John B twisted his face in confusion, his head tilting slightly. "What does that have to do with anything?"
Marleen sucked in a deep breath. "Look where that got him." She looked down at the ground, knowing how harsh that sentence has been, but the boy across from her needed to hear it to realize the seriousness of his situation. "Go home and don't be as stubborn as your father. It's for your own good, John." She allowed her gaze to travel back towards him before she turned back towards the door she'd walked out of.
John B hated every single word that Marleen had just said, but instead of scoffing like he wanted to do, he took the time to ask one last question before she could pull the door open. "Do you think she'll be okay?"
Stopping in her tracks, Marleen squeezed her eyes shut, her hand tightening around the handle. She wanted to give him a solid answer, but she wasn't capable of determining whether it was true or not. "For the sake of Ward and Rafe Cameron, I sure as hell hope so."
________________
SHE WAS CONVINCED THAT SHE'D SUFFER a brutal death when her time came. Ideally, she'd live to be thirty years old, not necessarily considered young but still too youthful to be considered old. What events would occur in her twenties were unknown, but with her family's legacy came enemies, and with enemies came wrongful death. She imagined blood, lots of it. However, the picture couldn't quite paint itself because she wasn't going to die just yet.
It was too bright for her to adjust her vision, the pounding headache emerging and making the confusion she felt ten times worse. She was lying on a bed, one that felt all too familiar. It was a hospital bed, which explained why she was surrounded by so much white. It represented purity, but she thought it was depressing.
She was confused, her thoughts distorted from the anesthetic the surgeons had provided. Prior events that had led to her waking up in the hospital were hazy for a few more seconds until she felt excruciating pain when she attempted to move her body upwards.
A mix between an attempted scream and a wince fell from her lips, her eyes squeezing shut as she pressed her head into the pillow. All of a sudden, she remembered everything that had occurred. She remembered that Rafe had pointed a gun in her direction and pulled the trigger. She remembered blood soaking into her clothing from the bullet wound. And she remembered sitting beside John B in the car before her body went limp.
Wait, if she was here then where was he?
"Jaylene, Jaylene."
She jumped at the voice, the simple movement triggering the muscles near her abdomen, resulting in more pain surfacing. A groan left her lips, her head turning to the side where she saw Marleen sitting beside her on one of the two chairs that were pressed against the wall.
Jaylene struggled to adjust her vision, the brightness threatening to blind her. She was fully aware of her surroundings now along with the obnoxious machines that she was hooked up to. It all felt like a fever dreamβwait, was it?
After weakly pinching herself a few times to confirm that it wasn't a dream, she parted her lips to say something, her voice cracking from how dry her mouth was. "Where is he?"
Marleen reached forward, placing a hand on Jaylene's forearm as she cleared her throat. "I told him to go back home." She explained, watching Jaylene's eyes widen.
The Rosewood girl rapidly shook her head, unable to believe what she was hearing. "No, no. Why would you do that?! It's not safe for him." Her voice was hoarse, prompting Marleen to stand from her seat so that she could pour some water into a cup.
With her eyes set on the nearby window, Marleen stared at the night sky, hoping that the boy had done as instructed and gone to Terrance. "He can't run away from this, Jaylene." She spoke softly, holding her free hand out towards Jaylene so that she could help her sit up.
Sighing, Jaylene took her mother's hand into her own, taking a deep breath before pulling her body up despite the pain. "He could get the death penalty if he's found guilty. Did that thought ever cross your mind?" She sunk her teeth down into her lip, taking the cup of water into her grasp which she quickly drank.
"So we'll make sure he's not." Marleen took the empty cup into her hand to refill it, watching Jaylene's face scrunch up in confusion at what she meant by that so she continued to elaborate. "The doctors want to keep you here for at least four to six days just to make sure that you're fine before transferring you over to St. Olive's in the Outer Banks. Luckily, the bullet didn't go deep enough to damage any important organs, but they weren't able to remove the whole thing. You lost blood, but not too much of it. They think you passed out from shock and not from blood lossβ"
"I don't have my passport. I didn't exactly get here the legal way." Jaylene tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, cringing at how dry the strands felt from the sweat that was locked onto them. She'd never had surgery before, so she felt disgusting knowing that her unconscious body was laid out in the middle of an operation room with multiple doctors surrounding it.
