Chapter 6 - Chaos, Conscience, and the Ambulance
Chaos erupted around me.
Alden was on his knees beside me within seconds, his face pale with horror. He shrugged off his suit jacket and pressed it firmly against the torn flesh of my shin where the jagged edge of the titanium stabilization plate was literally pushing outward against my skin.
“Don’t move, Fallon. Don’t try to move,” Alden pleaded, his voice trembling as he gripped my hand. His fingers were warm, steady, and anchoring me to reality while the world spun violently around us. “The ambulance is on its way. Stay with me.”
My parents pushed through the circle of horrified guests. My mother took one look at my mangled leg, the twisted black brace, and the spreading blood on the marble floor, and her immediate reaction was not horror, but furious irritation.
“Fallon, for heaven’s sake, what is wrong with you?” Helen shrieked, wringing her hands. “Why must you always cause a scene right before the wedding? Can’t you just stand up?”
My father, Stellin, crossed his arms, glaring down at me as if I were a misbehaving child throwing a tantrum on a supermarket floor. “Get up, Fallon. You’re embarrassing your sister. People are staring.”
Alden snapped his head up, his eyes blazing with a fury so intense that both of my parents actually flinched backward.
“Are you both out of your absolute minds?!” Alden roared, his voice echoing off the vaulted ceilings of the foyer. “Her leg is completely shattered! Her bones are broken anew! Your other daughter just pushed her down a flight of stone stairs!”
“She tripped! It was an accident!” Sutton chimed in from the upper landing, descending the stairs slowly now, adjusting her silk robe with a pout. “She’s clumsy, Alden. She’s been clumsy her whole life. She ruined my rehearsal dinner on purpose!”
The guests standing nearby stared at Sutton in sheer disbelief. The polite facade had cracked wide open, revealing the rot underneath.
Ten minutes later, the wail of sirens pierced the coastal air. Paramedics rushed through the grand iron doors carrying a backboard, heavy medical bags, and nitrous oxide tanks.
The lead paramedic, a weathered veteran named Chief Miller, took one look at my leg and the bent, twisted brace. He immediately signaled for trauma shears.
“Cut the dress,” Miller ordered crisply.
“No, wait—that’s a designer silk gown!” my mother protested, stepping forward as if to block the paramedic.
Miller shot her a look of pure venom. “Lady, your daughter’s leg is actively degloving, and her tibia is protruding through the soft tissue. If I don't cut this dress off to stabilize her knee right now, she’s going to lose her lower limb. Back. Off.”
Mom recoiled as if she’d been struck, retreating into the background without another word.
They administered a rapid dose of ketamine and fentanyl through an IV line to manage the agonizing pain. The world dissolved into a surreal, floating haze of muffled voices, flashing red lights, and the groan of metal as the paramedics dismantled my brace.
As they lifted me onto the stretcher, I caught a glimpse of Briany still holding her phone up, recording the paramedics wheeling me away.
May you like
Alden looked down at me, holding my hand tightly. “I’m riding with you in the ambulance, Fallon. I’m not leaving you.”
“Thank you,” I whispered through the haze of narcotics as the doors slammed shut, sealing us off from the toxic circus of my family.
