24.It was a mistake, dad.

John

"Mia drowned in a pool." He finally said. "We are at the hospital."

Dad must have had his own phone on speaker because I heard Mia's mum shout.

"You stupid boys." Dad growled. He was angry and rained a tirade of insults at all of us over the phone, knowing that we were near Quinn and could hear.

"I told you to take care of her." He fumed. "How did you let her drown?"

We couldn't even use the excuse that we wanted to use. We were all ashamed of ourselves and knew we deserved dad's raging words.

"Which hospital are you dummies at?"

Quinn told him and he clicked off the call. When he arrived at the hospital, he angrily scolded us, berating us for not protecting Mia.

We hung their heads, remaining silent. We knew how precious Mia was to dad but we didn't know he would flare up this much. Mia's mother was the one who felt sorry for us and tried to calm our father's emotions.

"What happened at the party?" Dad asked, looking at all of us but no one was willing to talk.

We were sorry