Yesterday, we got a phone call from Joy, my stepmother in Atlanta (or Marietta to be more precise). Me and my aunt huddled around the phone in curiosity as my grandma tried to decipher exactly what Joy was telling her. Joy has a tendency to be loud and all over the place with her explanations.
By the end of that phone call, I could tell that my grandma was a little upset. When she got off the phone, she turned around and told us that she didn't know any details but my biological father and my brother had been in a car accident.
My aunt was calm, almost as if the most depressing news would be nothing to her. On the other hand, I could feel the muscles in my stomach and shoulders tense as I waited for more details. My aunt seemed to read my face and told me not to stress and I assured her that I wasn't stressing at all.
But I was and for multiple reasons.
First of all, he's my brother and I was closest to him growing up. He's two years and two days younger than me and I spent a lot of my childhood protecting him from the neighborhood we were in and from stupid bullies. It was always my job to protect my little siblings and now that he's so far away, I feel useless whenever he gets into some kind of trouble because I can't rush to his rescue (not that he needs it now).
Secondly, last year, my friend Bryan Roman died in a car accident (I think in October). He was driving and a drunk soldier plowed into his car, ignoring the stop sign he should have stopped at, and caused Bryan's car to flip over numerous times before it landed on its roof. The paramedics say he died at the scene. The report says that the entire accident wasn't Bryan's fault...but we all knew that anyway. And Bryan had been such a great friend and such a great person and it angered and upset me so much that he died like that. He had so many dreams and so much potential.
After that, I had been a little paranoid about driving for a while. I mean, now I'm fine with driving, but I have my moments where I end up saying a little prayer because I remember Bryan's accident and feel I need some heavenly comfort.
But to hear that my brother was in an accident and not know exactly what happened? That was almost devastating and I couldn't help but to internally panic. I didn't want him to die. I didn't want him to be overly hurt (or hurt at all really).
Later on, we got another phone call saying that the car had been hit on the driver's side and that Ron, my biological father, was driving and Marcus was in the passenger's seat. That was pretty much all we knew and both of them were taken to the hospital. I felt slightly better, but not much. Just because he wasn't on the side that got hit didn't mean that he didn't have an injury or two anyway.
I played some League of Legends to take my mind off of it for a while. My stressing and panicking wasn't helping me out in the slightest, and in fact, it was making me sick to my stomach.
By the time I got a call from my brother, I had calmed down considerably. He called to banter about how they crashed into "his" car and how he was going to get them for it and I couldn't help but to laugh at his silly priorities. He assured me he was fine. His leg had hit the dashboard and the rear view mirror that had fallen had hit him in the head. Besides that, he was fine. Ron on the other hand, no one's sure about yet but he isn't hurt too badly either, all things considered.
Marcus told me that they were going to Little Caesar's and someone in the lane beside them decided to make an illegal right turn...right into their car. The other car then took off (supposedly because they didn't have a driver's license). They were eventually caught, I think. And thank goodness.
I hate illegal drivers that end up hurting people. You'd think they'd be more careful knowing that they aren't supposed to be driving. People greatly disappoint me.
But my brother and biological father are safe...and I'm severely happy about that.
