Accident by Danielle Steel

knew she would always be, time could never take that from her, but death had taken Phillip from her. She would never see him laugh again, or run across the lawn, slam the front door, or tell her a joke. He would never surprise her again, with one of his harmless pranks, or his sweet surprises. He would never bring her flowers. She would never see him grow old. She would see him forever as he was now, heartbreakingly still, his soul gone on to another place. For all their love for him, and his for them, in one swift unexpected moment, Phillip had left them.
    It made the next photographer's attack on them as they left even more repulsive. But seeing what was happening, Tom Chapman vowed to see that Phillip wasn't blamed for this disaster. If need be, he would clear his son's name. He didn't want Phillip's memory sullied by innuendo, or used to protect the Senator's wife, or the Senator's seat in the next election. Tom Chapman felt certain that his son was not to blame, and he was not going to allow anyone to say anything different. He said as much to his wife, as they drove away, but she seemed not to hear him. All she could think of was Phillip's face when she had kissed him.
    The night seemed interminable to all of them, as Page sat with Trygve. Both girls were still in surgery then, and Trygve and Page were beginning to feel as though they had been there forever.
    “I keep thinking about the options,” Page said quietly as the sun came up over Marin, and she tried to view it as a hopeful sign. It was another gorgeous spring day, but she no longer felt excited by the warm weather. In her heart, winter had come, with ice and snow, and all its desolation.
    “I keep thinking about what Dr. Hammerman said …she might end up brain damaged, or severely affected in some way, physically or mentally. How would we ever begin to deal with that? How do you live with something like that?” she said absentmindedly, talking almost as much to herself as to him, and suddenly she remembered Bjorn, and felt awful. “I'm sorry, Trygve … I wasn't thinking.”
    “It's all right. I understand what you must be going through. Or at least I can guess at it … I feel a little bit that way about Chloe's legs, and I remember what it was like when they told us Bjorn had Down syndrome.” He was being honest with her, they were both trying to understand what adjustments might lie ahead.
    She looked over at him. His hair was as rumpled as hers, and he had worn jeans and an old plaid shirt, bare feet and an ancient pair of sneakers. She looked down at her gardening sweater then, and remembered that she hadn't bothered to comb her hair. She didn't really care, and it made her smile to realize what they looked like. “We're a sight, the two of us.” She grinned. “Actually, you look better than I do. I ran out of the house so fast, I'm surprised I remembered to get dressed at all.”
    Trygve grinned at her for the first time all night, looking very boyish and very Nordic with his big blue eyes and blond lashes. “These are Nick's jeans, and Bjorn's shirt. God only knows whose shoes. I don't think they're mine. I found them in the garage. I was about to drive here barefoot.”
    She nodded, knowing only too well what he had felt when he heard the news. She couldn't bear to think of it, and she still had to tell Brad, yet another nightmare to survive. If only she could tell him that Allyson was still alive, and there was some hope. But it was unlikely they would know by the time she reached him.
    “I was just thinking about Bjorn,” Trygve said softly, as he leaned back in his chair with a thoughtful look. “It was awful when they first told us. Dana hated everyone and everything, mostly me, because she didn't know who else to hate. And Bjorn, too, at first. She just couldn't accept that we hadn't had a perfect baby. She talked about him being a vegetable, and painted a grisly picture of what the future would be like. She wanted to put him in an