Velocity of Impact:8-11-2026; Riley Chambers
The day started like every other day. The sun was rising, and the cat was lying at my feet, purring. The creaking of my bedroom door awoke me from my nightly slumber.
“Goooooodddd Moooorrrrrniiinnng,” my dad said to me, apparently quoting one of his favorite movies.
But I had no idea. I just stayed still, pulling the covers over my face to pretend to be asleep. I was waiting for that perfect moment when he bent down to shake my leg. The second he tried to wake me, I would jump and yell, “BOOOO!”
He would grab his chest. “OH, MY GOODNESS, you scared me!” he’d say. I knew deep down that I really didn’t scare him, but it always put a smile on both of our faces.
“It’s time to wake up,” my dad said. “This is the last day of school this week. Then you can relax.” He paused, looking down at me. “Hey, I know we usually talk about what you want for breakfast before bedtime. Since you got to bed a little later than usual, we didn’t talk about it. Anything sound good?”
I rolled my eyes, sinking deeper into my pillow. “Ugh, I don’t know, Dad, you decide. I just want to go back to sleep.”
“Oh, I’m right there with you, son. I would love to as well,” he replied. “But sleep doesn’t pay the bills.”
We went downstairs so I could eat before starting the day. At the time, I didn’t really think about everything Dad did just to get my morning moving. He started rambling off a list of options to see what sounded good to me. Even though I had told him, “You decide,” he still wanted me to choose something I would actually enjoy.
After each food he named, a flat "No" was my response.
“You need to pick something,” he said, and I could hear his breathing get heavier through his nose. “I need you to pick something. I have more things to do before I take you to school.”
“You want some cereal? That would be the quickest.”
“FINE,” I snapped.
He quickly poured me a bowl of cereal with milk, set it on the table, and immediately turned around to try to complete his tasks.
“Can I have some more milk in my bowl?” I called out, just as he was about to do something else.
Without hesitation, he went back to the refrigerator, got the milk, and poured a little more into my bowl. After returning the carton, he went right back to his own morning rush.
As I was eating, Dad got my backpack from the closet and brought it to the kitchen. He grabbed my lunchbox and proceeded to make my lunch. Knowing how much I loved pizza, he asked if that was fine.
“Uh, yeah,” I mumbled.
He packed the lunch, checked my bag to make sure it was ready for the day, and filled my water bottle. He placed the backpack by the front door so it would not be forgotten.
Then he ran upstairs, grabbed the clothes I was going to wear, and hurried back down. “Almost done?” he asked.
“Can I have a little more?” I answered, pointing to the empty bowl.
He stopped, took a breath, and went to the pantry to get the box. He poured me a little more, then kept moving. Next, he started tying up the trash bags, as it was trash day and the truck sometimes came early. As he came back inside from taking the trash can to the curb, he noticed that I wasn’t eating anymore.
“Done?” he asked.
“Yes, I can’t eat another bite,” I replied.
He grabbed my bowl and looked at the clock. “Okay, I’ll give you five minutes to let it settle, then we need to hustle and go.”
As the time kept ticking, I dragged a blanket onto the couch, trying to get as comfortable as possible for those five minutes.
Then Dad said, “Okay, one more minute.”
“What? Seriously?” I shot back.
“Son, just because you slow down doesn’t mean time does.”
“I know,” I said, my voice completely deflated.
He grabbed the remote control and clicked the television off. I got up to go through the motions of getting ready—which, looking back, wasn’t much effort at all. After brushing my teeth, I gave Mom a hug, told her I loved her, and wished her a good day. Dad and I walked out the front door, and I asked him if I could grab the light jacket I kept in my backpack. Sometimes it got cold in class, so it paid to be prepared.
“Of course,” he replied. He grabbed my bag, took it out, and we headed to the car.
Usually on the way to school, Dad and I would talk about random things, but they would always be something I could learn from. Sometimes it was the type of clouds in the sky, or the types of fish we caught when we went fishing. Our conversations usually continued until we reached the front of the school.
When we arrived, we stopped and carried out our daily ritual. I gave Dad a huge hug, and then we did our secret handshake. After that, I told him I loved him and to have a good day. He stayed in that exact spot, watching, until I was safely inside the building.
