“Were you rear-ended or…?” I ask, trying to sort out the details.
“Frogger’s fine,” Jerry assures me, like I cared at all about his van. “It’s me. I broke my legs.”
I move to the corner of the shop for privacy. “Plural?”
“Both, yeah,” he says. “Jumping off a waterfall. I miscalculated how far I’d need to jump. Hit the rocks on the way down.”
“Jesus,” I mutter as I watch people outside the storefront window going about their days.
“Pretty sure I saw him,” Jerry says. “When I hit the water. The pain was unbearable. Swear I saw the light for a second.”
I sigh under my breath. “I’m glad your sense of humor is still intact. What hospital are you in?”
“I’m still in St. George. Danielle’s with me. They airlifted us to the nearest hospital.” A sliver of exhaustion is layered into his voice. “You won’t see it since you don’t have social media, but I’ll have to send you a photo of the waterfall. It was breathtaking. Literally. It took my breath away.”
This gives me pause. “Can you send a photo? Of your legs?”
“Of mylegs? Hazel, that’s so weird.”
“Or of your hospital setup,” I say, suspicion sweeping through me. “I want to see how bad this is.”
“I’m literally suffering, and you want documentation of it?” Jerry asks. “That’s beyond messed up.”
“You’re right. That was a weird thing to ask. When did this happen?”
“A couple days ago.”
“And you broke both of your legs.”
“Oh my god, yes,” Jerry mutters. “Why are you repeating it?”
Because I don’t believe you. “Because I want to make sure I understand,” I say.
“I needed emergency surgery,” he says, rushed. “They had to put in screws. Something about helping the bones heal properly. The doctor said I got lucky. This could’ve been even worse if I had hit the rock differently.”
Nothing about this feels lucky.
“I’m sorry. That’s awful, Jerry,” I say, focusing on a jar of clotted cream fudge from the UK so I don’t have to feel the flood of guilt that rushes in. They’re so smooth and shiny in their individual clear wrapping—
“Hazel? You there?”
“What? Yeah,” I say, turning my back to the sweets. “I’m glad you’re okay. You’ll be groggy for a bit, I’m sure. Have you talked to Dad? I can fly out—”
“No and no,” he says quickly. “I don’t want to trouble anyone.”
“It wouldn’t be any trouble to come visit my severely injured brother.”
“Thanks, but I’m just… while I’m recovering, I’d rather not see anyone,” he says, “And can you not tell Dad? I want to tell him myself when the time is right. Once I figure things out. Otherwise,who knows what he’ll do to get the money. I don’t know if he can get another loan at this point.”
Obviously, telling Dad would not be good for anyone.
I’m quiet for a moment. “You think he’d need to get a loan for this?”
“This is going to be expensive,” Jerry groans. The exhaustion has turned to tentativeness. “I was at the waterfall in the first place to get pictures for a swimsuit brand I’m working with. It was the biggest deal I had in the works. They won’t pay me until I send over the deliverables, which isn’t gonna happen.”
Jerry always has something in the works. The initial Van Life Plan was for him to pay me back with the money he made from his marketing job, which had gone remote during the pandemic. Being a digital nomad lasted two years until Jerry’s company wanted everyone back in the office. Jerry did not return to the office.
By the end of our conversations, a little part of me always believes that he’s going to make it work. He learned how to be convincing from Dad.
