Crashing Upwards

Chapter One

Harper

The unmistakable tang of blood filled my mouth. My brain was fuzzy as I tried to open my eyes, but it was like they were superglued shut. My shoulder throbbed as if jammed in a wood chipper, and I couldn’t seem to move, no matter how much I wanted to.

“Can you hear me?” a gentle voice asked. Fingers gripped my wrist, and I groaned. “I’m so, so, so sorry.” A definite loss of control wobbled thorough that same male voice. “Please be okay.”

Someone smoothed the hair off my forehead. It felt kind of nice. The hands were soft, and they touched me like I was fragile. Valuable.

I’m neither.

Sirens, blaring horns, and raised voices surrounded me in a swirl of confusion, and still I found it impossible to move.

“I saw the whole thing,” a nasally voice announced. “He rode right in front of you. There was no way you could have stopped in time.”

“That isn’t really the point right now, is it?” the gentle voice snapped back.

A loud, raw groan erupted from my tight throat. My bones and flesh ached so horribly I thought I might even cry. Oh, God. How embarrassing. I wasn’t a crier. But then I’d never been in the kind of pain I was in at the moment either.

“It’s okay. It’s going to be all right,” the soft voice reassured me. “I’ll take care of you. I promise.”

People grabbed under my arms and lifted me. That’s when the real torture started. I wanted to yell for them to put me back down. Leave me where I was. But I couldn’t seem to form the words needed to beg them to stop. But then none of that mattered because everything went black.