Once inside, I headed upstairs to my classroom. The day went just like any other day—just a full day of learning with nothing out of the ordinary. Or, as Dad would sometimes say, it was “nothing to write home about.”
We stayed in our classroom for most of the day working through our daily worksheets, just waiting until it was finally time to head outside. When we finally got out there, it was boiling hot, and the bugs were everywhere. To make things more interesting, a dry corn husk blew onto the grass from a nearby farm. I picked it up and told everyone what it was, which immediately sparked a full-blown argument. A couple of kids were completely convinced it wasn't a corn husk at all, and no matter how much I tried to explain it to them, they refused to believe me.
As we were coming in from recess, my teacher asked what we were arguing about.
"A dried corn husk I found out there," I replied.
But I was quickly interrupted by a classmate: "It wasn't a corn husk!"
"Can I run and go get it real quick?" I asked my teacher.
"Yes, that's fine," she said. "But hurry up."
I ran back to where we had left it, but with all the wind we had been having lately, it was gone. Who knows where it ended up. Even though the husk was gone and my teacher advised us to stop arguing over it, it was still very upsetting because I knew I was right. In the end, I just had to "let it go"—which was definitely easier said than done. So, we all got in our single file line and proceeded to head back into the building and back to class.
As I had said previously, the rest of the day progressed the same as every other day. Every day after the school bell rang at the end of the day, I would go to an after-school program at the school. I would usually be there for about an hour and a half before Dad came to pick me up.
When we got to the after-school program, we put our backpacks, water bottles, and anything else we had down in one spot. Then the teachers let us go outside or, if it was too hot outside, to the gym or library. In the back of my mind, it seemed like it was getting later than usual. As the minutes ticked by, however, there was no sign of my dad or my mom. Even though there was no clock in the gym or outside, I knew it was much later than usual. I asked the after-school teachers if they had heard anything from them. They said no, but they assured me they were probably just running late and that everything was okay.
If they haven't heard anything, how can they know? I thought to myself.
So, I sat down outside at one of the picnic tables and waited.
As more time passed, I heard my name crackle over the teacher’s walkie-talkie. Yes, I thought.
I ran inside, grabbed my backpack, and hurried toward the exit. I tried to look through the glass as I neared the door, because Dad was always standing right there, waving to me with a smile on his face.
But this time, it wasn’t Dad. It wasn’t Mom, either.
It was my sister. When the door opened, I noticed her eyes were completely bloodshot.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, my heart dropping. “Where’s Dad?”
“We’ll talk in the car,” she whispered, her voice choking.
As I got in the car, I buckled up. As soon as my sister put the car in drive, the doors auto-locked and we pulled away from the school.
“What’s going on?” I demanded. “Were you crying?”
“There was an accident,” she replied, her knuckles white on the steering wheel. “Dad is in the hospital.”
“What? What kind of accident? Where’s Mom?”
“Mom is fine. She’s at Dad’s bedside,” she said, tears finally spilling over. “But it’s not good.”
“What happened?” I asked, while my own tears were trying to make an appearance themselves.
“He had to run to the office downtown this morning,” she said, her voice shaking. “On his way home... a car hit him on the highway. It happened so fast. They said he didn't even have time to react.”
As we pulled into the hospital parking lot next to the ER, I unbuckled and reached for the door handle, but my sister yelled, “WAIT!”
“You can’t just run in there. You have to prepare yourself,” she said, hiding her face in her hands. “He’s bad—he’s really bad. They have him in a medical coma right now.”
“What’s that?” I asked, my chest tightening.
“They put him to sleep with medicine. Because the pain and the damage... it's too bad.”
As we walked into the waiting room, the heavy double doors to the emergency room were swinging shut. For a split second, I saw my mom through the narrowing crack. Our eyes locked, and I let out the loudest scream: “MOM!!!”
I lunged forward to force the doors open myself, but my mom pushed them open from the other side. She grabbed my sister and me, squeezing us into the tightest, most desperate hug she had ever given us.
“You can’t go back there right now,” she wept, holding my head against her shoulder. “You’re not old enough. They won’t let you.”
