Thanks a bunch for the most amazing reviews ever. You guys rock. I hope you love this chapter. It's a little more cheerful!
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I turned abruptly when I heard the word travel down the foggy halls from a distance.
It wasn't just a word, at least not to me. This was a name, something special. The name that only one would ever call me, and get away with it.
"Mom?" I asked my voice secretively screaming with desperation. I was squinting against the light.
I couldn't see anything; the bright luminosity was just too strong. I began to think that I'd just imagined the voice. That it was all out of hope and desperation. Maybe, Mom wasn't there.
"Mom, is that you?" I asked again. For a moment everything was still and silent, but gradually I heard faint breathing, soft, gentle footsteps and the words 'I love you Susie' drifting to me. The words swam around my head in a dizzying manner. I wanted to hold ever single one of the words and cradle them to my heart as if they are each special. All because they came from her.
A dark silhouette formed, the immense light shadowing the face of the figure, but I recognized her. I'd know that shape anywhere. The slender form of my mom was distinguishable and I knew, just knew that it was her.
She continued to move toward me. Soon, she was close enough that I saw her face. Her eyes bright, fearful looking down the hall at me. I ran towards her, as fast as my legs could carry.
I reached her and didn't slow. I threw my arms around her neck, "Mom," I cried into her shoulder, squeezing her. I was just so glad I could see her. So exultant that I'd found her.
"Susie, what's going on?" I heard my mom's gentle voice muffled against my body that I'd latched onto her. It was fearful of the answer, yet full of curiosity.
I pulled away with a gentle laugh playing at my lips. "Come on, Mom," I said as I extended my hand to her.
Against my body's pleas for me to burst into tears, I held myself together. Now was not the time to cry. Even if they were tears of joy, pain, fear or relief.
I had to get my mom to her body. I just had to make sure she was okay, and she would wake up. She slipped her hand into mine. It was as cold as a ghost's hand should be and it startled me, I hadn't thought of my mother as a ghost.
I did see the glow to her body as I neared her but the thought never really thickened in my mind. Not until I noticed the usual warmth of my mom's hand was gone, left only with cold. The coldness was sad, and empty. But I looked at my mom's soft face and her gentle smile and the sadness was gone, and the emptiness filled.
I closed my eyes and pictured the hospital room, where I lay unconscious, next to my mother. I remembered her silent figure, dying on the bed, the sterile death-like smell floating to my senses, and the coldness that seemed to envelope me every time I was in a hospital.
I heard a slight gasp and opened my eyes. I was back in my cuddled body, under the blankets. I shifted under the fabric and slid myself out of the chair. My mother's hand—the one that had been holding my hand—was covering her mouth. Surely, because she was shocked.
Her eyes were the size of dinner plates as she deeply gaped at her body. The bruises had turned yellow and purple and the cuts along her face were healing but still showed strong. In the past week they had dropped some tubes as she healed, the scarring left on her arms was visibly noticeable.
"It's gonna be okay, Mom," I said gently, grabbing her hand and pulling her towards the shell of a body.
Her fingers made quick contact before she pulled them away in shock. One hand clutched the other and she had begun to shake. I reached for her hand again. Holding my grip on her tighter so she could on pull away, I forced her fingers on her own hand.
Just like that night with Jesse, my mom was sucked into her body. Her ghost form disappeared from my sight. My hands instantly wanted to grasp her. They wanted to cling to the air that she just was.
I was not as afraid—or heartbroken—as when it happened to Jesse, because I knew she would still come back. I just had to wait.
Don't get me wrong, I was still extremely afraid. I just had this really strong feeling she would be back. That she wasn't gone for good. That she would be okay, better than okay, great.
I could have been naive, but the burning hope inside me was enough.
That's all I've ever had. Hope, I mean. That's the only reason I've made it this long with my mom in this condition. I began to understand the fear that was in the hearts of everyone who loved me when I was in the same place my mom was. I understood that the only thing they had to hang on to was hope. Hope is all I need to be strong.
And although I had my doubts and thought that hope had left me, it hadn't. I just needed to look for it. Search inside myself, as well as the ones I need and love.
