buckle up.

Thursday, 22^nd May 2008

“There’s been an accident!” came the frantic voice.

“WHAT? What happened?!” I explode. My heart feels like it is ripping apart.

“I need to talk to Ummi, right now.”

I pass the phone to my mum and even then I do not believe the words I just heard.

An hour ago my two older brothers had just driven and dropped us off –my parents, me and my 3 younger brothers- at KLIA for our New Zealand trip. Ahmad has his short sem to focus on and Saif is caught up in his final year; so they both couldn’t make it. They were meant to be on their way back to Ampang. Saif was down with a fever and was asleep and so Ahmad had to drive.

I stand there next to the luggage trolley as I listen to my mom trying to calm my brother down and find out what happened. My dad and younger brothers are praying maghrib in the surau. I strain my ears to get the full story; only to get just bits and pieces of it.

“Where are you now? .... The highway? Okay... Are you alright? Is anyone hurt? What happened?”

Pause...

“The car hit a pole and overturned?.... And you both? Just cuts and bruises... Okay.... Let me talk to Angah...”

My mum is consoling Ahmad and trying to make him find out where they are. Find a landmark. Find the AAM card in his wallet. Make a call.

My dad comes out of the surau and when I break the news to him, he stares at me with disbelief.

“He’s crying now,” my mom whispers to my dad. “He’s in a complete shock.” I cannot imagine him that way. Ahmad is usually the level-headed one. The one who I can always count on to say that “everything will be okay” and it really does turn okay. The one who advices me straightforwardly when I cry my eyes out. I cannot hold it in. The tears form and I cry too.

As always, my dad takes the matter at hand and speaks into the phone. He finds out their rough location and after a while, Saif says a towtruck is there. A Chinese man talks over the phone and my dad asks how badly are his sons hurt and the condition of the car.

For a while, we consider if we really should go. Whether we should take the trip or tend to them. When my dad asks Saif if they can manage themselves, he answers that he doesn’t know. My dad makes calls to my aunt to take care of them and after my parents reassure themselves that Ahmad and Saif will be generally fine, we decide to board the plane. We run to the waiting area and find that most passengers are already seated. We are one of the last ones to enter the aeroplane.

Throughout the New Zealand Trip, my aunt updates my dad on their conditions.

They both have cuts. I hear Ahmad is hospitalized with a concussion. He has a memory loss. He keeps asking what happened and how he got there. He has absolutely no clue what happened and cannot recall the events of that night.

Later on, I would find out that after the car hit a pole at the highway, it overturned twice into a ditch. After it stopped and they both got out, Ahmad asks what happened and after Saif explains, he nods in understanding... but after a while, he asks again what happened; over and over again. I assume this is because the mind has gone through such a traumatic accident that the brain shuts down and refuses to acknowledge the shock.

Friday, 6^th June 2008

When I reach home, I am overjoyed to see Ahmad greeting me at the door (all limbs intact) and I hug him. I find Saif inside and hug him tightly too; afraid to let them get another close encounter with death before showing them how much they mean to me. They talk about what happened; though only Saif remembers it as Ahmad has amnesia of that night.

The Unser’s windows are all smashed. The front tempered glass is cracked and bent inwards. One side of the car is curved inwards. The car damages are worse than this my brothers tell me. I have yet to see the car.

Why they were not badly injured? Because they wore seatbelts: Which strapped them to the seats and kept them safe.

Lesson Learnt: Wear seatbelts.