Chapter 7
The sudden departure of the medical team left a heavy, suffocating silence in the house. The rhythmic flashing of the ambulance lights outside continued to paint the walls in shifting shades of crimson, but the urgent noise had faded into the distance as the vehicle rolled down the suburban street with its siren temporarily silenced. David stood in the center of the living room, staring at the indentation on the sofa where Sarah had been sitting earlier that afternoon.
Officer Miller lingered by the front door, his hand resting on the latch as he looked between father and son. "I’ll need both of you to come down to the station tomorrow morning to give formal statements once we have an update from the hospital. Don't leave town, David. I mean it."
"We'll be there, Tom," Arthur replied, his voice devoid of emotion as he walked toward the door to lock it behind the officer.
With a brief nod, Miller stepped out into the night, pulling the heavy wood door shut behind him. The click of the deadbolt sounded unnaturally loud in the quiet house.
Arthur turned back to face his son, the stern mask finally slipping to reveal the profound exhaustion beneath. He walked slowly toward the armchair by the fireplace, lowering his heavy frame into the cushions with a low groan of joint pain. He didn't look at David; instead, he stared fixedly at the cold hearth, where a few gray ashes remained from a fire burned weeks ago.
"You should go home, David," Arthur said quietly. "Your wife must be wondering where you are. The kids will be waking up soon."
"I can't just leave, Dad," David said, pacing across the worn carpet of the living room. He ran a hand through his short dark hair, feeling the dampness of sweat against his scalp. "Sarah is in the hospital, and the police think I had something to do with it. If I go home now, I'll just sit there staring at the walls, going crazy wondering if she's going to wake up."
"She’ll wake up," Arthur said, though there was little conviction in his tone. It was a statement of sheer willpower, an attempt to conjure certainty out of a vacuum. He looked up, his grey eyes piercing through the dim light. "Your sister has always been too stubborn to give up easily. Even when her mother passed, even when her business failed three years ago, she bounced back. But this... this debt thing, David. You said she was hiding it from me. Why didn't you tell me sooner?"
"Because she made me swear not to," David said defensively, stopping his pacing to face his father. "You know how she is. She wanted to prove she could handle the repair shop expansion on her own. When the supply chain crisis hit last year, it wiped out her cash reserves. She started taking high-interest bridge loans just to pay payroll. By the time I found out last month, the interest was compounding faster than she could generate revenue."
Arthur let out a harsh, bitter breath that sounded almost like a laugh. "Pride. The family curse. I built this house with my own two hands, and I taught both of you that asking for help was a sign of weakness. Maybe that’s on me."
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"Don't do that, Dad," David murmured, walking over to stand near the armchair. He looked down at his aging father, feeling a sudden, sharp pang of empathy that bridged the generation gap between them. "We all did the best we could with what we knew."
***