I buried my face in her shirt, the cold air of the hospital hallway burning against my tear-soaked skin. Reaching down, I gripped the strap of my backpack, feeling the outline of the light jacket I had asked my dad to pull out for me just hours before. I closed my eyes, desperately wishing I could slow down the clock, realizing too late that time never slows down for anyone.
She had told us she would stay in the waiting room with us; there was nothing else she could do except get in the way. After what felt like days—though in reality, it had been only four hours and forty-six minutes since Mom came out to wait with us—a doctor stepped through the doors and approached my mom, my sister, and me.
Just as he was about to speak, a familiar voice shouted from down the hallway. “Mom!”
It was my brother. My sister had called him on her way to pick me up from school, telling him to get here as fast as he could. But he lived out of state—none of us expected him this soon.
“How did you get here?” my sister breathed, staring at him.
“I drove straight to the airport,” he panted, his chest pounding. “There were no cheap tickets left, but I told the lady at the desk what happened... she got me on the next flight out. I didn't even pack. I just left.”
The doctor turned to the nurse standing beside him. “Get him a cup of water, please.”
Once she stepped away, he took a breath and looked at my mom. "Hello, my name is Doctor Parklynd. About your husband...” He turned his gaze to my sister, my brother, and then down to me. “...your dad.”
The nurse returned, handing the small paper cup of water to my older brother.
“Nurse Chen,” the doctor said gently. He knelt down until he was eye-level with me. “Young man, do you like chocolate pudding? I know for a fact that our cafeteria has some awesome chocolate pudding. They'll even put whipped cream on it if you’d like.”
I looked up at him, caught off guard.
“If you’d like, Nurse Chen can take you down to get some—if it’s okay with your mom.”
My eyes lit up, the heavy weight in my chest lifting for just a second. “Is it okay, Mom?”
“Yes,” Mom whispered, her voice trembling as she ran her fingers through my hair. “Go ahead. But you stay right with Nurse Chen, okay?”
As I walked away, the doctor's voice faded with each step while I strained my ears to catch whatever words I could, until the hallway fell silent.
DING!
The sudden chime made me jump. I had been so focused on what they were saying that I hadn't even noticed Nurse Chen guiding me toward the elevator or pressing the call button. Before stepping inside, I took one last glance down the long hallway. Doctor Parklynd was looking over his shoulder, watching me—waiting to make sure I was out of earshot before continuing.
The doors slid shut, sealing us in the quiet metal box. I looked up at Nurse Chen. “Is my dad going to be alright?”
She swallowed, startled. “So... do you want whipped cream on your pudding?” she asked abruptly, her voice a little higher as she tried to dodge the question.
Once we had the pudding, we rode the elevator down to the ER. Stepping out, I immediately scanned the spot where Mom had been standing. The doctor was gone. Mom, my brother, and my sister were sitting in the waiting room—my siblings with their faces buried in their hands, and Mom fighting to keep her composure.
"Mom," I said, walking up to them. "What did the doctor say? How's Daddy?"
"Sit down," Mom replied. "This isn't going to be easy to hear. If you have any questions, please ask."
As she began to explain, she squeezed her eyes tight, a single tear rolling down her cheek. "The cuts and broken bones will heal, but... he hit his head very hard when the airbags deployed. I know your sister told you that they have him in what they call a medically induced coma. They've moved him to the Intensive Care Unit to monitor the swelling in his brain. We won't know the full extent of the damage until he wakes up, and right now, the doctors can't tell us when that will be. It could be next week, or it could be tomorrow. We just have to take it one day at a time."
"He’s in the ICU now, and you are able to go see him if you would like," Mom said to us. "Only a couple of people can go at a time. One of you can come with me now, and then I’ll bring the other two back."
They told me I should go first so someone could be with me afterward if I had any questions. As we walked back to where Daddy was, I hesitated. The sterile smell of antiseptic filled my throat, and the rhythmic, hollow beep of the monitors seemed to match the thumping in my heart.
"Are you sure you want to go first?" Mom asked, kneeling down to look into my eyes.
"Yes," I replied. "I'll be okay."
