This painting, Edvard Munch's "The Scream," pretty much sums up how I feel this morning.
I did not finish Untamed because Friday afternoon, when the words were flowing, my son got into a severe car accident. Thank God he wasn't seriously injured. He got out of it with blunt chest trauma, a bad laceration on his leg that needed stitches, a bunch of cuts and contusions and a neck injury, which still has to be seen by a specialist.
The car is utterly and completely totaled. The front end was smashed up beneath the windshield, which was shattered. The dashboard was pushed so far forward by the collision that it snapped Ben's keys off the steering column. There was very little space left for passengers, and how my 6-foot-tall son managed to get out with both legs and no serious chest injuries or head injuries is beyond me. The collision was violent enough that the seatbelt tore skin off his clavicle — just tore it off.
So...
Instead of writing I was trying to keep my frayed nerves from snapping while dealing with an injured kid. I got "the call" Friday at about 6 p.m. that he was in the ER and had been in an accident. I couldn't even figure out how to work my own phone. Fortunately, my mom's number is autodial. Unfortunately, she lives 300 miles away. However, she was able to call my brother, who got a friend of his to drive me to the hospital and then who came to the hospital himself with his old SUV, which he's letting me borrow for the time being.
It was surreal seeing my son strapped to a board. It was just was surreal to see large blotches of his blood on the sheets beneath him and his blankets. He had two IVs and electrodes monitoring his heartbeat. Not really what I want to see...
We are so lucky to have him with us still. But dealing with the aftermath — no car, insurance hassles, medical bills, etc. — is not going to be fun. A part of me wants to throttle him now that I know he's going to be okay.
My new goal is to finish Untamed next weekend. I'm mid-way through the second-to-last scene and then have the epilogue.