Beautiful: Truth's Found When Beauty's Lost Part 8

"Megan, it's bad. It's very bad."

She couldn't move then.

James leaned over. "What is it? What's wrong?"

Will was sitting on a couch across from her. The coffee table was covered with empty beer bottles, a bong, and a bag of weed. "I had a text earlier that someone was in an accident."

"Ellie," Megan said, trying to know that this was really happening.

"I'll drive you," Will said.

They met her parents hurrying out of the emergency room.

"They're taking her to Davis," Dad said. "To the burn center."

"The burn center?" Megan asked, but her voice was drowned by the sound of a helicopter taking off. "Is that her?"

Dad could only nod. Mom looked like she should sit or be admitted herself.

"What happened?"

"We don't know. She was riding home with Stasia Fuller."

"What? Where was Ryan?"

Will stepped up then. "How bad is it, Mr. Summerfield?"

The look on her father's face sobered Megan up.

"Stasia died in the crash." Dad shook his head and started to cry.

Megan had never seen Dad cry, not ever.

"And they don't know if Ellie's going to make it."

Chapter 5.

THE OUTSIDER.

The Anonymous Blog about Life at West Redding High October 20

Comments: The newspaper said they were investigating what happened. They'd been at a party, so it doesn't take a genius.

They weren't drinking. People from the party even said so.

They saw Stasia with a drink. But not Ellie.

Why was Ellie riding with Stasia then?

We didn't break up."

Megan looked toward the waiting room and saw Ryan emerge from inside. He turned toward her in the hall, then walked the opposite way, but not before she saw the look on his face. She nearly called to him, but he was already near the end of the corridor.

Vanessa poked her head out of the waiting room, calling, "Ryan, I'm sorry." Then she saw Megan.

No, don't come talk to me.

Vanessa approached her.

That a group of Ellie's friends had driven down to sit in the waiting room in Davis was beyond annoying. They only added to the agony of this entire ordeal as they sat around chatting about random things, texting on their phones, crying as they talked about her sister. She wanted them all to leave. Megan understood why Ryan was there. And maybe Vanessa. But there were, like, ten other people, a few teachers, the princ.i.p.al, and two pastors from their church. The waiting room was smaller than her bedroom.

"Should I have told him?" Vanessa asked, pulling her hair into a ponytail and wrapping a band around it.

"You're asking me if, while in the hospital waiting room, you should have told Ryan that his girlfriend had broken up with him before she was in a serious car crash that may cost her life and that he blames himself for?" Are you really that blonde?

"All I said was sorry about them breaking up. I was trying to make him feel better. He wanted to see the text."

Megan shook her head. This was not a conversation she cared about right now. "Did she say that she actually broke up with him?"

"You read it."

I think Ryan and I just broke up. Sorry, I know you wanted the homecoming thing.

Seeing what were perhaps her sister's last words printed out on Vanessa's ridiculously bright pink phone sent a sharp jab of pain through Megan. And what last words were they? Ellie was worried that Vanessa would be mad at her. She was saying sorry over stupid homecoming.

"Listen, I don't care about this. But for the record, she didn't say they broke up. The words I think are sort of the clue there. So leave me alone. I just care if Ellie lives through the night." Megan unleashed a few profanities under her breath.

That got rid of Vanessa, though Megan felt a strange compulsion to hold on to the cell phone, to hold on to something of her sister. Vanessa's heels clicked down the hall. Seriously, who wore heels to the hospital when her best friend might die?

That Vanessa was Ellie's "best friend" had been just another irrational thing in Ellie's life that no one else seemed to recognize. While everyone thought Ellie was always reaching beyond and above, Megan felt she reached the wrong way. It was hard to admit, but her sister could have been even more.

The hospital sounds returned as Vanessa disappeared-someone moaned in a room, machines beeped, an announcement came over the intercom. Megan stood alone in the hall. Her parents were filling out paperwork. The cold and sterility surrounded her; fluorescent lights hurt her eyes. Ellie was in surgery in some room beyond the double doors. While Megan was smoking and drinking, Ellie had ridden home with a sober driver. Yet Ellie was the one severely burned with her life in jeopardy.

Megan woke from a dream where she and Ellie were talking.

"We're just different. That's why we hate each other."

"But I don't hate you," Ellie said.

