Ariana had stabilized. That was the only thing that pierced Kayla's brain as she rushed into the hospital much later that evening. She had been interviewed for a very long time by the Detroit Police Department and then again by the FBI. Kayla had been terrified the entire time. She just knew they were going to piece together the truth and that she would end up in prison. She fully expected them to know that it had been she, Kayla, who had murdered Marcus and the others back in California.
It turned out that neither agency remotely suspected Kayla of any wrongdoing. Dwayne, having told the San Diego PD that it had been Marcus who had killed Claire, and he who had done the killings Kayla was responsible for and that Dwayne had killed his own brother to stop his murderous rampage. There was no reason for them to suspect Kayla at all. She was even being hailed as a hero for killing the leader of a powerful street gang that the FBI had been trying to take down for years.
She was worried they would ask her why she had left San Diego so abruptly after Claire's death and why Dwayne had come looking for her. However, as they had no evidence of any wrongdoing, and the fact that she had taken out a known violent criminal, it appeared that the FBI had decided to accept the win and let Kayla go.
Kayla, however, did not give one single damn. All she cared about was Ariana, and she was doing much better. She had stabilized and that fact alone had greatly encouraged her doctors. Everyone seemed to believe that the most serious danger had passed. The focus then settled on Ariana's extreme blood loss. Kayla could testify to the fact that Ariana had lost vast amounts of blood the previous night. She had received a transfusion, but the hospital was short on Ariana's blood type; O-Negative.
It was lucky, then, that both Kayla and Penny were O-Negative. Kayla immediately offered to donate whatever was needed. They could hook a vacuum to her for all she cared. They, of course, did not take that much from either woman but by the time Kayla had finished giving blood, she felt quite woozy.
"I think I might pass out," said Kayla, looking across the room at her mother who sat on the bed opposite her, investigating the cloth bandage that the nurse had secured to her arm.
"Me too," said Penny, looking slightly nauseous. "Did I... have I ever mentioned that I don't like to see... blood?"
"I don't think so," said Kayla. "I guess it's a good thing it doesn't bother me."
"That isn't funny, Mikayla," Penny said sharply.
"I wasn't joking," Kayla shot back.
"And that's a good thing, because you always sucked at telling jokes," said Claire, who leaned casually against the end of Penny's bed examining her fingernails as though they were a mildly interesting television program.
"Oh, who asked you?" Kayla snapped.
"What was that, sweetheart?" asked Penny distractedly.
"Uh... nothing," said Kayla uncertainly.
"Yeah, kiddo," said Claire. "Don't forget, you're the only one that can see me. Don't want people thinking you're going bat-shit, now do we? Of course, the first sign of madness is talking to your own head... and the second sign is answering yourself." Claire smirked. "If I'm not a ghost, you're really screwed."
"Thanks..." Kayla muttered. She left her mother and went to sit with Ariana. She hadn't actually visited Ariana in her room yet. In truth, she didn't want to go in. She was afraid, terrified of seeing Ariana so fragile. It was with an immense amount of trepidation that Kayla pushed open the door to Ariana's room and stepped inside.
The room was deathly quiet save for the periodic beeping of Ariana's EKG. She felt oddly as though she were walking into a tomb and she wished she could turn around and run away. But she had to stay there; she had to stay strong for Ariana. Both her mother and Claire had told her so.
She slowly approached Ariana's bed, her gaze falling on the redhead's right hand, which lay loosely at her side. There were still bloodstains on her fingers. Kayla went into the bathroom and returned with a rag moistened with water from the sink. She sat down next to the bed and carefully began wiping Ariana's hand.
"There," she said, gently placing Ariana's hand back onto the blankets. "That's better." She finally forced herself to look up at Ariana's face. She was so pale, like a ghost. Her brilliantly red hair was a mess and despite Kayla's attempts to smooth it, she simply couldn't do anything with it.
