Turned
Chapter 1
One gunshot was all it took for me to come spiraling down. I guess you could say that always knew my life would end like this.
No, I wasn't dying, but something inside me was. Something inside me had been dying for a long time, but that night, it was finally dead.
"Oh my god, Kyle!" my mom screamed has the gunshot echoed across the walls.
I saw her running and reached my arms out to her. And I touched her, alright. As she rushed over to Charlie's side, my fingertips barely brushed the side of her arm.
My dad stood straight in front of me. His mouth fell open at the sight of my mom kneeling before Charlie, checking his pulse and forehead. She was completely ignoring the fact that my throat had just been sliced open.
I felt warm, sticky blood dripping down my neck and onto my clothes. As the seconds went by, more and more blood came from the gash on my neck, until finally it was almost pouring.
"Mom!" I screamed. She didn't blink an eye. "Mom!"
I could feel my mouth moving, I could hear my voice, I could feel more and more blood coming out of the wound as I strained my neck to look at my dad. He didn't look like he knew what was happening. I looked to where Danny and Lacey were standing before, only neither of them were there now.
Then, as if they were sent by angels, Danny came running back into the room. He came toward me, squatted down, and picked me up like a baby.
"Lacey's in the car ready to go. We're going to take you to the hospital, Jo. You're going to be okay. Just stay with us."
I nodded. I didn't think I could manage to speak. I was losing too much blood, so much that I was barely hanging on.
The last thing I remembered before blacking out was leaning my head against Danny's chest and trying to ignore the nausea I got from feeling him running.
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I was only unconscious for a few minutes, which was thankfully all the time I took to get me to the hospital. I woke up about the time Danny opened the car door and let a group of men in emergency vests carry me inside. They rushed me to the emergency room. Danny and Lacey weren't allowed in.
Being unconscious is different from sleep, though. I'm not denying that I fell asleep, no matter how embarrassed I was about it. To my surprise, the first voice I heard was my dad's.
The plain, white, circular clock above the door said it was one in the morning. My dad hadn't changed out of his uniform, so I assumed he'd been here for a while.
"Hey, honey. Are you okay?" he asked.
"Yeah, I'm good," I replied.
I sat up a little and patted the open space on the bed, beside my legs. The pain got the best of me, though; I winced and plopped back down on the hard hospital pillow. He didn't seem to notice my pain. He took my suggestion and sat down next to me.
"How do you feel?" he asked.
"I'm fine, I already told you."
"It doesn't hurt anywhere, does it?"
"Just my throat."
"Then you're not fine."
"Dad..." I whined.
"Do you need a nurse? There's a button over there. It's funny what kind of technology they come up with in ten years. We haven't been in a hospital since you were six years old with bronchitis. Remember that?"
"Yeah, I remember. But I'm pretty sure there was a button."
"No, there wasn't."
I rolled my eyes and laughed. "Whatever, dad."
We were quiet for a minute. My dad kept going between looking down at the bed and looking at my throat when he thought I wasn't paying attention.
"Where's mom?" I asked.
He looked up at me, surprised. "Um, why do you ask?"
"Hmm, I don't know, dad. I'm in the hospital with a life-threatening injury. I'm sure you can see why I'd like to see her."
Before he could reply, my mom stepped in the room.
"Jo, don't be so melodramatic," she said, smiling at the sight of me.
My dad glared at her. "Tess, I told you not to come in here."
"Kyle, you can't stop me from seeing my daughter."
"You sure could stop yourself from seeing her all this time while you've been catching up with your half-dead son!"
"Let's not forget why he's half-dead, Kyle!"
"Will both of you stop?" I said, catching their attention.
"I'm sorry, honey," my mom said. She knelt down next to my hospital bed and stroked my cheek. "How are you feeling?"
"You'd know if you had bothered to come check on her," my dad interrupted.
I looked at him in annoyance. "Dad, can you give us a minute?"
His eyes went between me and my mom for a few seconds, but he finally stood up. "I'll be outside if you need me."
When he was gone, my mom sat where he was sitting before.
"I'm so sorry, honey. It all happened so fast. I never saw that coming."
I stared at her, wondering if she was going to comment on what I was thinking. When she didn't, I took the lead.
"So I was dating my brother?"
"Your half-brother," she corrected me.
"It doesn't matter, he's still my brother. I still kissed him."
"I know you're confused and disgusted right now, but don't forget that I feel the same way."
I laughed sarcastically. "This is all so messed up."
She laughed, too. "Believe me, I know."
"Are Danny and Lacey here?"
"Yeah, they're just outside. I don't know if you want to see them right now, though."
"Why not?" I asked.
"Well, you see, they-"
"They what?" I interrupted.
"They're both pretty shaken. Lacey's a lot worse off than Danny, though."
I just nodded. There was nothing else to say. A few minutes of silence later, my mom leaned down and kissed my forehead.
"I'm going to check on Charlie. I love you."
She was about to leave when I asked, "How is he?"
She looked surprised, and I didn't blame her. I wasn't even sure what part of my brain cared about how he was doing. But I asked, so I got an answer.
"Charlie?" she asked. I nodded. "He's in surgery now. He isn't doing well."
"I'm sorry, mom."
"There's nothing you could've done, honey."
Then she left.
I knew my mom had other things to worry about besides how I was feeling. I couldn't hold her accountable for wanting to get to know her own son. But there was a part of me that wanted to keep her as far from Charlie as I could.
I couldn't figure him out. He was a question mark amongst a crowd of periods; a blue fish amongst a sea of red. The things he had told me and the things everyone else had told me about him and his past never added up, no matter what sequence I mentally twisted them in.
I wanted to turn that question mark into a period. No matter how much I was afraid of him, I had to approach him. I had to get answers.
Everything I had known about Green Grove for my entire life had been thrown out in a matter of months. I didn't even know my own mother as well as I thought I did. If she was telling the truth about Charlie's birth and Vikram Desai's friendship with her, then it seemed like all answers to the chaos began with her.
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A/N: I apologize for the short first chapter, but there will be much longer chapters in the future! I recently began rewatching the first season of Twisted and would like nothing more than to see it renewed! I don't see how such an amazing show could get low ratings. It's better than any other show that ABC Family has to offer.
Anyway, this story is going to follow what I think would happen if the show had a second season. I hope one day it will! This story may be from Jo's point of view, but I'll never be able to capture in words the amount of emotion Maddie Hasson puts in her character. She's an amazing actress!
Please review below and let me know your thoughts, any ideas you may have for this story and its future chapters, or constructive criticism.