At Least I Had Her

I look outside the window hoping that the next car that drives past our house is my dad, but it isn’t. I try to call him but it just goes straight to voicemail. I decide to go outside.

“No, Ty. Don’t go outside. Wait for daddy!” Lexi says pleadingly.

I look at her but I open the door anyway. I look up at the force field just like I did this morning but instead of feeling a little uneasy and a little suspicious, I just full on feel like I’m going to vomit. I breathe in the fresh air, and almost feel like I’m going to cry. Lexi comes to stand next to me.

“What if he doesn’t make it?” she says sadly.

“If he doesn’t make it, then all we can do is remember everything he taught us, and survive,” I say, as I inspect all of the lines of electricity, coursing through the sky. I look down at Lexi and her arms are crossed, not like if she were going to throw a temper tantrum but the way she does when she wants to cry but knows she shouldn’t.

“It’s just in,” the lady on the tv says, making Lexi run to the couch, “It has already begun. The last flight from Chicago to Nashville, Tennessee, out of Chicago’s O’hare airport...was bombed just 17 minutes before it would have landed.”

I stare. I just keep staring, hoping she’ll say that she’s joking, but that doesn’t come. My legs feel as if they are non-existent, my stomach is in knots, and my sister. Fuck. My sister, my 7 year old sister, is crying hysterically and all I can do is stand here. Go to her, you idiot! Comfort her, PROTECT her, because you’re all she has now.