Embrace by Cherie Colyer Page A

following the odd procession into the hall. The other students were back in their classrooms. The click of Mrs. Parris’s heels stopped just outside the doorway, leaving us to be enveloped in an eerie silence.
    In the nurse’s office, they tried to get Kaylee to lie down. They wanted to speak to Josh and me in private, but they wouldn’t get the chance. Kaylee trembled each time Josh let go of her. It was like he was the glue holding her together, the person keeping her from screaming and jumping on more furniture. Kaylee needed me too; she held my hand so tightly I thought my bones would break. Tears stained both our faces.
    “What did she take?” Principal Douglas asked.
    While I didn’t know what was wrong with Kaylee, I did know one thing. “She doesn’t do drugs.”
    Principal Douglas wiped the sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief and sighed. “I know she’s your friend, but we can’t help her if we don’t know what she took.”
    Kaylee spoke, the first words since we’d left the classroom, only she sounded more like a parrot than a girl in control. “I don’t do drugs.”
    Josh smoothed the hair away from her forehead and kissed the top of her head. “She’s not on anything.”
    Principal Douglas pressed on. “Look at her. She’s shaking like a leaf, she’s clammy, and she can barely talk. Maybe she’s a closet addict.”
    “No. She’s not,” Josh and I replied at the same time.
    I didn’t need our principal telling me what Kaylee was; I could see for myself, and even though I knew he was trying to help, he was making me angry.
    Two men in blue EMT uniforms walked in, one holding a black leather bag. The taller of the two knelt down in front of Kaylee and shined a light in her eyes.
    “Pupils are normal.” He proceeded to take her blood pressure, which was elevated. Her temperature was normal. He stood back up. “She’s not showing the common symptoms of someone who’s under the influence. We’ll take her to the hospital. I’m sure they’ll want to do blood work.”
    I could have told them what the blood work was going to show. Nothing. Something else was wrong; why didn’t they see that?
    “I’ll get the stretcher,” the second paramedic said.
    “I can walk.” Kaylee stood.
    Josh and I followed her lead, our fingers laced through hers. She trembled. Josh switched which hand he used to hold hers and wrapped his arm around her waist for support.
    The paramedics exchanged looks. After a moment, the first nodded.
    Kaylee pulled Josh and me closer. “Don’t leave me.”
    “Never,” Josh whispered to Kaylee. Louder, he said, “We’re coming.”
    I half expected someone to tell us we couldn’t go, but no one did.
    The taller paramedic led the way out of school. His partner followed. When we reached the ambulance, the first paramedic turned to us. “You’ll have to follow us in your car.”
    Kaylee squeezed my hand even harder. I yelped. Josh placed his hand under her chin and tilted her face up to his. “We will be right behind you. I promise.”
    She nodded and let the paramedic help her into the ambulance.
    At the hospital, a pert nurse stopped us just outside of Kaylee’s examining room and asked, “You are?”
    “Her brother and sister,” I replied quickly, hoping if she thought we were related to Kaylee she wouldn’t make us stay in the waiting room. It worked.
    Kaylee’s parents arrived shortly after us.
    The whole afternoon was surreal. Kaylee kept a tight grip on either Josh’s or my hand at all times. Her eyes never stopped roaming the room. They ran test after test, but wouldn’t tell us anything. It was unnerving, so Josh and I resorted to eavesdropping on her parents’ conversation.
    “The MRI didn’t show any abnormalities,” we heard her father saying to her mother, “and the initial blood work came back negative. Her doctor is wondering if she’s having some type of post trauma from her near-death experience with the semi.”
    There was a