"Now, if you say anything bad about this one...Bill..." I warned as I stepped out of the changing room with the dress on. It felt right and as I stepped outside and looked at myself I felt that this was the dress I had been looking for, although it was slightly big.
Mom should have been there to help me find it, but I was glad that Bill was the one to clap his hands together as he stared at me.
"I have nothing to say about this!" He cursed under his breath. "Have I ever told you how lucky Tom is?" I nodded. "Because since I know you, I kinda felt that he had a thing with you that none of us had... and...now you're getting married!" His smile grew so wide I smiled too. "Isn't this crazy?"
"Yeah..." I agreed.
"He's happy, you know?" I looked at Bill through the reflexion. "He can't stop writing music, it's like...he's super inspired. I think it's because of you."
That same night we went out to a restaurant with some other friends of Bill and Tom's, I got lost in conversation with them, they were all joking around and talking about anything that came to mind. My phone rang and I told Bill a few seats away from mine that I'd be outside as I stepped into the street to answer away from the loud laughter and noise of the crowded place.
"Hello, Jo Jurado." I answered the phone.
"Hola, ho-hola?" The woman on the other end spoke Spanish, but she had a weird accent I hadn't heard ever in my life.
"Sí, diga?" I spoke Spanish to the lady. She let out a breath and kept speaking.
"Josefina Jurado?" I murmured a "yeah".
"Digo...sí, sí...soy yo. ¿Quién habla?"(I mean...yes, yes...that's me. Who's this?) I asked the lady who was calling who she was.
I immediately knew what it was about when the lady explained she was calling from a hospital in Mexico, I almost drop the phone; I had to back off into the wall and lean there as she kept speaking.
"They were in a car crash." I repeated after the lady. "How are they?" My brain was going on and on too fast to even decipher my own thoughts, but I could still speak Spanish, somehow...
"I cannot give patient's information through the phone, I'm sorry; you'll have to come to the hospital." I raged right then.
"Are you aware that you're calling all the way to Los Angeles? It's not a drive away and I cannot be there in five minutes!" I yelled into the phone.
"I'm really sorry. It's hospital rules." The lady kept her cool while I felt like vomiting.
"Well, thank you then!" I was angry. "If anything happens do call me, is that not against the rules?"
"No, Miss..."
"Look...I'm sorry. What's the name of the hospital and where exactly is it?" I calmed myself down and listened carefully before thanking the Mexican lady and hanging up with tears staining my face. I wrote the information on a note in my phone and yelled into the street earning a couple of glares from people passing by. "Fuuuuuck!"
"Hey, was that you?" Tom appeared from the restaurant and looked at me leaning on the wall. "What's wrong?" He tried to hold my hands while I held on to my own torso to keep myself from yelling anymore, not once had anything like that ever happened to me. "Hey, Jo; take it easy!" He said loudly as I pushed him away with my eyes closed.
"No, no! I'm not taking it anyway!" I yelled at him, as he stared with a straight face. "I'M NOT TAKING IT EASY BECAUSE I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED!"
"What are you talking about?" Tom tried taking my hand in his again; failing once more as I didn't want him to hold me because then I would completely break down into a horrible crying mess, I always did.
"DON'T TOUCH ME, TOM." I warned him, he let out a laugh and reached out again, this time not caring how much I pushed him away; he got his arms around me and in a second I was leaning almost all my weight on him as I cried into his chest getting his white sweater-like shirt wet. "Dad was in a car crash. The girls were on the car with him." I let out as I held on to him as tight as I could.
"Shhh..." He rubbed my back and whispered on my ear. "It will be alright, we'll take a flight and you'll see, they're all gonna be alright."
"If something happened...Tom...I would die." I bit on my bottom lip as Tom kissed my forehead.
"Jo, they're gonna be fine, don't talk like that."
The next few hours were horrible; I bit my nails all the way to the airport. Bill was going with us and Tom had to pack for me as I couldn't even fold my socks leave alone the shirts. I was worried sick, but we had to wait to get to the hospital. On the plane it wasn't much better because I wasn't allowed to have Bora with me, at least stroking her calmed me down a little bit, but with a text to one of the guys' friends we had left the dogs, sure that they would be taken care of while we were done.
As we arrived to the hospital almost one day later I ran up to the nurse in the desk by the entrance, the guys were tired, I could see it and I could feel myself tired as well, but neither of them wanted to stay at the hotel we had checked into after arriving to the unknown city of Quintana Roo.
"Hello, I'm here for the Jurado family?" I asked in Spanish. After looking at her computer's screen for a few minutes she looked up at me.
"I only have an Alvaro Jurado in the intensive care unit." She said which didn't help me at all to find some peace. Bill and Tom stood next to me in that moment.
"Can you look for Ulrike Jurado?" I said; the boys stared without understanding.
