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Zoe and I take a Tumble
Erin Flora
I was taking Zoe to the pediatrician’s urgent care office in Independence that night. I thought she had an ear infection. Kids with cleft palates are supposed to be more prone to ear infections, or so I had heard. I was always on red alert for signs of infection. She had been acting funny for a couple of days, crying and rubbing her nose and ears. Off to urgent care we went. I had buckled Zoe into her care seat wearing her green sleeper and white sweater with big, fuzzy flowers around the hem. I climbed into the other side of the truck and pulled the seatbelt over my pumpkin colored Yellowstone t-shirt. I hadn’t been consistent about wearing my seatbelt in the previous few weeks because I’d been so depressed and out of whack. I remembered that night. I always remembered when I was with Zoe.
I backed down the driveway and drove off into the night. There was no hurry because I had left early so as to make it in time for the 8:45 appointment without having to rush. I got up to speed quickly as the last light on 40 highway turned green and when the truck hit 55 miles per hour, I eased off the gas to go around the curve there at Robert’s Nursery. Coming out of the curve, there appeared to be headlights from a car on the other side of the road. My mind almost dismissed these headlights before I realized the trees from the nursery in the median would prevent me from seeing cars on the other side of the highway. Then there came one of those awful double take, deer in the headlights, train coming and I’m stuck on the track kind of moments.
I swerved into the right lane. Then the car coming at me swerved into the right lane. I swerved back into the left lane. And then the other car swerved back into the left lane. It was a disgusting rendition of the “passing in the hallway” dance. As I tried, once again, to swerve back into the right lane, the passenger corner of my beautiful red truck slammed into the front passenger quarter panel of her demonic gold Chevy Malibu. I felt it in my bones; I heard the crunch of cars becoming non-functional. Unfortunately, I’ve never been afforded the luxury of passing out in dire circumstances. The mind, however, can only take in so much information. With the chaos of the wreck going on around me, I ended up with snap shots of action and emotion. I was left to piece together the missing moments of my life.
Time leapt forward. I felt the truck’s rear end sliding to the left as I numbly wondered what Zoe was doing. I felt the truck about to tip. I closed my eyes. Time leapt forward. I felt the roof of the truck cave in. My head was shoved onto my right shoulder. I wondered if Zoe was still in the truck. I wondered whether I would ever see her again. I thought, I’m dead if this truck rolls anymore. Time leapt forward. The truck was sliding down the road. I could feel the motion. I couldn’t hear anything. I never thought to scream. Time leapt forward. The truck slammed into something and we came to a stop. I didn’t know where I was or what was going on outside. I couldn’t see anything. Then I remembered I had my eyes closed, so I opened them.
I still couldn’t see anything, but I could hear Zoe screaming. I took the first breath in what seemed like ages and let go of the steering wheel. I was pretty sure that it was no longer doing anything as far as steering went. I forced my right hand over to the passenger side. I groped around until I could feel my Zoe’s face. Her eyes were squeezed shut and her cave of a mouth was wide open. Good. If she could scream like that, then she couldn’t be that badly hurt, right? Screaming was definitely better than dead. I tried to soother has I moved my hand down to the seat belt buckle. I popped the buckle loose and fell to the roof of the truck, my shoes flying off my feet as I landed. I had neither the time nor the wherewithal to search for them. There were many more important things to deal with.
I started shoveled things out of my way, trying desperately to get over to my baby. It’s amazing how stuff multiplies when we need to get somewhere quickly. Bags and books and compact discs all went flying as I forced my way closer to Zoe.
“It’s okay, baby. We’re going to be okay.” Maybe if I repeated it often enough, it would be true. It became my mantra for the next few moments. I’ve not met anyone, so far, that has attempted to remove an eight month old baby form a car seat in the pitch black while it was hanging upside down. For some reason, they don’t go over that in the parenting classed they force you to attend before they will allow you to take your brand spanky new baby home from the hospital. I struggled helplessly with her harness. They make those things impossible to work with when you’re right side up. Trying to invert the mechanics of a baby seat when you’re not really in your right mind should be a form of torture used to break down hardened criminals. I was soon reduced to screaming hysterically. I found out later, when my husband called the man who had come to assist me out of the truck, that I had been reduced to screeching the most basic of stereotypical motherly pleas for help.
“Oh god My baby Somebody help my baby ” I screamed over and over again as I worked frantically at the harness of the care seat. I managed to unbuckle the strap and Zoe’s legs came out. She was hanging there by her head, still screaming. I screamed some more from pure frustration. I had forgotten the stupid plastic doodad that holds the straps in place over her chest. I managed, by some miracle, to work her head free of the straps and pull her to my chest. A horrible thought came to me as I made to turn around. How was I going to get out? I couldn’t break out the window with my bare feet. Hell, I didn’t even know how much time I had to get out. That truck could blowup any second. With dread in my heart I turned myself around. The window had broken out during the accident. I don’t think I’ve ever thanked God so much for broken glass. I made my way to the window with Zoe clutched to my chest. The opening was much smaller than it had been previous to the accident. I took a deep breath and prepared for the worst. I squeezed through the broken, bent, malformed window frame on two knees and one hand, still screaming and toting a screaming Zoe with me. By some miracle I managed not to get scraped or cut up any more than I already was.
