I typed with one thumb: Medical emergency on 18.

Ambulance.

Sorry.

Then I looked up and watched them lift her, and I counted the minutes without meaning to, the way I count everything.

Seventeen minutes, from my knee hitting that gravel to the doors shutting.

I stood there with my hands in my pockets until the ambulance pulled away.

Then I got back in the Buick.

The dashboard clock read 8:22, and the passenger seat lit up again with his name.