Without her there, I realized just how silent everything was. No nurses were bustling through the halls in search of patients or supplies. It was too late for that. I walked over to the door frame, and saw that no one was in the long hallway that ran down to another wing of the hospital.
I didn't see a nurse or doctor—or even a person—anywhere. The hospital was stark empty. I looked at the clock that hung on the wall in the room, and noticed that the time was 3:30.
No wonder why it was so tranquil. But the intense quietness of the room was so overwhelming that I had to sit down.
I shuffled over to the side of the bed. My mother's figure hadn't changed and I hoped she was alright. Plunking my butt in my chair, I rest my head on the palm of my hand to wait.
That's what I did. I just waited.
I sat like a bored teen in her least favourite class. Head slumped, body hunched, bored expression on my face.
Except I wasn't really bored. Just extremely nervous. Why wasn't she back yet? What was taking so long?
I began to grow severely anxious when an hour's time had passed and she still hadn't awoken, let alone, shifted, or moved.
I stood up and began pacing at the foot of the bed. Picking up an old, annoying habit, I set into chewing on my fingernails.
I continued to walk back in force in a delirious state, mulling over why she hadn't awoken yet. I think I began to mutter slightly, it was genuinely scary.
When I felt my knees buckle from the lack of sleep, and over dose of constant worry I had to grab the bed for support. Leaning on the wooden footboard, I tried to relax.
I had begun hyperventilating and despite my efforts my breaths hardly calmed. The silent hospital grew more and more silent beneath each sudden intake for the invisible air.
And then, cutting through the silent, like a butcher's knife, a machine began beeping.
My eyes—like a hawk's—snapped to the machine with a blinking light. The beeping was even, low, and steady. I didn't know what was happening.
But the silence was cut. And more sound arrived filling my ears. I heard a stir right before a nurse scuttled into the room.
She made no mention to me. Just went to work on my mother. Adjusting, moving, and changing.
I began to tremble at the unknown. My fingers becoming white from squeezing the footboard so relentlessly.
A white coat, walking on quick feet, followed in behind the nurse. A flurry of movement happened, my vision blurring in the moment.
The nurse grabbed my upper arm gently. I was in too much shock to pull it from her hand. She led me out of the room, "Just stay out here, please. I wouldn't want you to get in the way of the doctor," she mumbled to me.
I opened my mouth to acknowledge my comprehension, but the words were stuck, unable to roll off the tip of my tongue. I had nothing I could say. My mouth had become starch dry.
I settled for a nod. It was hesitant, but the nurse understood. She made movements back to my mom's room, looking over her shoulder at me quickly before continuing. Her white shoes landing in shuffles on the whitened hospital floor.
Everything was so white, I felt out of place in my jeans.
I watched as the nurse closed the door, to my mother's room, behind her. The last sight I saw through the cracks of the closing door was the doctor looking at her chart. He shook his head in an unbelievable expression.
My emotions were so confusing I could not comprehend them. I wasn't sad because I was too confused. I was too confused so I wasn't happy.
I didn't understand what all the beeping and hushed secrets meant. Why couldn't they just tell me what the hell was going on?
I reached into the pocket of my black Abercrombie sweater and found my cell phone. I began dialing home, but I screwed up on the fourth number.
My shake was growing worse from the confusion. I clicked for the menu and flicking through the names, and numbers of my contacts. I found home and pressed the green button.
I heard the dial tone, followed by the quick beeps of the numbers dialing. I pressed the ear piece to my lobe and waited.
It rang, once, twice and a third time.
Come on pick up. This is so important.
The phone clicked as someone on the other end picked up. I opened my dry mouth again but the words wouldn't roll. I closed my mouth as my tongue glued itself dry to the roof of my mouth.
"Hello," a groggy voice answered. I had woken them up. Of course I had it was like 4:30, 5:00 o'clock in the morning, on a Saturday.
They wouldn't normally wake up for another six hours, at least. Unless Brad or Jake were going surfing, but they hadn't in a long while.
Not since Mom…well…
"Hello?" the voice questioned again.
I coughed, I needed to speak. "It's Suze," I muttered scratchily. It was a dull pain that pulsed as I spoke. I had no idea why. I wasn't crying, I didn't hurt emotionally, nor physically. No one had hit me. Yet my throat throbbed.