"I made some calls while you were out, so that shouldn't be a problem." Marleen walked towards the end of the bed, looking over at the door to check if a doctor or nurse was nearby to alert them that Jaylene had regained consciousness.
With her eyes widening in fear and her mouth gaping open, Jaylene stared at her mother. "Some calls? What? To who?" She frantically questioned, her heart rate increasing, "Does he know what happened? That I'm here? Alive?!"
"No, your father doesn't know what happened or that you're very much alive." Marleen shook her head, refusing to admit that she hadn't called due to her own cowardliness. "You should be the one to give him a call."
A dry laugh bubbled in Jaylene's throat. "No, I don't wanna talk to him. He literally placed me under house arrest and forbade me from seeing John B. Not to mention he threatened to send me away to boarding school." She rubbed her temple with her free hand, sighing loudly to reduce the sudden stress she felt. It was almost as if she was refusing to process that she'd been shot.
"He's your father."
"Someone should remind him of that then." Jaylene coldly said, turning her head towards the large window on the other end of the room so that she wouldn't have to continue with this conversation.
Marleen could easily catch a hint so she decided it'd be best to leave Jaylene alone for a few minutes to collect her thoughts, so she motioned towards the hallway, her body pushing itself towards the door to exit the tense room. "I'm gonna go find the doctor to let him know that you're awake."
A nod was all Jaylene managed, her eyes fixated on the dark sky. She kept her gaze set there until she heard the door close, her head moving slightly to the right before her eyes landed on the blanket that was lying across her lower body.
The room was mostly silent, the only source of sound coming from the faint sirens of approaching and departing ambulances. She breathed in sharply, the pain rushing across her abdomen as she lifted her body a bit to help ease the discomfort on her back. The urge to walk over to the bathroom so that she could remove the hideous hospital gown to get a look at the damage Rafe Cameron had caused grazed at her skin, but the thought of potentially hurting herself further kept her from doing it.
She wanted to burst into tears, the pain increasing with every second that passed. Why her? Why did bad things always happen to her? She felt like the universe kept throwing punches at her that she wasn't capable of dodging in time and she was sick of it! It wasn't fair. None of this was fair.
Her breathing rapidly increased, the sudden lightheaded sensation forcing her to slowly press her head back to the pillow it'd been rested on. She knew what she needed at that moment, but she couldn't have it. She couldn't put herself at further risk . . . but she wanted it more than ever. She needed it to ease the pain; to drive her into a state of oblivion . . .
She shut her eyes.
Suddenly, she was no longer lying on the bed in Nassau's finest hospital but instead was sitting on the tan leather sofa, the blanket hanging from her shoulders with her knees pushed to her chest as she hugged them tightly.
Her heart was pounding, her mouth dry. She wasn't expecting such a straightforward question, especially one so serious. Truth be told, she was feeling a bit underwhelmed in the weeks leading up to the event that occurred a week and a half ago. Actually, she'd been feeling that way since she gained the ability to process her emotions. It wasn't an overpowering feeling, but it wasn't slim enough to be buried under all the chaos in her life.
She could admit that she had some issues that she chose not to resolve and instead pushed them aside, but she wasn't suicidal. Maybe she often mentioned that she was going to tie a noose around her neck, but it wasn't literal. She only ever made jokes like that at kooky events like midsummers and cotillion, but that's all they ever were to her . . . a joke.
There was a part of her that wondered how healthy it was to attend parties as often as she did at her age, but what else was there to do besides that? She was a teenager for god's sake, that's what everyone her age did. She wasn't battling depression. The overdose wasn't her doing. And she definitely wasn't trying to kill herself.
However, while it hadn't been her intention, she couldn't help but wonder how peaceful it'd be to be torn away from all responsibilities; life as a whole. She liked to believe that when one died, it was the same as when one was in the womb. One sees nothing, feels nothing, and instead of an anticipation that many waited for, one becomes a memory.
Jaylene was uncomfortable with the question, the question that reminded her why she never sought therapy. She didn't like feeling so vulnerable, so exposed. She wasn't raised in a world where feelings were openly discussed, so she had a difficult time processing them sometimes. Despite all that, she had an answer to the question, one she never thought she'd be saying out loud. "I didn't intend for this to happen, but I wouldn't have been opposed to that outcome."
authors note:
hi π«¦.
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