Sunlight (Chapter 5- "Familiar")

The last time, the ambulance came too late. The last time, he rushed to help his father into the car, he put the key into the ignition and drove, and drove, hardly able to keep his composure, narrowly avoiding the potential earthquakes on either side of him, as they rushed by.

The last time, it was only the two of them, holding her hands, trying their hardest not to cry until they were home, a task of which they failed to accomplish. The last time, all he could see were brain scans and all he could hear was quiet words, all muffled by angry tires and shattering glass, and crunching metal. The last time, they weren't sure why.
This time, his gaze was fixed on the road, his head was still pounding, the images were still vivid, but the complicated light with her hands on the steering wheel was at his side.
The caregiver had been called home to her children sick to their stomachs and lungs; he heard coughing on the phone as she hurried out, he heard the desperation in her eldest daughter's voice.
He understood. Her family came first.
Damir shut his eyes tightly, papyrus fortifactions to prevent the lightning strike. The fire was lit. Inside him were smoldering ruins; rubble filled his bones, sank him into the sea.
The brake, the tires scraping against pavement, sounds like amplified claws on chalkboards echoing in a canyon, spiraling, past her face, the ditch, through the glass...
His eyes shut then as well. All else was clear...
...sounds like a softball hiting a brick wall, shatter-sounds immediately afterward, inflated airbags, something piercing skin, sharp pain, the deafening sounds of crumpling metal throughout... a single voice... deep sanguine warmth leaking... 
It would never end.   
A pause in movement.
"Damir?" she whispered.
"Damir, come on... we're here..."
He stared ahead, seeing, hearing, feeling, sharpredcrackshatterscreechthnkshoutscreechstabpierceredredred...
The water ran in the shower. She was by herself, she was alone.
"Damir..."
The woman laid on the hospital bed, silent and sleeping, chest rising and falling and falling once more...
"Damir..."

Tears.

Her hand reached his shoulder.

"Come on..."

He heard breath catching, a torn sob. His own or hers?

The lock popped up. The woman had been sitting right here.

The sunlight traveled from driver's seat to passenger's door, taking the handle, opening it. Damir could hardly comprehend the blue-gray eyes upon him, her hand taking his. He left the vehicle, with his arm under her. He had heard the sirens as his father had arrived. He saw the lights. Was his father already inside?
He could not prepare.
Somehow, the young woman brought them both through the door.
"Damir," she whispered again. They were at a station, a counter, a woman with a computer...
"Soren Pax," he choked. "We... we need to see him."
"Are you family?"
He could only nod. Amira pulled him closer; he noted her arm around his waist. He noted the feel of the winds and the rains and lightning inside, tearing apart all that once was; even stone ruins breaking. Ache. Needles and bruises up and down his leg, it felt, while the rest of him crumbling ruins with rain and thunder and lightning and wind slamming upon them, so many tiny pieces.
Again down a hall. Again on an elevator. Up the floor. The sun his support, the eye of the storm, however small. Down another hall. More swirling white coats, pastel scrubs, a blur...
On another bed. Another face, more eyes shut, more whirring machinery... more, more, more, more... the same.
He stared down at his father.
They sat down, a unit, two chairs by the bed. Time reduced to insignificance. Sky outside going from dark, to darker, rain ending, but dark sky remaining.
Blurs of colors and white.
The blur of different colors faded after time. The blurry mouth of the doctor, saying words he already knew.

He did not hear them. He felt the stone turn to sand, felt the rain-swelled ocean sweep him away. The sun warming the water. Her arm around him.
"We'll... give you some time alone now."
Doctor voice, so quiet. The words he'd heard before. The sights he'd seen before.
He knew what she saw too.
He looked down at his father, felt the ocean from his eyes, washing sand. His breath catching along with hers, her arms around him, her tears falling, shared saltwater, undrinkable, falling, an ocean created.
Sand built up in a castle, warmed by the sun, lifted, standing. And then his hand touched his father's face, warmth to fade soon. Oceans rising.
The moon changed the tide, but the sun warmed the waters. Her arm was around him, holding him, keeping him from falling apart.
But he had long since been the pebbles and rubble, gravel and grit, for generations.