"Suze, are you okay?" the voice questioned with concern. They had become more awake and personal than when they first answered.
"Jake," I said, muttering into the phone, "Something's going on. I don't know what, no one will tell me, but come down here…please?" I pleaded into the phone.
"Okay," he said, slowly, as if trying to comprehend the situation. I clicked the phone shut, not waiting for a goodbye.
I slumped against the wall, before flicking the phone open again. I found the name at the top of the list of callers, and once again I pressed the green button.
I waited two rings before someone answered. "Hello?" the voice said into the phone. Just like Jake's voice, it was groggy with sleep. Although, instantly this voice made me feel better.
Just a tad less nervous. "Jesse," I whispered into the phone. Unable for a volume of voice any louder.
"Susannah, is everything alright? Are you okay?" he questioned. Always wanting to make sure I was okay.
"Yes," I whispered again. "I just, can you come to the hos-ho-s-pi," I stumbled on the words. Thinking the word was easier than saying it. "Can you come see me," I whispered differently than I had been trying for.
"Of course, Querida. I'll be there in five," he said reassuringly. "I love you," he said.
"I love you, too, Jesse," I said before clicking the phone shut.
I slid into a plastic chair beside me, glaring at my mother's door. Willing them to come out. I wish I knew what was wrong. I seemed so full of questions. Yet the only one I wanted the answer to was will she live.
I couldn't ask the question because there was simply no one to ask. Just as I couldn't cry because I had no idea what I'd be crying for.
I thought she'd be awake by now. Talking to me, hugging me. Not dying!
The fact that she wasn't moving frightened me. I thought it would work.
Oh god, what if I made it worse? What if I just forced her soul to eternal damnation in a dying body?
Yeah, god Suze. Way to make sense there! I felt a hand land on my shoulder. Tearing my glare from the door, I looked up to the figure staring over me.
Jesse's face loomed above mine. Without hesitation, I stood up, and threw my arms around his neck. Clutching him to myself, I muttered to his shoulder, "What have I done, Jesse? I think I did something bad. Or stupid. Oh god, you were right. You knew I'd do something stupid, and you were right, you're always right."
"Shh, Querida," Jesse said smoothing a hand over my hair and shoulder blades, while his other hand rested on the small of my back pulling me into him. "It's going to be okay. Everything will be just fine," he whispered to me.
I pushed myself further into his structure. The safeness I needed forming the further I tried to burrow. "How do you know, Jesse?" I muttered, pleadingly. I was pleading, begging that he was right.
"Trust me," he whispered back. He was always right, and I did trust him. I trusted him with everything. Everything.
I nodded, harshly, into his shoulder. My arms snaked under his arm in a tangled mess of limbs. I squeeze his back muscles deeply, clutching them. I felt his tense body huddle around me, cradling me. It felt like heaven to be in such a tight embrace.
Jesse just held me. He did until Jake, and the others showed up. I turned in Jesse's arms to see them coming down the hallway. Jesse made to remove his hands from around my sides, but my hands shot to his. Gripping them firmly I pulled the back to their places and he complied, holding me again.
I leaned my head against his chest, relaxing back into his form. I shut my eyes, pinching them closed, bracing myself for the coming events.
I opened them and saw the Ackerman clan in front of me. I let go of Jesse's hands and he let go of me. I stepped forward and just shook my head. "I don't know," I said, answering all of there unspoken questions.
I heard the faint click of a door opening and my glare shot back to my mother's room door. The doctor stepped out towards us. Followed by the nurse.
"You can see her now," he said. He made for more words but I darted past him and into my mother's room.
Her body was the same still shape as before. I ran to her side and threw my arms around her. Trying my hardest to hug her against the bed.
I pulled away and watched as her eyes fluttered open. "Susie," she whispered to me. The same word that had caused me to find her. I glanced at the door and saw Jesse and the bunch of them standing there, staring wide eyed at me and my mom. "I love you," she finished.
I threw my arms back around her neck. "I love you, too, Mom."
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Yay!! Claps! Her mom's awake! I didn't want to make it anymore depressing than it already is. Besides its gonna get a whole lot worse later on.
Ha-ha, foreshadowing, as my English teacher calls it.
This is only the beginning. So Review, please!
Vicky-toria
