Anything for Love

Anything for Love

I felt the pain in my head instantly. It was throbbing to the same beat as Taylor Swift singing “Shake it Off” in the background. Who the hell put this song on my radio? My entire mouth tasted like metal. What could that be?

I instinctively twisted my body to the right to look at Jay. He was so handsome. My rock. As I started to blink my eyes into focus, I realized he was dripping in blood. His head had a pretty severe gash across it. I’m sure his whole body was messed up but my head focused only on his face.

“Baby, baby, get up. I think we hit something,” I said as I tried to reach out and shove his arm. My own arm felt very heavy, almost impossible to lift. I tried again, and this time it felt as though I had made contact with him. “Baby. Look at me.”

He slowly maneuvered his eyes to stare into mine.

“Celeste, you need to get out of here. Go get us some help.”

“No, I can’t leave you. What did we hit? I don’t remember anything before I woke up.”

“I think I remember a deer running in front of the car. You swerved to miss it, and we skidded. I braced for impact. But I remember a tree. A big tree.”

I again slowly turn my face toward the front of my car. No doubt about it, we hit a tree. Or more like I hit a tree since I was the one driving. A massive tree, which appeared to have some low and long branches.

“Celeste, can you unbuckle?” Jay asked me.

“I think so. But Jay everything hurts. My head hurts. My eyes hurt. My chest hurts.”

“I need you to do us both a big favor. I need you to unbuckle and go find help.”

“Jay, just let me take a nap. I will feel better if I just close my eyes for a second. I think my nana is talking to me. She keeps saying, Celeste, go to sleep.”

“Celeste, get up. Do not fall asleep. Get out of this car. If not for yourself, do it for me. Don’t you want to save me? We can walk away in a bit, holding hands. Won’t it be nice to breathe fresh air again? Do you smell that? Fumes. Nobody wants their last memory to be of gas fumes. Please go.”

“Baby, you talk a lot. Just five minutes. Then I will get up. Say night, night.”

“Dammit, Celeste GET UP! Do not do this.”

I know he was yelling at me. I was just so tired. My body refused to move. And get out of the car. I wanted a nice long nap. Maybe follow the light I kept seeing when my eyes closed. It looked warm there. 

Then Jay said one last thing to me, “Please get up and go find help for me. Do this one thing for me and show me how much you love me.”

And I opened my eyes. Was he questioning my love for him? He knew how much he meant to me. Everything in life was for him. I would give up my own life, my own comfort to save him. Maybe that was what I needed to do to show him.

“Ok, no sleep right now. I will go find some help.” I reached down with my right hand and began to push down on the seat belt buckle. This small pressure released a wave of pain throughout my arm and shoulder. I thought about giving up and going back to rest, but I heard Jay’s voice asking me to do this for him. FInally it unbuckled and I twisted to open the door handle. 

When I pushed the door, my entire body almost tumbled to the ground. I righted myself and grabbed my forehead. The pain was intense. Worse than any migraine I have ever experienced. When I moved my hand away, it was dripping in blood. My head shared a matching gash with Jay.

“Shit, shit shit,” I yelled as I stumbled through the root covered grassy hill. Everything felt like obstacles put in front of me to stop me from my destination. I continued to repeat Jay’s words in my head. The only thing that was motivating me at all. 

When I reached the edge of the road, the area was baked in darkness. I prayed for someone to come along, unsure if I would be able to walk any farther. In the distance, a faint headlight glistened. “Please stop. Please stop,” I whimpered. I attempted to lift my arms to get the driver’s attention, but my muscles didn’t feel like working.

The driver seemed to notice me from a distance. It began to crawl in speed as it came closer.

“You alright, ma’am?” he asked as he rolled his window down.

“No,” I squeaked. I coughed to improve my voice level and said again, “No.”

He pulled his car over and quickly got out. He was by my side in a millisecond and scooped me up. “What happened to you?”

“My car. I hit a tree. My Jay, he needs help.” Then I blacked out.

When I awoke, I was surrounded by emergency personnel from police officers to hospital doctors.

“Well hello there young lady,” a smiling officer said next to me. “You had us scared for a bit there.”

I reached up to my head, which was still throbbing. There was a bandage covering the gash, and an IV attached to my wrist. “Jay, did you save Jay?” I whispered.

“The passenger in the vehicle? I am sorry ma’am, he did not survive.”

“What do you mean? Yes, he had to. I promised him I would get us help. To save him. I wanted to save him.”

“Ma’am when did he talk to you?”

“Right before I left the car to find help. He shoved me awake. Pushed me out. Told me to find help,” I yelled as I wrapped my arms around my stomach. Sickness taking over.

“When did you take the drive in your car?” the officer asked. He was making my head hurt more with all these questions.

“We went out to dinner tonight. We both had steak and we were on our way home.”

“And what night of the week is tonight?” he asked; another silly question.

“Thursday. Tonight is Thursday night.”

“I hate to break this to you, but it is Friday night. Your car accident was not tonight. And our coroner has already examined the body of the passenger. He seemed to have died on impact more than 18 hours ago based on body temperature and rigor mortis. He could not have spoken to you before you exited the vehicle.”

My mind is jumbled. I can hear his voice. He had spoken to me, hadn’t he? It felt so real. He was my motivation. Otherwise, I may have never gotten up. I may have stayed in that car hidden from the world. 

“The EMT’s say it's a miracle you found help when you did. The doctors in the ER whisked you away for life saving surgery. Internal bleeding and a ruptured spleen. If you hadn’t gotten it right when you did, you both would have died.”

Tears welled up in my eyes. I was having difficulty processing any of the news. Jay was gone, I was alive. I would have given up my own life to save him. 

“And baby, don’t you see, I gave up my own life to save yours,” I hear Jay say to me. I close my eyes and watch him walk into the light, turning once to wave goodbye.