I urge. She still doesn’t move. I begin to panic. I don’t know what to do.

Should I call dad? No, he’s at work, probably stacked up on paperwork. He wouldn’t want me bothering him.

Nana? No, she’s hospitalized. Probably comatose in bed. I can’t call Papa, he’s with Nana.

I groan in frustration and push my fists into the sides of my head, trying to hold in the panic tears welling up in my eyes. I can’t cry, because then I won’t be able to see.

“Mum!” I call out, shoving her shoulder. She doesn’t move.

Is she dead? I think. She can’t be.

I search through my pockets, hoping to find the slim outline of my phone. Then I remember, it’s on my side-table next to my bed upstairs.

I run through the house, my socks slipping and sliding on the hardwood floor, sprinting to the stairs.

I’m not sure why I’m running, but I am.

I finally get to my room, out of breath and panting. I put a hand on my heart before I enter my room, hoping to keep it from pounding out of my chest.

And then I remember what I was running for. My phone is laying still and unsuspecting right where I left it this morning. I dart across the room, almost knocking over my lamp in my haste. I dive onto my bed and hit my head on the wall.

I yelp and put a hand on the top of my head. I dial the emergency number and pray for the line to not be busy.

After six rings someone finally picks up. I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Emergency services, how can I be of assistance?” A dull voice on the other end of the line says. I’m immediately annoyed at how calm they are.

“Um, emergency services?” Damn you Emm, they know they’re emergency services! “My mom, something happened. I need help, I’m only fourteen, I don’t know what to do.”

The receptionist is silent for a moment.

“Please help me.” I whine, scolding myself for how pathetic I sound.

“What is your address?” They finally say. My breath is tight in my lungs as I give my address, name, and phone number.

“The ambulance will be there as soon as possible. Would you like me to stay on the line with you until they get there?” They ask, still calm as ever. But I notice a hint of worry in their voice, barely disguised.

“Yes please, tell me what to do.”

“Emmy, do you know of the disease that has taken flight throughout the planet?” The receptionist asks. I’m struck dumb. There’s a disease? Is that why mum resorted to liquor and dad to work?

“D-disease?” I stutter, holding the flat screen of my phone against my face.

“Yes, a disease.” The receptionist says, “It targets a variety of people. Has your family told you about it?”

“No.” I say, horrified at my parents. How could they keep something so important away from me?

“Would you like me to tell you?” I can hear the ambulance sirens.

“Yes.” I breathe

The receptionist goes on to tell me about a stream of a prior disease, from 2020, COVID19 that was a horrible pandemic (my parents had told me), how that stream had mutated and gotten so out of hand that it was indetectable for forty years and has resurfaced in the young and middle-aged minds. They tell me that it’s lethal and could have killed my mum, and is probably in my brain already.

They don’t get any farther because the front door bursts open downstairs.

“They’re here, thank you.” I say into the phone, then hang up and run downstairs.

There are four uniformed men, each one looking around our messy house. I’m again aware of the alcohol smell throughout the house. Shame floods through me and my face reddens.

“Are you Emmy?” One of the men asks. I nod, swallowing past the lump in my throat.

“Where is your mother?” Another asks. I numbly point back into the house, our messy messy house. Angry tears threaten to spill across my cheeks.

“Can you show us to her?” The first one asks. His face is sharp and angular. The way his cold blue eyes scan the room makes my stomach turn with unease.

But still, I nod, and lead them through my house that smells of vodka and unwashed clothes, to my even messier, parents bedroom where my mum lies just as I left her.

I watch from the doorway as two of the men lay a stretcher next to my mum on my dad’s side of the bed and gently roll her onto it. I hear a clank as the bottle my mum was clutching in her stiff hands falls to the floor and rolls under the bed.

The same two men lift the stretcher and take her out to the ambulance, I watch as they hurry out of the room. They must be as repulsed as I am by my parents' cleaning habits. 

I fight the urge to cover my face with my hands as the other two men look at me. One of them is the one with the angled face.

“Emmy,” He says, “Can you come with us? We don’t want to leave you alone.” He speaks to me as if I’m a toddler about to explode. My body stiffens. I’m not sure why, but I don’t trust this man. But I can’t call dad and mum’s already in the ambulance. So I follow the men into the street and allow them to help me into the back of the ambulance.

I barely hear the instructions falling out of his mouth as he straps me in. I wish I could go back to bed.