"...Yes, I'm sorry... her body's in the morgue." She replied, I breathed in feeling my mouth running dry and then asked again with fear.
"Jazmin Jurado?" She typed again and turned her eyes to me shaking her head. This, the boys understood and Tom placed his arm around my waist as I felt my eyes water and held tightly to the edge of the desk as my knuckles turned white, it scared me to ask again, but even with the knot on my throat I had to. "Liliana Jurado, please."
"She's in paediatrics." She said with a sorry smile on her face.
I asked where to find my father and sister and then turned to the boys.
"I need to see my dad." I told them.
"I'll go see Lily, don't worry." Bill hugged me briefly before I told him which way to go.
"I'll be here with you." Tom held my hand all the way to the intensive care unit. Dad was lying on a bed with machines all around him; I recognised the bag of blood they were giving him.
I was already crying when we arrived but when I saw the amount of machines he was hooked to my first instinct was to turn to Tom next to me and hold on to him for some support, which he gave, placing his chin on top of my head when he put his arms around me before a doctor approached us. They said it was pretty serious, he had been hit by a bigger car; fortunately he was sitting on the opposite side to the one that was hit. Ulrike and Jazmin had been hit by the car; while Lily had made it with only a couple of scratches, a broken arm and some burns on her legs because she had been secured on her special chair.
The doctor required me to identify the bodies too, which I had to do because there was no more family to do it and I wasn't going to throw that responsibility on Tom or Bill. I had to do it, and I had to do it on my own.
"Are you sure?" Tom asked me as I stepped into the elevator with the doctor.
"I am." I managed to say before letting go of his hand. "Wait in dad's room, don't leave him alone please." I told him, afraid that my father would wake up while I was gone and be sad when no one was there for him.
"If you're sure after a glance, tell me and we'll cover them." The doctor, an older man told me. "They're quite a sight, I'm not gonna lie to you."
The hallway to the morgue was a long and cold place; I walked behind the doctor who opened the door to the freezing room where the bodies were kept, I had to hold my light sweater closer around me while trying to keep myself calmed as he pulled a drawer out. It wasn't any drawer though, but a large iron plate with a body on it.
The body was under a greenish blanket. The doctor looked at me and I nodded, he lifted the blanket and I saw my step-mother. I painfully noticed that her hair had never stood out so much against her freckled skin.
"It's her." I closed my eyes, trying to ignore the smell and the awful image of pale lifeless Ulrike that I had on my mind.
"This one will be harder. Are you ready?" The doctor was patient with me as I walked forward to the other body. He took it out and I was in front of a smaller body covered by a blanket.
The man uncovered the body and I felt the heaviness of my saliva turning thick on my mouth, a big knot appeared in my throat. I still had to look, because it seemed so unrecognisable. Burns, cuts and missing pieces of my sister. It hurt too much having such a struggle in my head in order to tell if it was her or not. But in the end, when it was almost too painful I had the certainty.
"Yes, it's Jazz." I said through gritted teeth before storming out of the room and into the hallway where I found a trash can and emptied the contents of my stomach in it. I heard the doctor when he walked out; he was scribbling something on his clipboard.
"Can I give you something?" He asked as I nodded with my head still over the trash can.
"Did it hurt?" I cried out.
"Your sister?" I nodded. "No. It was instantly, what you saw was post-mortem, I can assure you: she didn't suffer."
I spent that night next to dad's bed, Lily wasn't discharged because she had hit her head and they wanted to have her in observation for a little longer. Bill was with her, he was being an amazing friend to us, and I knew dad would appreciate all of the boys' support so much when he heard about it...
Tom called his and my mother while I was tuning out on the chair next to dad's bed; I kept quietly twisting my engagement ring with clammy hands and biting on my lip.
Tom had insisted on going to the hotel, but I didn't want to leave. After what I saw, I couldn't close my eyes for long and my father's state kept me worried.
"Jo, you'll get hospitalized too if you don't rest." Tom tried, but I told him to go to sleep.
"If you're tired go to the hotel to sleep, I won't be mad but I won't leave." I said to him as I held on to my father's fragile hand. There was another chair in the corner of the room.
"I'm not leaving you now." He pushed the chair and placed it next to me, Tom's beard was messy with no trim for a little more than two days now and his eyes looked tired; but he still held on to my left hand intertwining our fingers and kissed the back of my hand before resting our hands on his lap and letting me lean my head on his shoulder. "You mean the world to me." I felt the light kiss on the top of my head as I gave his hand a squeeze. Even if an I love you would've worked better, I held on to what I had.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
So...sad... I am sorry, I write what comes to my mind and well...this one is an emotional moment. Let that sink in.
Thank you for reading and voting; and please write a comment and let me know what you're thinking about the story now!