Chapter 3: Accident
I stumbled from the couch with a grunt, and Mishmash jumped from my lap before I hit the floor with my feet. After a moment of regaining my balance I let out a sigh.
Another ring of the doorbell.
I rubbed my eyes and let out a yawn, half walking half stumbling to the door.
When I opened it I was surprised at who was standing there and what she was holding.
"Felicia?"
She was wearing jeans and a peach sweat shirt, and her hair looked like it had been groomed perfectly. If it weren't for the slightly welted black eye she would have looked perfect.
"Good morning," she said softly.
In her hands was a small tray with two cups of what smelled like coffee with a dash of cinnamon.
"I uh... made you some coffee. Would you like some?"
"Yeah... yeah sure."
I took one of the cups and took a sip. It was delicious, with just the right amount of heat. Not too bitter, not too sweet, with the awesome flavor of cinnamon to back it up.
"This is really frikkin' good."
"I'm glad you like it," she said with a soft laugh, "I have to go up to the roof to feed the birds now."
I don't know why I said it.
"You know what? Let me come with you, I'll help you feed them."
"Oh... I... I couldn't, you might scare them."
"Nah, how hard could it be? It's just laying out some feed right?"
"I suppose so. Well, yes..."
The roof had an amazing view of the city, that was for sure.
In the center was a large vent fan, neighbored by the small coop Felicia had spoken of earlier. Several pigeons were already gathering, and for a roof swarmed by pooping birds every morning it was extremely clean.
"So this is it huh?"
"Yes."
She handed me a small bag of feed and we set about business.
"So," I said, tossing a small amount of feed inside the coop, "What's your job? You know... aside from feeding birds."
"I work at a daycare center. The children can sometimes be troublesome, but it's a good job, and I like doing it."
"You seem kind of meek to be handling crazy kids every day."
"Heh... I've had to adjust. A few months ago I would have never been able to talk to you the way I did last night."
"Shy?"
She nodded, "Mm, even now it's difficult."
I tried not to let it bug me that I dreamt of her in the form of a small and socially inept pony the night before, especially considering as I had just met her. "Well, it's good that you can talk to me, I would have been a bit too worried about you last night if you couldn't even say a word. Speaking of which, how's the eye?"
"Oh, it'll be alright. It's the first time he got that bad, so I knew I would have to call the police right away."
"Right... hey listen, I gotta get going to work, if I'm late the boss man is gonna kill me, so."
"Right, have a good day."
"You too Felicia."
My job consisted of answering phone calls for customer service. The company I worked for was an out of the way computer company that refused to outsource, but was having a bit of trouble hiring people with the right qualifications. If there was one thing I loved more than cleaning the barrel of a gun so it could fire another day, it was building a computer from scratch.
I barely had my resume' through the door before they hired me, and just like that I had been working at Tom's Computers ever since I'd gotten back, and had even earned a few raises from my good work.
It was hard to find companies like that, so I counted my blessings and brought my best to work every day.
Granted we still had cramped cubicles, but the boss didn't give a crap what we decorated them with, and it was a very open work place, nobody was offended by anything.
It was the ideal work spot, the kind that people searched high and low for until they ended up settling into a mediocre zombie job.
I enjoyed my time in the military, and I enjoyed this job, but aside from a picture of a koala nothing else held its home as a decoration in my cubicle.
My cubicle neighbor Phoebe Packard on the other hand, was a completely different story.
"Psst..."
I had just finished a particularly blaring round of what we like to call 'stupid calls' when Phoebe poked her head over the edge of her cubicle, just enough so that I could see her large blue eyes, but not her mouth.
Her blindingly blonde hair was pulled into a tight bun, and looked like it was about ready to explode at a moment's notice.
It fit her character well, the woman was a ticking time bomb, and I was surprised she was wearing anything other than a straight jacket.
Above her floated a group of bright pink balloons tied to the corner of her desk. The balloons were emblazoned with large yellow letters that looked like they had cake frosting dripping off them, 'Life is a Party' indeed Phoebe.
"Hello Phoebe."
"I just got an EXTREMELY important call Billy!"
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah! It was this lady who was having trouble with her computer."
"Erm... isn't that just a regular call?"
"Nonononono, you see. This was super duper important because it was for her son's birthday!"
"... And?"
