“Don’t!” I cried, putting my hand on his arm. “Remember what we were told in class when the paramedics talked to us. He might have a spinal injury that you’ll make worse.”
He pulled his hands off Noel as if Noel’s body had turned to molten steel.
“Is he bleeding badly?” Susie asked through her tears.
“No,” Bobbi said, a little calmer. “But he’s not regaining consciousness. Everyone else all right?”
“I hurt my arm, but it’s not broken.”
“We’re okay,” Kent said.
Both Susie and Bobbi started to cry. I didn’t. Maybe I was in a state of shock, but I felt a certain calmness, almost as if I had left my body and was above it all watching, just like some uninvolved observer, detached enough to do and say the right things.
“Put your jacket gently under Noel’s head,” I told Kent.
He nodded, stripped it off, and did as I said.
“Does Eddie have a first-aid kit in the car?” I asked Susie.
“I don’t know.”
She shouted for him. He was now screaming at the old man for being an idiot. His wife started shouting back. I opened the door and got out.
“Stop it!” I shouted at Eddie. “You’re not doing any good. Wait for the police and the ambulance. Do you have a first-aid kit?”
He looked at me, then muttered some curse words, and returned to the car. I got back in, too.
“No, I don’t have a first-aid kit,” he said. “They shouldn’t let people that old drive. He looks like he’s ninety.”
“You weren’t watching the road, Eddie. None of us was,” I said.
He spun around.“Bullshit. The guy just backed out without looking.”
“Forget about it,” Kent said. “Just let Eddie ta
lk to the police,” he told me sternly.
Eddie glared a moment more, and then we all sat there, dazed and still, until we heard the sound of sirens. The patrol car arrived first, and Eddie got out again to talk to the police. One of the officers looked in at Noel.
“Has he been unconscious all this time?” he asked.
Bobbi said yes. He felt for Noel’s pulse and then turned and spoke into the phone on his shoulder. Minutes later, the ambulance arrived. We all got out and watched the paramedics carefully remove Noel from the SUV and get him onto the stretcher to load him into the ambulance. One of the patrolmen began to take down our names, addresses, phone numbers, and information about Noel. While he did that, a tow truck arrived and began to hook up Eddie’s SUV. The elderly man, whose name we learned was Mr. Morgan, was able to drive his car back onto his driveway and out of the street.
“My father’s going to skin me alive if they don’t rule this was the old man’s fault,” Eddie said. “My insurance is high enough as it is. Damn.”
“I think we should be worrying more about Noel,” I said.
No one said anything, but I could see they all agreed. Eddie asked the policemen about helping us follow the ambulance to the hospital. The police told him one of us had to call his or her parents.
“I’ll call my father,” Kent volunteered. “Let me borrow your phone.”
Eddie handed it to him, and Kent moved off to speak privately with his father. I wanted to call Cassie, but I was afraid of what she would say. I would have hated to have my father come out, too.
Kent’s father arrived pretty quickly after the call. He was concerned first about each of us and thought Bobbi should have her arm checked out at the hospital immediately. We all fell into an even deeper silence as Kent’s father drove us to the hospital. He brought Bobbi to the admittance desk, and a nurse took her to an examination room to check her arm. Eddie, Susie, Kent, and I sat in the lobby waiting to hear about Noel. When we saw his parents arrive, we grew even more terrified. Noel’s father came out a while later. He looked very angry.
“What the hell happened?” he asked Eddie.
Despite all his bravado, Eddie began to cry as he explained and blamed the elderly man for shooting out without looking. I heard him tell Noel’s father that he hadn’t had much of a chance to avoid hitting him. He said nothing about Susie distracting him, however. I looked away, ashamed. Noel’s father marched off again.