The Hardest Read-The-Room Fail

CONTENT WARNING: Parent In Car Accident (Very minor injuries, but scary situation.)
A few years ago, when I was nineteen and my sister was sixteen, my mother was hit by another car while pulling into the trailer park my family lived in. She was turning left in a tiny car, and a guy in a pickup truck tried to pass her on the left.

It was maybe 7:00 or 8:00 am on a weekend, so everyone else was still asleep. The sound of the crash woke my sister and me up. [Sister] ran out to see what happened and I stayed in bed. Less than a minute later, [Sister] ran back inside, yelling.

Sister: *Panicking* “It was Mom! Mom got hit!”

I jumped up, and [Sister] ran to wake up our stepfather. The three of us ran outside, not stopping for shoes or anything. We ran to the car and got to [Mom]. She was shaken and had whiplash but was otherwise fine. Someone had already called an ambulance.

We were standing around the car when a neighbor I hadn’t met before came up to us from the crowd of bystanders. I thought she was going to offer help or something, nope.

Neighbor: *To me* “Can you run and get me a cigarette? I need one.”

I was crying and panicking, standing next to my injured mother’s totaled car, with my trapped mother inside and my panicking sister next to me. I was barefoot and had cuts on my feet from the rocks and glass, and I hadn’t grabbed my glasses before running outside, so I was half-blind. It was obvious who I was, considering I had called my mom “Mom” numerous times. 

So, this random woman, whom I had never met, looked at the scene in front of her, took in everything, and decided to walk over — not to help, but to ask for a cigarette from the crying girl on the verge of a full-on panic attack, instead of asking someone from the crowd, some of whom were actually smoking.