“You’ve done it this time.” Frank tried to drown out his Nann­– helper’s words by focusing on his car’s dying purr as she killed the engine. It didn’t work and she kept on talking. “I don’t know how you’re going to get out of this one.”

That’s the thing about adults; they admonish you for being reckless and not having a plan but when push comes to shove and you need their help, they were quick to admit their inability to help. Frank was well aware of the situation he got himself into. His father made sure of that. Because the man’s phone never stopped ringing after what happened this afternoon. He made sure Frank understood.

But unlike most other adults, Frank’s father was quicker in figuring out a plan to either put the pieces back together or round them out so well that they no longer cut you when you touched them. That’s why he was in front of this kid’s considerably small house.

Susan pulled the key from the ignition and began putting her things together as she got ready to leave the car. Frank waited for her to put the key in his outstretched hand. Susan merely looked at his hand, then at him, and finally at her purse as she resumed digging through it aimlessly. Frank sighed, figuring that this was part of his punishment. Instead of throwing a childish tantrum, he resolved that his situation could be much worse. He could’ve been Cole Shaw.

While Susan was getting her things together, Frank stepped out of the car and examined the brown house in front of him. He thought it was an odd color to paint a house and deliberated whether they had done the job themselves. Cole didn’t look very artsy, judging by his student ID card, and neither did his mother so that would explain their keenness for design.

At Susan’s request, Frank shifted his focus from the house to the back seat as he helped her unload her kits. They weren’t as heavy as they were plentiful but she had decided to bring this much stuff since she didn’t have the chance to go through Cole’s medical file thoroughly. The only thing Susan knew was about the boy’s main condition — Stone Man Syndrome — and when Frank learned about it himself guilt ran through him.

Once they had everything, Susan fought with her packages so she could use the house key. In the end, Frank took it from her and opened the door himself. Unlike the outside, the house’s interior was very well laid out. The design was practical, modern, and coherent which led him to believe that the person who decorate the interior was different from the person who painted the house.

“Cole?” Susan called.

They waited for a few seconds before she tried again. When she did there was still no answer.

“He’s probably sleeping from all those meds,” Frank suggested.

“His room should be upstairs.” Susan pawned off the bags to Frank. “I’ll go wake him up and let him know what’s going on. In the meantime, put these things away in the guest room.”

Frank set most of the bags down and decided to move them in order of smallest to heaviest. Even though it was his first time in the house he navigated it as if he lived here himself. Jackie made it quite easy since her descriptions were very accurate. She had mentioned the layout to them only once when they met and asked if she needed to repeat herself. Frank insisted it was enough mostly because he couldn’t stand looking at the unconscious bedridden Cole for another second.

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On his second trip back to the guest room he was interrupted by loud thuds overhead and an alarming cry. “Frank!”

“Yeah?” He didn’t like the panic in her voice and immediately he was on edge.

“I need you. Bring the K bag. Hurry!”

Frank searched the pile of bags in his hands for one labeled K but it wasn’t there. He didn’t remember bringing it to the guest room either. He doubled back to the entrance and looked through the bags there. Once he found it, he flew up the stairs into the boy’s room and stopped dead in his tracks once he saw the small-bodied boy motionless in the wheelchair. The boy’s head lolled to the side and his chest did not rise nor sink. He was sure the boy was dead and he had never seen a corpse before. Especially one he had knocked down himself.

As Frank contemplated if he had killed the boy, Susan grabbed the bag from him and peeled it open. She sifted through vials with one hand while the other was putting down a paper with the boy’s name on it. Susan loaded the contents of one of the vials into a needle and then stuck it into the boy’s arm.

Once she injected the counter-drug, she proceeded to give him CPR and then ordered Frank to get her J bag. At first, he didn’t hear what she said, but soon her voice shook him out of shock and once he understood her request, he sped down the stairs and into the guest room where he had stored the bag in a cabinet. After he brought it back to her she took out a respirator and began to use it on the boy.

Within minutes Cole was conscious again, but instead of questioning what happened, she gave him something to ingest and then helped him to the bathroom. Frank listened to Cole hurl his guts out for a steady five minutes. He would’ve been appalled if he wasn’t more terrified.

Susan pulled him away. “I’m going to make a call. Watch him while I’m gone and round up any more pills you see about the place. Doesn’t matter what it’s for. Take everything and put it in a trash bag. We’ll replace what we need later.”

Frank nodded and she disappeared downstairs.

Frank stood near the ajar door and watched Cole lean over the bathtub, probably waiting to heave again. Cole had some mess in his light brown hair, but Frank doubted that the boy would care about it. There was a slight glistening on the guy’s face that Frank first thought was sweat but later realized it was something else. He didn’t intend to invade the guy’s privacy so he started his search for the pills in the bedroom. Cole wouldn’t be able to reach the bathroom cabinet anyway.

There were tons of pills around the place. Most of them had been prescribed ages ago but were never finished. He found some in the closets and shoeboxes, but he found most of them in a locked bedside drawer. Once Frank finished the bedroom, he went into the bathroom and opened the cabinet over the face basin.

“What’re you doing here?” Cole’s words caught him off guard.

Frank hesitantly looked at the boy, uneager to meet his dull green eyes, but Cole was looking at the mess he created in the tub. Frank’s eyes stuck to that instead.

“I’m Frank. I came to check on you.”

“You wouldn’t need to check on me if you didn’t knock me down and run over my ankles.”

“That was an accident. I didn’t see you coming.”

“The campus is pretty big. How did you end up on the walkway? You shouldn’t have been on the walkway; it’s meant for walking.”

“I never expected—” Frank caught himself. “Look! I never meant to hit you. If I wasn’t here, you would’ve been dead by now. You should be thanking me!”

“Thanking you?” Cole yelled in rage. “You broke my legs! I can never walk again. Do you get that? I can’t walk. I can’t go to school. From here on my life will be centered around only two things; that wheelchair and my bed. I’ll never be the same again.”

Frank looked away, back at the mess, and felt a hole in his chest.

A moment later Cole spoke, “Does my mom know?”

“No,” Frank said, “I don’t think so.”

“The lady said she was going to make a call. I don’t want her to call my mom. Don’t let her.”

“But she should know.”