myself.
I got an emoji blowing a heart back at me, which I took as a good sign.
Four o’clock crawled by. Five o’clock was punctuated by Hal getting home—apparently, he’d received permission to leave the puppy at Phee’s house until tomorrow morning, which was lucky. It meant I could take Max home and not have to worry about waking the dog if we got busy. Which…fuck, that would be nice. Everything was nice with Max so far, but the sex we’d had this morning was revelatory for me.
I had never been like that with another person, felt so powerful and open and soft all at once. I’d never been welcomed like that, either. It might be possible, just possible, that Max liked me almost as much as I liked him. I wasn’t the type of guy to believe in happily-ever-afters, not after the way my parents’ relationship imploded and my brother’s wife dropped everything and ran, yet with Max, I wanted to be that guy.
Five thirty came and went, and everyone at Hal’s was getting ready to head to the church. It was a little early for them to be leaving, but it had started snowing again about an hour ago, and Hal liked to drive like an old lady when the roads were slick. I stared anxiously at the clock—half an hour. I could be at the church from here in fifteen minutes; the play would have just started. I could sidle in and grab a seat next to Max and watch the festive fusion unfold, and we could try to make sense of it together. It was going to be perfect. Five forty-five. Five fifty.
The next shift showed up—Amos and David were nice guys, especially because they could have pulled rank and shoved their shift off onto me for Christmas, but they hadn’t. Amos brushed some snow off the shoulders of his jacket as he nodded to me. “Getting cold out there,” he said cheerfully.
“Looks it,” I said. Five fifty-five. Almost—
“Heads up, guys!” our desk sergeant called out. “Highway patrol is asking for backup for a head-on collision on State Route 10. Injuries were reported and paramedics are on the way, but they need help managing the traffic and handling witnesses.”
David sighed. “Sounds like all hands on deck. So much for a quiet Christmas Eve.” He glanced at me. “I hate to do this, Nicky, but—”
“No problem,” I said immediately, swallowing my bitterness—I had a job to do, and hell if I was going to bitch about it just because it was inconvenient. “I’ll follow you guys out.” I pulled out my phone for a quick text to Max and Hal: Big car accident. I might not make the play.
I got two messages a minute later. Hal’s was a picture of the stage, complete with living menorah, and the caption, You’re only missing out if you planned to watch this stoned, and a simple two words from Max: Be safe. Yeah, I’d do my best.
…
The spot we drove out to was only a quarter mile or so from where Max had gone off the road. There were cars piled up in each direction, most of them as far onto the shoulder as they could get with the snow there. I eked out a path in my Jeep and headed straight for the flashing lights of the ambulances. I had some medic training from my time in the army, and I didn’t know how many injured there were yet.
Thankfully, it wasn’t as bad as it looked—from the chatter I could make out, everyone was alive, if not uninjured. I couldn’t make it out very well, actually—there were a lot of lights and sounds and people, horns honking and engines revving irritably. Stepping into that maelstrom was like getting hit in the face by a memory sucker punch. I had to shut my eyes and do a breathing exercise for a few seconds to ground myself in reality.
It’s cold here, not hot. There are no dead bodies here, just a few people who got injured. You’re okay. You’re okay. You’re still breathing, you’re not hurt, hold it together. You can do this. You can do this.
My counselor had talked a lot about the beneficial effects of positive self-talk, and I’d kind of laughed it off in session, but right now it was the only thing keeping me from bolting.
Amos’s hand found my shoulder and squeezed gently, bringing me back to the present. I started to apologize, but he just shook his