Phoebe let out a long gasp of horror, "Billy I thought you were better than this! This computer was for her son's BIRTHDAY! If something you give someone at an awesome party doesn't work that's... that's... NOT GOOD!"
"Did you take your meds this morning?"
"Meds?"
"And there's your problem."
I couldn't see her lips, but her eyes went into a glare, and I could tell she was frowning, "You don't understand, I have to take these papers up to the boss, I need you to take this call Billy! The party must go on!"
"Alright already, just do what you need to do Phoebe."
I felt a pair of arms wrap in a death grip around my neck and a kiss planted on my cheek.
The next instant she was walking away giggling, "Thanks Billy! Line five is where it's at!"
I rolled my eyes and picked up the phone, hitting the button for line five. "Tom's Computers, customer service, this is William speaking, how may I assist you today?"
"Hello William, my name is Barbara."
I frowned, she sounded elderly. "Hello Barbara."
"Right... My son Gregory works at the police station as a jailer, and he loves those virtual games you can play on the computer, so I bought him a nice one from Mr. Thomas' store."
"We're a third party seller Ma'am, we make most of our profit from parts, and we sell the computers from other companies, do you know what kind of computer it was?"
"It was... oh what do you call those fancy ones, Alienware?"
"Alright, do you know the model?"
"I have it written down here..."
By the time the call was done I had counted it at about a half and hour, and she was up and running again, I was slightly annoyed that Phoebe shoved her workload into my zone, but there was no helping it, so instead of complaining I went back to work.
By the time Phoebe had made it back it was ten minutes to closing time, and her grin was aimed at me, "You're awesome Billy! I'm throwing you a party!"
"Um... no thanks."
She frowned, "No, I'm throwing you a party and you're going to be there. Check your schedule and let me know when you're free tomorrow."
"Okay okay, sheesh."
Pushy much?
"So William, how was your day?"
I sighed and put my hands behind my head, staring at the spinning oak fan in an effort to sort of hypnotize myself and relax.
"Phoebe wants to throw me a party," I said in the most monotone voice I could muster.
Doc laughed, "Maybe you should go. If it's a party you could see some new faces, and it seems like you're finally comfortable enough to start talking to people again."
"Yeah, she didn't leave me much choice in the matter anyways. I barely got away from the welcoming party when I first started working at Tom's place, and I guess I could have only put it off for so long before she caught me."
"Hmm, a little more time and you won't need to come see me at all William."
"Ha, you know I love your company Doc."
"That I do. Maybe... when this is all done, we should have a toast."
"Didn't take you for a bar hopper Doc."
"I said a toast, but if we have to go to a bar, then that's alright with me."
"You got yourself a deal."
"Anything interesting happen aside from Ms. Packard's usual antics?"
"I met my neighbor yesterday night, Felicia Shirley."
"Oh?"
"Yeah, real sweet girl, feeds the pigeons on our roof apparently, kind of shy though."
"I see."
I slid the key to the apartment door into the hole and twisted, opening it to be greeted by a set of stairs and our mailman, Deborah Hollie.
"Hey Deb."
"Heya Will."
She turned to me and I smiled and let out a sigh.
The girl was about my height, and had a very obvious lazy eye. She was kind of a klutz, but she was good at her job and was friends with pretty much everyone in the building who didn't stay locked in their cave all day, "Whatcha got for me today?"
She scratched the back of her head and grinned, "Sorry I'm late today, there was a huge accident down by the post office." She handed me a small stack of mail, and I was glad to see there were no bills, at least not yet.
"Ah don't worry about it. What happened by the post office?"
"A girl got hit."
"... Huh?"
"Yeah." Deborah's gaze fell. "She was on her way back home from the library and got hit by a taxi. They say she's in critical condition."
I didn't know why, but a feeling of dread much like one I would get down range crept its way up my spine, "Do you um... know anything about her?"
"No. She's friends with Ms. Shirley I think."
"Felicia?"
"Yeah."
I tucked the mail into my belt and went back the way I came, "Thanks for the mail Deb, I'll see you later."
"Huh? Where are you going?"
I didn't bother answering, I rushed to the corner and started waving and whistling like a madman, "Taxi! Taxi!"
It wasn't long until one of them pulled up and I was in the back seat.
"Take me to um..."
The hospital closest to the post office...
"Uh... Lankard Memorial Hospital please."
"You got it pal."
"Make it quick."
"No you don't understand, I'm here to see Felicia Shirley, she's a friend of mine, her friend got hurt and I'm worried."
