Mistakes from my past

10 YEARS AGO

The night of my high school end of the year party is a night I will never forget. It started out as your average end of the year party if you have ever been to one. Kids were dancing, playing loud music that hurts your ears, and drinking heavily. I am usually the life of the party, but I was the designated driver that day. The party was really fun and lasted for a long time. My friends and I stayed there for 7 hours. We left when the clock struck 3:00.

With my drunk friends in the back seat and Sarah in the front seat, I drove as carefully as I could, but the darkness wasn’t making it any easier on me. 

“I want to drive now”, Sarah said drunkenly. 

“No way, you're drunk and could get us in trouble with the cops”, I said pushing her away from the steering wheel. 

Sarah started making an annoying noise and said that if I didn’t let her drive she wouldn’t stop. After a while, I gave in and let her drive. I knew it was a mistake right when I did it because Sarah was driving recklessly. All of a sudden I hear a thump. I open the door to check on what she hit, but she yanks me back in the car and locks the doors. “If you don’t check, none of us knows what happened. Do I make myself clear?” Sarah said looking at each one of us. The car gets silent and no one makes a sound. “I said, ‘DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?’” Sarah said yelling at us. We all say yes as Sarah drives away.             

The next day, I woke up to go to Sarah’s house. I see my mom watching the news as I had out the front door.  The news talks about a hit and runs that happened near 42nd street. That’s when I realized the news was talking about what Sarah did. She accidentally hit a man going to pick up his daughter from the party we were at. I know it was mostly Sarah, but I still feel guilty for not fighting back or calling the ambulance. The man’s legs don’t work, but with some physical therapy, his legs would be good as new. Who knows how long that physical therapy would be though? What if physical therapy doesn’t work? Questions like this started popping up in my head as I went to Sarah’s house.

When I arrived at Sarah’s house, Sarah opened the door quickly, pulled me in, and asked me if I saw the news today.  “Of course I saw the news”, I told Sarah. “The person we hit is all right. All he needs is some physical therapy, and he is god as new. No harm is done.” Sarah said as she patted my back. “The person that we ran over. You mean the person that you ran over. We didn’t do anything wrong. You did everything.” I said as I walked over to the living room. In the living room, I see my friends all sitting on the couch as well, watching the news. “We can’t get arrested for a mistake, right?” my friend Jake asked with a worried face on. “No, but you could get arrested if you don’t say anything about it”, my other friend Sasha said. “No one is getting arrested. The guy is fine, and there was no crime done. No blood on our hands.” Sarah said as she changed the channel. “If there was no harm done, could we come out and tell the truth?” I asked as I switched the channel back to the news. “Definitely not. The guy could press charges still. We take this secret to our graves.” Sarah said as she turned off the t.v.

10 YEARS LATER

I am now 28 years old and I am the youngest doctor in the hospital I work at. Ever since Sarah hit that guy with a car, and we never confessed, I developed so much guilt that I realized that I don't want to hurt people, I want to help them. Surprisingly, Sarah, Jake, Sasha, and I are all still friends. Jake became a therapist and Sasha works at the same hospital as me. We work on the same floor so I am more friends with her than Jake and Sarah. Speaking of Sarah, she became the owner of a chain of car dealerships. Everything was going so well in our lives, until that one day when everything changed.

It all started at one of Sarah’s car dealerships where Sarah was visiting for the day. She told us that there was a person who bought a car and looked exactly like the person she hit 20 years ago. Jake then said that a man had a therapy session with him and told him about how he has a fear of cars since he was hit 10 years ago. He also told him that he is trying to get over his fear today by buying a car. Since nothing weird happened to me and Sasha, we ruled it as a coincidence. After a week though, a man has rushed into the hospital Sasha and I work at and Sasha and I were told we had to do surgery on this guy that got in a car accident. Once we got upstairs and Sasha opened the door, she walked back out and ran to the bathroom. I follow her.

  “You have to be kidding me”, Sarah says as she splashes water on her face, “That guy should probably never touch a car again. They have it out for him.” “You think this is a sign from God? I mean, it can’t be a coincidence that he showed up where all three of us work at.” I ask Sasha. “What do you think God is trying to tell us?” Sasha asked. “God is probably telling us to save this man while we can instead of making him get hurt again”, I say to Sasha. She nods her head and we walk out of the bathroom confident that we are going to help this man. 

As we enter the room, we get rushed to the operating table and we get suited up for the operation. With everything we need, Sasha and I start doing surgery on the man. It was going good at first until all the pressure hit Sasha and she fainted. It was up to me to finish the operation. I was sweating like crazy and I couldn’t stop my hands from shaking. The only thing that kept me calm was knowing I could help this man now, unlike before. After the operation was finished, I splashed some cold water on Sasha to wake her up.

“Should we call his family?” Sasha asks. “Nah. I just want to apologize to him while he is asleep.” I say while facetime Sarah and Jake. “What are you doing?” Sasha asks. “I’m calling Jake and Sarah so we could all apologize,” I say as I turn my phone so Sarah and Jake could say their apologies. 

After we finish, the man wakes up and asks who we are. Sarah then answers, “We are just four people who want to say sorry.”