“I didn’t see her.”
I looked up.
“You told us in the driveway that she shouldn’t have been standing there.”
“She was in the driveway.”
“You said you didn’t see her.”
“I didn’t.
Not until afterward.”
“Then how did you know where she was?”
My mother moved between us.
“Enough.”
That one word carried decades of muscle memory.
Enough questions.
Enough embarrassing Briana.
Enough refusing the version of reality that kept dinner pleasant.
Normally, I would have fought harder the louder she became.
This time, I didn’t.
I sat down.
I put the dashcam on my lap.
And I waited.
The silence seemed to make Briana more nervous than shouting would have.
She started talking without anyone asking her anything.
“The sun was in my eyes.
And there were groceries everywhere.
I was trying to turn in.
She was low to the ground.
You know how kids are.
They move suddenly.”
Mr.
Brennan frowned.
“The groceries fell after the impact.”
Briana turned toward him.
“You weren’t even there.”
“I was across the street.”
Her mouth opened, then closed.
My father stepped closer to her.
“Stop interrogating her.
She’s shaken.”
I almost laughed.
Chloe was the one behind the hospital doors.
But Briana, in her clean pale blouse, was the person everyone kept protecting from discomfort.
A nurse appeared and asked me to come with her.
I stood instantly.
The dashcam went into my purse.
My mother reached toward my arm.
“Leave that here.
You don’t need to carry things around while you’re with Chloe.”
I stepped out of reach.
“I’m keeping it.”
Her hand remained suspended for half a second before she lowered it.
That was the first time I saw fear in her face.
Not fear for Chloe.
Fear of what the truth might cost.
The nurse led me down a hallway painted with cartoon clouds.
I focused on each blue shape because it was easier than thinking about the words fractured skull.
When I finally saw Chloe, she looked impossibly small beneath the hospital blanket.
Her arm had been stabilized.
