Twilight Zone

Ring. Straight to voicemail. Again. For the 3rd day in a row now. Josh, who always answered his phone, even when I think he shouldn't have, never had his phone on now. The parentals gave me lots of strange reasons for why I couldn't talk to him. I felt in my heart something wasn't right but I had no proof this wasn't just me being paranoid so I kept on trying hard not to think about what my husband might be up to. A million possibilities kept running through my head though I tried to block them out. Did Dad and he get into a fight and did he get kicked out? Was he in jail somewhere for something? But then, one night, I finally received a call from a hospital in Austin, Texas. No message. Just that someone had called me. It felt as though my heart stopped. I called them back. Josh picked up. He proceeded to tell me he was in an accident and in the hospital. He'd had to have surgery. He would be Ok but the injuries were pretty severe. My strong husband, who I'd only ever heard cry one time in the 10 years I'd known him, his voice began to break as he told me how he'd fallen asleep at the wheel and woken up to broken glass and searing pain and blood. Part of me felt this huge rush of relief that he was alive and was going to be OK. Part of me just felt shocked. I sank to the ground and tried to stay calm knowing how he hates when I lose control of my emotions. It took a while but I got permission to leave military tech school to go see him for 2 weeks. Walking in and seeing him in a hospital gown so helpless and banged up made me want to throw up. I wanted to run to him and give him a huge hug and a kiss and just hold him but I was afraid to touch him.

Front of my car after the wreck.

Back of my car after the wreck.

The other time my heart froze and time stood still for me was one evening in our bathroom here in Idaho. I'd been suffering bouts of nautia and a late period and sore breasts for a while. Josh kept joking about ha ha what if you're pregnant, which was something I assumed couldn't or at least was highly unlikely for us at that time. But to get him to lay off I had taken a test and it had come back negative so all my fears were assuaged. However, after a few more weeks of no period, I decided to take one more pregnancy test. Josh ran into the bathroom and took the test before it had time to fully work. He held it and wouldn't let me have it. He told me later his intention was to mess with me and say it was positive to see my reaction even though we both thought it would be negative. But I knew right away when I saw the look come across his eyes...a look for shock and uncertainty. He looked up at me. "It's positive." Again, for the second time in my life, my heart froze. I didn't know what to think. I took the test and sure enough...positive. I went to the living room to sit down.