As we approached his bed, the steady beep of monitors filled the room, and tangled tubes ran into his arms and mouth. I could barely recognize my dad beneath the thick layers of bandages covering his face. Dark purple and black bruises peeked out from beneath the white gauze, looking far worse than anything I could have ever imagined.
My eyes instantly filled with tears. "Daddy! Daddy! Wake up!" I screamed.
Mom grabbed me, engulfing me in a tight hug. "It's okay, son," she said gently. "He can't respond right now. But hold his hand and talk to him. He can still hear you."
I looked at my mom with concern. Reaching out, I touched his hand, but as soon as I did, he jumped as if I had caused him pain. It startled me, but Mom assured me I hadn't and that it was okay.
"Daddy..." I said as my eyes started to overflow with tears. "I'm sorry, Daddy. I'm sorry I didn't listen to you. I love you. Please wake up," I pleaded.
I looked up at my dad's face. Even though it was mostly covered in bandages, his eyes, though closed, were still visible just as a single tear trickled down his cheek.
"Mom!" I cried with excitement. "You're right, he can hear me! He's crying."
"Let me go get the nurse," Mom said. "She told me to let her know if anything happens." She turned to me and asked, "Will you be okay with Daddy while I go get Nurse Chen?"
"Yes," I responded.
As Mom walked out the door to find the nurse, I turned back to my dad. "It's okay, Daddy," I told him gently. "I'm here."
Mom and Nurse Chen walked back into the room a moment later. "So, what's going on with your dad, little man?" Nurse Chen asked.
"Well, I had just told my dad something, and Mom said he could still hear me. Then a single tear came down his cheek," I explained. "So, he could hear me, and he was crying."
"I'm sure that came as quite a surprise, didn't it?" she said gently. "But, and I hate to say it, it was most likely just a reflex."
The word hit me like a punch to the chest. A reflex? Just a reflex? She was taking away the one sign that he was still in there with me.
"NO!" I yelled. "He was crying! He could hear me!"
I quickly pulled the curtain open and ran out, heading back to my brother and sister in the waiting room.
As I pushed through the metal double doors, I ran straight into their arms, crying.
"It's okay," my sister said, squeezing me tighter. She caught my brother’s eye over my shoulder, giving him a knowing nod. "Why don't you go ahead and see Dad? I'll calm him down."
After about twenty minutes, my brother came through the double doors toward my sister and me, his eyes bloodshot. Since she was the only one who hadn't been back to see Dad yet, he focused on her.
"They said he can't have visitors for a bit," he told us. "They need to run some tests, but if you go back right now, I'm sure they'll let you see him for a few minutes."
"I'll wait," she said. "Maybe it will give them time to figure out what's going on."
I looked up at my sister and asked her why she didn't want to go see him.
She looked back at me and said, "A few minutes wouldn't be enough."
"Dad and I were just talking about time this morning," I told her. "That it doesn't slow down just because we do."
She looked at me and said, "You know what? Sometimes, you seem older than you are."
She decided to go ahead and head back, but they had already closed his area off to visitors.
"It's okay," I said. "I'm sure it won't be too long."
After about an hour, the doctor came out to talk to us. Before he could say anything, Mom stood up. "Any news?"
"Well," Dr. Parklynd said, "give me a chance to explain everything before you react. We managed to stabilize the bleeding in his abdomen during the first surgery, but we need to keep him heavily sedated. His body needs time to handle the trauma."
"Surgery?" Mom interrupted.
"Yes," Dr. Parklynd replied, his voice calm but grave. "The CT scan showed active bleeding in his brain, and swelling is beginning to build up dangerous pressure. Before we proceed with an emergency craniotomy, we need to talk to you about the risks and what to expect."
"SAVE OUR DAD!" my sister interrupted, stepping directly into his line of sight. "THAT'S the only path you need to take!"
Mom laid a trembling hand on her arm to quiet her, looking straight into the doctor's eyes."Do what you need to do, Dr. Parklynd. Just bring him back to us."
"I will do everything I can," he replied. "Nurse Chen has some consent forms for you to sign, and I’m going to scrub in with Dr. Shayton in the O.R. He’s our top neurosurgeon. If anyone can relieve the pressure and stop the bleed, it’s him. Please wait in the surgical lounge around the corner, and I will update you the moment we have news."
