Here's a short story I wrote.

Fallen Leaves
by Mitch Jones

August Hartman was speeding down the road in the dead of autumn with fire in his eyes and acid burning a hole in his stomach. He barely watched the road. He was looking around and taking in the tranquility of the forest in autumn. The leaves were fiery colors that reminded him of the ulcer burning inside of him. He was going about 90 mph and accelerating.

He had just come back from coffee at Sarah Whiting’s house. She told him she had something very important to tell him. He had laughed as he always does. She was telling him about how insensitive he seems sometimes. Was she breaking up with him? As the conversation wore on the realization of that fact became inevitably clearer. When it finally hit him full force it was like his heart was filled with lead and sank to the bottom of his soul. He got up angry and said simply, “Goodbye Sarah,” with little expression on his face and then walked out of her house and probably out of her life.

Now he was driving down the wooded road that leads to her house in his station wagon, circa 1980s, and feeling every bump in the road as if it were a punch in the face. He looked to the trees as if they were oracles. He looked for answers to what he should do next in their fiery leaves. No answers came.

A curve crept up on him without warning and he pulled the wheel sharp to stay on the road. It was a little too sharp and there was rain left over from the night before. The car spun out of control like a macabre merry-go-round until eventually a tree caught the back of the car with a big crunching noise. August had hit his head a couple of times. He was sleeping an unnatural sleep.

August is in the hospital. He is still dreaming about the accident and how much he misses Sarah. He hasn’t awaked since. Sarah and his best friend Nick are there. They’re watching him dream, his eyes rolling under his lids, his chest peacefully moving in and out. Sarah is crying and Nick is holding her. The nurse comes in and puts something in August’s I.V. The dream gets fuzzy for August. Sarah can see him waking up, she calls to him. He opens his eyes and reality is fuzzy now.

“How long was I out?” August whispers. Nick and Sarah smile.

“Only about 10 hours,” Nick says. “We came as soon as we heard. That was about 2am last night.”

“Awesome, what’s the damage?”

“They haven’t told us yet. They wanted to tell some family members, but since you don’t have any they just withheld all that. They weren’t supposed to let us in, but we told them we’re all the family you got.”

“Thanks for being here.” August is 18 and already he feels old.

“No problem, I’ll go get the doctor and tell them you’re awake.”

Nick is gone just like that and it’s August and Sarah alone again, just like last night before the crash. Sarah sits on August’s bed.

“Listen, I don’t know what I was thinking last night. I don’t think you’re insensitive, it’s just that I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about our lives lately and I decided that you don’t need me. That was my pragmatic conclusion, but now I realize that I’m madly in love with you and I can’t stand to be without you.”

Sarah reaches over and kisses August. Color and warmth fills his sallow face. Now she is lying on the bed next to him, holding him gently like they’re some sort of couple. She is crying and so is August.

There’s a knock at the door. Sarah gets up. Nick walks in with the doctor following behind him.

“Hello, I’m Dr. Hajik-Jabar,” she says as she offers her hand toward August. August takes it and limply reciprocates a handshake. “You’re very lucky. You had quite the concussion. That’s why you were out so long, but amazingly you got out of that car with only a couple bruises. You can leave tomorrow if you are feeling up to it.”

“Thank you doctor,” Nick whispers.

The next day August checks out of the hospital with Sarah at his side. They don’t ride a car home. Instead they walk through the woods behind the hospital. They are holding hands.

“I can’t help but think how fortunate I am. It seems like a dream. There are so many people who go through these things and don’t get out safely. And you, you’ve been so great. I can’t believe how lucky I am,” August says still whispering.

“I don’t know why I said you were insensitive. You can be quite sappy when you want to,” Sarah responds.

Somewhere in the intensive care unit August was being kept alive with machines. His eyes were still rolling around inside his head. He was dreaming that everything was great, everything was okay, everything changed. He was dreaming alone, his chest barely moving, working with the aid of a respirator. He was comatose. Nick and Sarah were in the waiting room; they weren’t allowed to see him. August stayed that way for quite some time. The doctors would occasionally say that he looked happy and indeed, every once and a while August would seem to be smiling.