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soothing just like they are trained to be. “Are you there? Ma’am, are you there?”
    I hold Landon’s shirt up to my face again briefly when I taste the metallic blood running into my mouth. “We…uh…we were driving west bound down the highway and hit an oncoming car.”
    “Is anyone injured?”
    “Yes… there’s a guy… on the hood. I think he’s dead. And Steven…”
    “Steven what? Is he injured?”
    “Yes,” I cry out, Madison squeezes her eyes shut when she sees Cash take his hoodie and shirt off and pushes it inside the car in between the door and Steven. “Steven… he’s bleeding out from his side I think.”
    “Okay, you need to compress the wound, ma’am. Take a dry cloth and press it against the wound. I’ve dispatched aid vehicles. They’re five minutes out.” I yell out the orders to Cash, he yells back that he is already doing that. “If he bleeds through that, put another one on top of that. Don’t remove the first one. Just keep applying more and don’t move him.”
    I tell Cash everything they’re saying and look to Landon, his hands are on the pavement as he kneels on the ground. He vomits again, maybe from the adrenaline rushing through him or maybe it’s the alcohol.
    A car stops and asks us if we’re all okay. No one answers because we’ll never be okay again.
    I start crying harder and I think the dispatcher knows this and tries to calm me. “Ma’am, stay calm. We’re sending help, please stay on the line with me.”
    “Okay…” My voice trembles. In the distance, I hear the faint sirens and breathe a little easier.
    Cash puts one arm around Alexa and whispers in her ear. She’s fighting him and I see his mouth moving, speaking in soothing tones, trying to talk to her but she’s not having it. He’s so calm and collected you’d think he’d been in an accident before like this. I fear the worst in that moment like everything is suspended in time and we’re waiting for the inevitable impact.
    Steven is dying. I know it in my gut and I wish so damn much that it wasn’t true.
    Landon is standing there hunched over just staring at the car, his eyes wide. He doesn’t know what to do. I want to go to him but I don’t.
    What do I say? What do I do?
    Madison lays her head on my shoulder and I feel the warmth of her blood soaking through my hoodie.
    Cash shakes his head walking away from Alexa. He comes over and wraps his arms around Madison and me. I rest my head against his shoulder, suddenly it feels too heavy to hold up. Alexa screams, “Where are the police? Where are the fucking police?” so loud I flinch and I feel Madison jump, too.
    An older couple comes over to us a few minutes later after Cash walks away. The woman is asking Madison and me questions but neither of us are answering. What’s the point? It’s not going to change the events of tonight. There is some guy sitting next to Landon in the middle of the street and there are a bunch of people around Alexa and Steven.
    It’s too late…I want to scream but what’s it going to do? It won’t turn back the clock, lives have been irrevocably altered and utterly ruined.
    The sirens from the cops, fire trucks, ambulances fill the quiet. There’s lights shining over the wrecked cars and it’s then that I see how bad the accident really is. It’s a miracle that the five of us made it out alive.
    An EMT kneels so that he’s level with me. “Ma’am,” I look up, it’s all I can do. “Can you come with me, please, so that we can assess your injuries?”
    I nod and attempt to get up. Madison grabs my hand, it’s a life line for us. “It’s alright, Madison.”
    It’s a lie.
    Nothing will ever be the same.
    One moment changed everything forever.

What do you do once everything in your life changes?
    You survive.

Chapter One
     
    Three Years Later
    September 18, 2013
     
    Landon
    A game.
    The quarterback has a lot of choices and choices that are made on the field are rarely perfect.
    So he