The Tears

After hearing him I tried to answer him as best I could, but I was totally out of breath:

"NOMIKO... HELP ME... QUICKLY....!!!"

I barely had time to finish my sentence when she was already answering me:

"YUICHI, ARE YOU ....?"

She didn't have the time to finish her sentence that I was already out of the wood, I threw a glance on my left and on my right and there I saw her. About fifty meters to my left, standing right at the edge of the forest.

I didn't even take the time to reach her, I was already laying Nath on the ground, while taking care to put her leg gently on the ground.

Nomiko came running towards us in a panic:

"Yùichi! What happened? Why are you covered in blood?

"

"I don't know, I found him already in that state. But we don't have much time before he loses the use of his leg, he lost a lot of blood. I replied, distressed."

"Let's take him home quickly; surely Daddy can do something for him. She replied after she had recovered her senses."

It's true, she's right, our father will surely be able to do something for him; being a lumberjack, he often injured himself and each time, he treated himself, it's sure that he will manage to save him.

So I took Nath on my shoulders and we set off again to reach the house which was in front of us, almost 200 metres away.

It took us less than a minute to get to the door of the house.

"Nomiko, open the door quickly!" I asked her hurriedly.

And in a fraction of a second, she opened the door and it slammed violently against the wall.

"Can you be quiet when you come in, please?" Our mother asked calmly before she realized what was wrong.

"YUICHI, NOMIKO, NATH, WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU !?" she asked us terrified.

For the second time in my life, I saw my mother panicking. The first time I remember was about 10 years ago when our father came back from the woods with a broken elbow and his arm split open in the middle; it was a scene worthy of a horror movie. So it's really rare for my mother to lose her temper like that.

We didn't even reply to her as we had already laid Nath on the living room table.

In a disconcerting calm, I took command of the operations:

"Nomiko, you go and get Dad, he must still be out in the yard. Mum, you take Shiro and take her somewhere else so that she doesn't see all this. And I'll change his bandage and get things ready for Daddy to take care of him."

The three of them started to do what I had asked them to do.

And I went to get a clean cloth from the cabinet in front of the table, took off my dirty shirt and used the cloth to make a tourniquet that would hold better than the previous one.

After changing his bandages, I went to the bathroom where I got some disinfectant, needles and sewing thread.

By the time I got back to the living room, my mother was already back pressing my tourniquet to stop the blood flowing.

I didn't have time to explain to my mother what to do next:

"Mum, keep pressing on his leg, I'm going to help Nomiko look for Dad."

"Okay, let's do it like this." She replied in her usual calm manner.

I walked out of the room towards the yard, which was at the back of the house.

I went out of the house, but I didn't see Nomiko and my father anywhere, my first instinct was to call them both:

"DAD, NOMIKO, WHERE ARE YOU?"

Fortunately Nomiko answered me at once:

"I AM ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE HOUSE, BUT DAD IS NOT THERE!"

"I'LL LOOK FOR HIM ON THE OTHER SIDE IN THE MEANTIME!"

So I set off in the direction of the woods, which was where he was most likely to be.

As I continued to run to look for him, I started to call out to him:

"DAD, WHERE ARE YOU?"

During those five minutes that seemed like an eternity, I must have uttered that phrase a hundred times.

But after more than five minutes of searching we had not found anyone, until Nomiko shouted:

"YUICHI, I FOUND IT!"

I didn't even answer her, I was already running towards the house.

But while running I had a strange unpleasant feeling that I can't describe.

Even running as fast as I could, it took me more than three minutes to get back to the house.

I arrived at the door and called out to Nomiko one last time to see if she was still outside, but no one answered, which only reinforced the strange feeling.

When I went inside, they were all already there and that's when I knew what this strange feeling meant when I saw their faces; Nomiko and my mother were crying and my father had tears in his eyes, which was also very rare.

My first reaction was to ask them:

"What's going on? Why are you crying? We have to hurry up and treat him?"

But strangely enough, when I said these sentences, I knew that I already knew the answer to my own questions and tears began to flow down my cheeks.

My sentence remained unanswered and there was silence for about ten seconds.

It was my mother who broke the silence of a few seconds that had seemed to last several minutes.

I saw my mother come towards me and hug me, saying:

"It's over, I'm sorry, you did what you could."

But I answered her directly:

"What do you mean it's over! We didn't even treat him! Look, Dad didn't even use the thread and needles, they're still lying on the table!"

My mother, always very calm, answered me:

"I'm proud of you big boy, you fought well, but it's too late, he's not breathing anymore."