"Ari..." she whispered. She knew Ariana couldn't hear her, the doctors had told her so, but she had so many things she needed to say. She had to talk, to let everything out before she imploded. She wanted to cry, but she discovered that her pain seemed to be beyond tears now. It had seeped into her soul and settled there. It started to devour her from the inside. "I'm so sorry, Ari. This... you... it's all my fault. I should have left the warehouse. I never should have stayed. I never should have fallen in love with you. I tried so hard to leave... I wanted to, but I... You were just so... God, I needed you, Ari. I needed you... bad.
"I was selfish. I knew this day would come... I knew he'd find me and I knew you'd end up in the middle of it. I thought I could protect you. I thought... I thought I was smarter than him. I wasn't. He knew from the start right where to hit me and I should have known... I should have anticipated it. I was stupid and I let this happen. I should've stopped him, I should've... I should've... Fuck, Ari! Why did you take that bullet for me?!" It was the thing that had weighed on her more than anything else had since Ariana had been shot. It was the one thing that made her feel even more miserable.
"He shot me, Ari! He shot me! I should be in that bed, not you! I should be the one dying! You should have let him kill me! I could have handled that. I would have been okay with that. I deserve it, but you… you don’t. I was supposed to protect you, to keep you safe. It wasn’t your responsibility to protect me…”
“I asked her to,” her mother’s quiet voice said from behind her. Kayla turned around, confused. Penny stood by the door, watching with bloodshot eyes.
“What?” Kayla asked. She didn’t understand this at all. How could Penny have asked Ariana to protect her. It made no sense.
“When she called me, I… I asked her to look after you,” Penny explained. “I asked her to keep you safe. She promised me she would. I guess she thought she was doing what I asked...”
“You didn’t ask her to put herself between me and a loaded gun, Mom,” said Kayla, shaking her head. “She did that herself. Hell, she would’ve done it whether you asked her to or not. It’s just who she is.” Kayla turned back to Ariana, considering the matter closed.
“I wish you could have met her, Mom,” said Kayla quietly. “She was incredible. She always said that I was the strong one, but Mom… God, she’s so much stronger than me. She… she’s been through so much… she’s been through things that would destroy most people. I couldn’t have survived what she went through, what she suffered through.
“It would have broken me, but her? I think all it did was make her that much stronger. She’s got the purest heart of anyone in the world. She’ll give and give and never expect anything in return. Her grandfather died a couple of years ago and he left her over a quarter of a billion dollars. Do you know what she wants to do with it? She doesn’t want to buy an island or a jet or a mansion. She wants to use it to make other people happy. Damn girl bought me a two hundred thousand dollar car just because I said I liked it.”
“She almost sounds too good to be true,” said Penny. Kayla closed her eyes and nodded slowly.
“Yeah…” she whispered. “I guess she was.”
-.-
The week that followed was the longest of Kayla’s life and by the end of it, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to live to see the next one. Ariana’s condition remained the same and according to her doctors, there was very little chance that Ariana would ever wake up. While there was still some amount of brain activity, the damage, they said, was just too severe.
That had been exactly six days ago and since then Kayla had begun a downward spiral that she was sure would never end. She spent most of her days in a near catatonic state, unmoving and refusing to speak to anyone. She sat in Ariana’s hospital room, usually at the window, staring blankly out at a world that didn’t seem to care that such a beautiful person was gone from it forever.
Kayla had stopped eating and she only slept when her brain could no longer keep her awake. She was letting herself waste away and she didn’t care. She couldn’t care. That had been the strangest realization of all. She didn’t care about anything anymore. She felt nothing. Not happiness, not sadness, absolutely nothing at all. She only felt empty.
Claire still visited her occasionally, but Kayla had long since stopped responding to her. In recent days, Claire hadn’t been speaking either. She just sat there with her in silence. Perhaps this was a projection of Kayla’s feeling of emptiness. She couldn’t know for sure.
Kayla was in her usual spot at the window, sitting in a chair and staring out at the hospital parking lot, when her mother entered the room. She paused briefly at Ariana’s bed before approaching Kayla.
“Kayla, sweetheart, I’m really worried about you,” she said softly. “Will you come downstairs with me? You need to eat.”