The obese lady behind the counter sighed and rolled her eyes for what must have been the fifth time since I had walked into the rather large lobby of the hospital.
"And I told you already sir, we can't just have strangers running around. The family has been called and the close friends have been confirmed, you're not one of them."
I didn't want to understand, I wanted to leap over the counter and hit her.
For some reason I thought about Fluttershy, and what would have happened in my dream had one of her friends been hurt, or worse.
"Bill?" I turned around at the soft voice that came from behind me, and was surprised to see Felicia, "What are you doing here?"
"Deb told me one of your friends got hurt and I um... got worried."
Felicia looked down, tears in her eyes, "Tammy, she... she got hit, and Rachel isn't here yet, and I... I..."
"Hey," I stepped forward and put a hand gently on her shoulder, "It's gonna be alright, I'm sure your friend is on the way."
"What the hell is going on?"
Then I saw her.
She damn near broke the door barging into the hospital, rushed past several people who gave her incredulous looks, and came upon Felicia and I like a tornado. I almost flinched away when she turned her glare towards me, "Who is this guy?"
Felicia flinched, but swallowed and started to talk, "He's um... he's my neighbor, he heard that my friend got hurt and came here to make sure I was okay."
I did a double take.
About a foot and a half shorter than me, her hair was as long as mid back, and was styled at the top like a punk rocker would have it, but she didn't go overboard with it. What she did go overboard with were the streaks of a dyed rainbow pattern going all the way through her otherwise blonde hair.
I felt my eye start twitching.
"Dash?"
"What?" asked the girl.
"Erm... nothing."
"My name is Rachel, Rachel Daniels, you?"
"William Jenkins, I met Felicia yesterday when that guy was tossing her around."
Suddenly as she had come bursting onto the scene, her expression changed from a glare to a wide grin, and she locked her arm around my neck and started giving me a noogie of all things, "HAHA you sly dog, she told me all about that! Didn't know it was someone good looking as YOU though. Hey, need help getting her pants off?"
"Rachel... now's not the time," muttered Felicia, "I know I was kind of vague over the phone, but Tammy... she's in critical condition."
The noogie stopped instantly and I was untangled, Rachel looked shocked, "She what?"
"She was... she was hit by a car."
Rachel frowned and stepped forward to give her friend a hug, "I'm so sorry Felicia."
"I... I don't know what to do Rachel."
Then Felicia started crying into Rachel's shoulder, and I felt like I'd been hit by a ton of bricks.
After what seemed like an eternity Rachel pulled away slowly as Felicia started to calm down, "Is she still in surgery?"
Felicia shook her head, "No, I've just been afraid to go see her. The doctors say she's not awake yet."
"Alright, come on Shy Buns, you too Prince Charming."
The room was small and brought out feelings of claustrophobia. The steady beep of an EKG almost caused me to slip away into one of my flashbacks, but we weren't there to worry about me.
In fact, I didn't know why I was there in the first place. I had only known Felicia a day.
"Visiting hours are almost over," said the nurse gently, pushing aside the curtains surrounding the girl's bed.
My eyes widened when I saw her.
The girl I ran into on the intersection the day before, battered and bruised.
It was easy to recognize her dark purple hair with the magenta line.
For some reason I panicked a little.
"Is it alright if we sleep in the waiting room?"
I didn't know why I asked, but the nurse smiled, "Normally we wouldn't allow that, but since your friend is in critical condition and her family won't be here until tomorrow... I'll talk to Doctor Jameson."
To this day I don't know why she bent the rules for us.
Maybe it had something to do with how worried Felicia looked, or maybe it was Rachel's strength, or maybe... maybe she was just a really good nurse who wanted the best for her patients, even if she had to break a few rules and regulations along the way.
That night we slept in the uncomfortable chairs of the waiting room in the center of the second floor, a few yards away from Tammy's room.
Felicia clung to Rachel like she was her lifeline.
And me, I was afraid the nightmares would come back.
They did... but not in the way I thought they would.
"Mister, you gotta wake up! Wake up!"
My eyes snapped open, and I was greeted by the sight of a very worried, very distraught looking spikey creature.
"Wha... I... huh?"
"Please get up! Somethings wrong with Twilight!"
Somewhere in my gut I knew exactly what was wrong.
It was a good thing I knew how to listen to my gut.