As I was exiting the vehicle, I saw two or three pairs of legs. Apparently my screaming had attracted someone’s attention. I glanced down the road and saw the bottle of windshield wiper fluid standing upright in the middle of the road. I couldn’t help but think that it was supremely unfair that the bug juice got to be right side up, but Zoe and I were reduced to hanging upside down like a couple of oversized bats. I stood up, still screaming, still clutching Zoe. She was screaming. I was screaming. I looked at her. She looked at me. We screamed together. I eventually came to the realization that, if I stopped screaming, then Zoe would stop screaming, too. I managed to choke my screams back.
I stared around me with a numb sense of awe. The truck was on its roof behind me, a crumpled and sad looking mess. I shivered and looked away. There was a wide trail of debris leading back up the road. It sparkled in the headlights of the cars that had pulled up after the accident. I wanted to walk down the road to see if the people in the other care were okay. After staring really hard at all that glass and then glancing down at my feet, I decided against it. I asked the man next to me if he knew anything about the condition of the people in the other care. He knew nothing. He had been galvanized into running my direction by the hysterical screaming about a baby. He asked me if I was okay. I blinked at him and he pointed to my left elbow. I looked down at the large gouge in my arm with bemused wonder. I shrugged and asked if I could use his phone. I called Doug at work, but he didn’t answer his cell phone. I ended up calling my parents. My mother answered the phone.
“Hello?” She sounded calmer than I thought she should.
“Mom?” No matter how calm I try to sound in the midst of a problem, it always seems to show up in my voice.
“What’s wrong, Erin?” She didn’t sound so calm anymore.
“I’ve been in a wreck. I’m not hurt and Zoe’s fine.” I probably should have told her Zoe was okay first. Once you’ve had a baby, you don’t seem to matter anymore.
“Hold on, Erin. I’m giving the phone to your father.” I could hear her telling my dad that I’d been in a wreck.
“Where are you, Erin?” My dad’s never been one to waste words.
“I’m on 40 Highway past Woods Chapel. I’m standing on the side of the road.”
“What happened?”
“It wasn’t my fault, Dad. I—“At twenty-seven years of age I still had to defend myself.
“I don’t care whose fault it is. Just tell me what happened.” So I spent the next few moments reliving my very recent horror. I had to have been babbling by the end. “Erin ”
“What?” My eyes felt wide enough to hold a three course dinner.
“Calm down. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“I can see the ambulance coming. I don’t know if I’ll be here.” I watched the ambulance creep up the road.
“I’ll find you.” We hung up as the ambulance pulled up and the side door swung open. I handed the cell phone back to the man, thanking him as I climbed about the small, sterile sanctuary that is an ambulance. I had never been in an ambulance before. I can honestly say that I was not impressed and I hope to never have to climb into another one as long as I live.
The EMT had me sit down on the gurney. They examined me and Zoe and interrogated me about every detail of my life up to the moment I heaved myself aboard the S.S. Medicine Van. They were particularly amazed that I had been able to get Zoe out of the car seat. I could only blink in the face of their amazement. What was I supposed to do? Leave her hanging upside down in a truck that might blow up? I was more amazed that there was anyone in the world that would have left their baby in the vehicle while they made like cowards, turned tail, and got the hell out. There came a knock at the door. It was a member of the State Highway Patrol.
“You wouldn’t happen to have anyone in there that knows what happened out here, do you?” The officer peered in through the side door of the ambulance.
“As a matter of fact, we do. This young lady can tell you anything you need to know.” The EMT resumed wrapping my elbow as the trooper climbed in. I proceeded to tell my story for the third or fourth time that night. He took notes, asking me any number of questions and taking down my and Zoe’s information. There came another knock at the door. The trooper opened the door and the thunderously worried faces of my Dad and older brother, Dave appeared. Dad’s eyes darted to Zoe, sitting on my lap, and then to my face.
“We’re fine, Dad.”
“How the ******** did you get out of that truck? ? ” Dave lurched forward, trying to get into the ambulance. He never was good in bad situations.
“I don’t know, Dave. I just did.” I wasn’t entirely sure it wasn’t a trick question. I obviously hadn’t gotten out in the normal way. He looked at the truck and then back at me.
“How did you get out of that truck?” He was nearly screaming by this point.
“I….I don’t know ” Dad must have seen my eyes getting larger.
“Dave, be quiet.” Dad scowled at him. “What do you need out that truck, Erin?”
“Um…” I must have done a lot of looking blank that night. I just couldn’t seem to get my thoughts together. “My purse, my backpack. Zoe’s diaper bag. Any school books you see. And…uh….my shoes?”