“I’m not hungry,” said Kayla, speaking for the first time in three days. Her throat was tight and it felt strange to form the words. She didn’t like it, the feeling of it. She wished she didn’t have to talk. She wished everyone would just leave her alone.
“You haven’t eaten in two days, honey,” said Penny. “You must be hungry. You should eat something.”
“Do you know how Ariana eats?” Kayla snapped, still gazing out of the window, not really seeing anything at all. “Do you know? They come in here twice a day and shove a plastic tube down her throat.”
“That doesn’t…”
“I’m not hungry,” Kayla interrupted. “Leave me alone,”
“Starving yourself isn’t going to help her,” said Penny reasonably. “Please, honey, just…”
“Get out,” Kayla said in a monotone. She had no energy for anger. Even her rage had abandoned her. She couldn’t even gather the strength to shout. “Please, just… just leave me alone.”
“Okay,” said Penny, putting on her best understanding voice. “Okay, well I’ll come back in a little while then. I’ve got to go to the airport and pick up your sister. She’s flying in today. Her flight gets in at 8:15 tonight. We’ll come by later.”
Kayla wasn’t sure when Penny left. She just stopped talking, but Kayla never heard her leave. Time passed, although Kayla was never sure just how much. She judged the time of day by whether or not the sun was up or not. The hours themselves held no meaning. They were just long, endless spans of time that Kayla wished would end.
Sometime later, after the sun had vanished and Kayla had been left to stare instead at the darkness beyond the window, the door opened once again and Cooper came inside. Kayla didn’t acknowledge him. She half-wished he had the strength to do what he said he would. She wished he would just kill her. She knew he wanted to. She could see it in his eyes every time he looked at her.
“How is she?” Cooper asked after standing beside her bed for a few minutes. Kayla didn’t immediately respond. She gave a good deal of thought to every word she spoke. She only spoke what she absolutely had to.
“The same,” she said, not bothering to look at him.
“Have you gone home recently? You’re wearing the same clothes you had on yesterday,” To Kayla, he didn’t sound remotely concerned. He was just making idle conversation.
“No,” she said.
“Well, you should,” said Cooper. “Staying here isn’t going to make her wake up. You should go home… get some rest.”
“I’m fine,” said Kayla. “I don’t want to go anywhere… especially not back there.”
“What? The warehouse?” said Cooper. “Why not?”
“It doesn’t matter,”
“You brought it up, Kayla. Why don’t you want to go back to the warehouse?”
“Because it’s hers.” She said before she could stop herself. “It’s her home, Coop. It was never mine. I shouldn’t be there.”
“If you’d have thought of that before, this wouldn’t have happened,” Cooper snapped, but then much to Kayla’s surprise, he sighed. “I… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“Why not? It’s true.”
“No… no, it’s not,” said Cooper slowly. “It’s… Look, what I said the night Ariana was shot, I… That was wrong. You didn’t mean for this to happen, I know that. I never liked the idea of the two of you living together… of you being together… but I always trusted Ariana’s judgment. You said she knew about Dwayne, about the danger she was in. I know she loved you…”
“Loved…” Kayla said quietly. “Hmm… I guess that is the right word, isn’t it?” Cooper walked over and sank into the chair beside her, the chair so often occupied by Claire.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” he said gently.
“I know how you meant it,” said Kayla. She shook her head. “I wish she was dead. If she was dead, it’d all be so much easier. But this… not knowing… I hate seeing her like this. She’s alive, but… she’s not.”
“There’s always hope,” said Cooper. Kayla didn’t think he sounded as though he believed that at all. “She could come back to us. As long as her heart’s beating, there’s hope.”
“Not much,” said Kayla. Cooper managed a thin smile. Kayla couldn’t understand how.
“Don’t need much,” he said. He stood slowly and put his hands in his pockets. “I gotta get to the bookstore. I’ll swing back by in the morning. In the meantime, start taking better care of yourself. You look terrible.” He left, and Kayla, alone once again, turned back to the window and lost herself in the darkness beyond.617Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2Lx9lUvFhV