Megan was trying to explain that they did in fact hate each other on the surface, but underneath they knew they'd always be there for one another. They'd formed a bond as little girls that wouldn't be broken by parental stupidity, a grandfather's favoritism and cruelty, school popularity and shunnings, or anything else.

She awoke in the middle of this dissertation with her neck aching. Several others slept around the waiting room. One girl was texting on her iPhone. Megan headed to the bathroom and then to the cafeteria.

"Here." She set a Styrofoam cup of coffee and a large number of cream and sugar packets on the table in front of Ryan, who sat alone at a table in the corner.

"Thanks," he said, rubbing bloodshot eyes.

She took a red stirry-thingie from the front pocket of her purse and set it down by the cup.

"When do they expect some news?" he asked, and Megan realized it had been only four hours since she'd seen him leave the waiting room. It felt like days.

"The surgeon will be out in about an hour, the nurse said."

Ryan looked at the wall clock and nodded. He sipped his coffee without adding anything, staring at the table. "I was about to go to the chapel."

Megan wondered if that was an invitation or a good-bye.

He hesitated. "Wanna come?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "It's better than the waiting room."

The chapel was just a small, empty room with a row of benches, a carpeted platform, and a wooden altar. On one side was a table with red candles. Only one was lit. Megan had expected something more chapelesque, like stained gla.s.s and an ornate altar.

Ryan walked to the table and lit a candle. She saw him close his eyes a moment. His dark brown hair was sticking up, and his T-s.h.i.+rt was wrinkled, jeans baggy. Even if he was a jock, Megan had to admit he was handsome. He was also broken. He found a place on a bench close to the front and seemed to forget that she was there.

Megan didn't know where to sit. By him, behind, or should she just go?

"You can sit here if you want," he said, glancing back at her.

She slid into the bench beside him. "If you want to be alone, just tell me."

He shook his head and ran his hands through his hair. "No, it's okay."

They sat in silence. Ryan leaned forward with his forehead resting on the back of the bench in front of them. Megan felt the quiet settle around them like a peace interrupting the noise. It carefully pushed out the distractions of Vanessa and friends in the waiting room, the distress in her mother's face-though she continued to act hospitable to everyone, as if they'd come to a party at her house-and the family members who kept calling Megan's phone for updates, as if all of this were easier on her than on Mom or Dad.

"I wonder if G.o.d gets sick of people only talking to Him when they're desperate," Ryan said, leaning back beside her. His eyes were on the empty wall above the carpeted altar area.

Megan didn't really want to think about G.o.d. She some times went to church if Mom begged long enough. There had been G.o.d discussions at parties. She'd thought about becoming a Buddhist for a while, but that was more to upset the family than to actually seek enlightenment. Long ago, she had loved Jesus. But that love seemed far, far away now. "If I were G.o.d, I would. But maybe not, since He's, you know, G.o.d and all."

"I thought you didn't believe in G.o.d."

Megan glanced around nervously. "You shouldn't say that while we're in a chapel."

He glanced at her with an eyebrow raised.

"I'm not really an atheist. I told Ellie that so she'd stop inviting me to youth group. She was driving me crazy."

Ryan smiled then. "She always invited me too. I only went sometimes, to see her." His smile faded. "We got in a fight before the party."

Megan shrugged. "People get in fights."

"We didn't break up. Vanessa got a text from Els saying we might have broken up or something like that. So she tells that to everyone."

Megan closed her eyes. The pain radiated from Ryan. He really did love her sister. As in, really loved. Megan had always thought of him as another dumb athlete, and maybe he was that, though he was surprising her a lot in just the short time she'd been talking to him.

"If she doesn't make it through this . . ."

Megan wanted to say, "She will." But the truth was, Megan didn't know that. The realization hit like a slap to her face.

"If I had driven her home . . . I should have taken her home . . . or we never should have gone to Mitch's." Ryan shook his head and spoke quietly, not with self-pity but with such a burden of guilt.

Megan could think of nothing to say that could make it better. So she closed her eyes again. And before long, she was asking G.o.d for help whether it annoyed Him or not. They needed it. For Ellie, for Stasia's family, and for each of them as well.

Chapter 6.

THE OUTSIDER.

The Anonymous Blog about Life at West Redding High November 1

Comments: What's happening on "The Outsider"?

Can anyone find out more about Ellie? I heard she was burned in the fire. It's been a week. Who went to Stasia's memorial?