“Your shoes?” His eyes narrowed.
“They kind of fell off.” I smiled weakly at him. “Eh he he.”
“Goddammit, Erin I’ve told you not to wear those god damned sandals when you’re driving ”
“I’m sorry.” I hung my head. I was reduced to being five again.
“What hospital are you going to?” Well, that was a good question. I didn’t know and, as it turned out, nobody else did, either. Apparently taking an adult and a child in the same ambulance creates its own special problems. The children’s hospital wouldn’t take me and the adult hospital wouldn’t take Zoe when the children’s hospital was right next door. I told them I’d get out and walk across the street, but, apparently, that isn’t allowed. So we ended up going to a different hospital. In retrospect, I should have just had my dad drive us to the hospital.
After an extremely long time sitting around in the ambulance, I was treated to a singularly unimpressive ride to the hospital. I didn’t even rate sirens or flashing lights. When I got there, the doctor checked me out and signed me up for a chest X-ray and abdominal CT scan. The X-ray happened right away and only took a couple of minutes. The CT scan took a bit longer to set up because of the horrible, bitter, orange flavored nastiness that I was forced to imbibe beforehand. It said right on the cup that it should be served cold. I got it room temperature. It was all I could do not to throw it right back up. In the midst of my suffering, the State Trooper showed up. After having inquired about the passengers of the other care to everyone and their proverbial dog, I finally found out that they were going to be fine. They were in much worse condition than we were, but they would live. It turned out that the driver had just turned fifteen not more than two weeks earlier. The passenger was still fourteen. They were driving an older friends’ car. I looked at the wall when the Trooper told me all this.
“It’s okay to be angry, Mrs. Flora.” He practically yelled it at me. “I wasn’t even in that truck and I’m pissed off ”
“They had no right.” I nearly whispered, staring at the wall.
“You’re damned right, they had no right ” He gave me the information of the owner of the car and the two girls driving it. I thanked him and he left. I spent most of the night in that ER. It was two-thirty in the morning before I was discharged, no that it was easy to leave. After my X-ray and CT scan were complete and every nurse and doctor on the floor had stopped by to goo goo over Zoe in her miniature hospital gown, I was forgotten. Dad stopped by to pick up Zoe. Doug and I just sat there waiting. I cleaned up my elbow and shoulder and all the myriad tiny scratches on my forearms from all the glass I had crawled through. I had to beg for a tub to wash my feet in to get the glass out of the soles. I practically had Doug tackle someone to clean the laceration in my scalp. After all this, we waited and waited. And waited.
I finally got up and hobbled around the nurse’s station. The doctor asked the nurses why I was still in the ER. I rolled my eyes and went back to my room. Someone finally came in with my discharge papers. I pointed to my elbow where there was still a gaping wound. She stared at it dumbly before going to get help. When help arrived I was further tortured by having adhesive applied around my gaping wound before Steri-strips were applies. The adhesive hurt more than the hole did. Armed with a pair of booties to cover my bare feet, I hobbled out to the care with the assistance of my husband. We made it home with no further trouble and, after struggling out of my dirty, glass and dirt covered clothes, I fell into bed. It took mere seconds for me to fall asleep.
It’s been one long struggle since then. I struggled with the auto insurance company. I struggled with the health insurance company. I struggled with the ambulance company. They not only charged me $899 for a slow ride to the hospital, they charged me $899 to hold my daughter on my lap on the way there. They got huffy with me when I suggested that, next time, I’d leave Zoe sitting in the middle of the road. The girl on the phone didn’t think that was the answer, but she couldn’t provide a better one. We had to buy a car to the tune of $6600. Thousands and thousands of dollars, we’ve paid. The young lady who was driving was ordered to pay us $45. I joked to my husband that is almost bought me a tank of gas. We finally were reimbursed for everything several months later.
The money wasn’t such a big deal, though. The impact on my psyche was much worse than the impact on my wallet. I have a very hard time riding in cars now. I sometimes freeze when I’m driving at night and someone is coming down the other side of the road. A moment of sheer panic takes over. I was so very angry for so very long. I cannot explain the rage that lived inside of me. I look at my Zoe each day and pray that she is not taken from me. Every smile is a miracle and the feel of her tiny hand wrapped in a death grip around my index finger is the greatest comfort I’ve ever been afforded. I never got to explain to those girls what it was that they almost took from me. I don’t think that they’ll ever understand. No mother should find out so early on what I was forced to realize. No matter what I do, how vigilant I am, or how hard I try, I cannot protect my baby from everything. There’s always some idiot out there with a sense of entitlement. They think they have the right to do whatever stupid thing they are doing. It’s all fun and games until everything goes so horribly wrong. Then it’s all a pile of excuses and apologies. I cannot save Zoe, I can only cherish her. So I hoard every hug and every kiss and hold very “Ma-Ma” she utters close to my heart. Now I know what there is to lose. I know that I can lose it at any moment. And I know how easily it can be lost.