I'm getting married soon. Say hello to my lovely soon-to-be wife, AnneriaWings. The theme is blue and purple and all is invite—as long as you bring presents, of course. ;)
Well, it seems as thought fanfiction dot net hates me. I lost three documents, all of which I am frustrated over because I know that I will never rewrite them the way that I first wrote them. Oh, writing site, how I loathe thee. (Yes, the little poem-thing in the beginning is a direct reference to T.S. Elliot's poem whose name escapes me at the moment.)
Oh, and - Katie (AnneriaWings) has already wrote most of Wasteland, just hasn't posted it. I say that there will be no more Requiem until she posts. XD Sorry about that. (But really, she follows it on dA, so I can still post on ff-net. Muahahaha. For whoever actually reads. Review~!
requiem
it ends with a bang
a bang, bang, bang
not a whimper.
[part iii]
The day wore on like usual; with constant stares, the threads of whisper curling around my ears. For a moment, I couldn't tell you if they were real or not; lately, I seem to be seeing, hearing things that aren't there, floating in and out of space and reality before stopping somewhere in between. It scares me. but if I was being completely honest, I didn't mind it either.
I met with Vlad last week, but it seemed like eons ago when I didn't think about it and when I did, I felt like it was still a few hours beforehand. I could still see Vlad's piercing eyes through the threads of Jazz's red hair, hear his voice resonating in my head. I couldn't figure out, for the life of me, his plan. It wasn't like there was anything more to do with me—I was still sane enough (I hope) to not fall into any traps, and I knew that he knew that. But I wasn't completely there either. That I was sure of very well.
There was nothing to gain from my existence. I was numb all over, feeling like I was forever stuck in a state where I couldn't heal and I couldn't possibly fall deeper into oblivion—even though at some times, both sounded so tempting.
During these days, I would muse and wonder what hell felt like. I know that the Bible and Testaments and whatever said that it was a burning, fiery depth of endless pits, no escape, no help, nothing. You where there by yourself, kept to yourself, no matter how much you cried out for help, turning into ashes by an ever lasting fire that melted your insides and made you feel worthless.
If that was hell, than I was sure that I had already been through it.
It made me think of hell in a different way; if there was a hell, I'd imagine it to be frozen over. Cold. Frigid. Numb, left in a state of nothingness and nowhere, like I was, like I was supposed to be, confused and lost and placed in something that wasn't supposed to be there. I think it would be much worse to not know what you were faced against, to be left in a prison with shackles you've tied to your own wrist, fighting off your demons that will never go away, slipping deeper into the darkness.
Huh. Maybe I am screwed up. More than I think.
I've noticed something new in my patterns of behavior. Before Jazz did. I don't think she has yet, actually. I mean, she still hasn't called Vlad yet, and I know that she wouldn't do so without asking me first.
(would she?)
I shook my head and with a dry throat, look to the top shelf of the kitchen, where prescriptions from the doctor lay. High blood pressure, Advil, Tylenol, allergy medications...sleeping pills.
It's so easy, I find, to just reach out my hand and grab it, stuff a few down my throat, close my eyes and realize that it'll be all over. I wouldn't have to go through the pain of seeing my parents every day, act like nothing's wrong, try to heal when healing is just so hard. There are moments when I believe that trying isn't worth it, when I believe that nothing I can do will help. Me, and Jazz, and my parents were forever screwed, broken by one night's mistake.
And pretending through these lies—God, I can't take it. I hate lies. I hate lies. I hate them so much.
Maybe it's because my whole life has been a lie for two years. Lying to my parents, lying to my teachers, lying to my classmates, sometimes even lying to my best friends. I weaved myself an intricate web of lies, so thick and hard that I couldn't break out of it until someone else had done it for me, shattered it all in one place, made me never want to lie again. Because lies brought hurt. They brought pain and right now, I hated pain.
But I knew one thing for certain; the truth hurt a godawful lot more.
It's been a month, almost. Nothing. No change. Nothing. Because me and my family, we still pretend like nothing's wrong, even though we try and sometimes we don't, and it's confusing because you don't know when to give up and when to keep going on. Because it's all so hopeless.
Nothing.
That's what I felt.
Absolutely nothing.
Dead, maybe, just like Phantom is. Just like our family is.
Without me noticing, my hand reached out for the plastic orange bottle, hard in my palms, blocky letters and numbers possibly the last thing that I might ever see. My cold fingers lightly goes over the words, printed in ink, small bumps in the label. I stared at the round tablets, miniscule and so hard to believe that enough of those could kill me. Rid me of this pain. Permanently.
Because pain was all I was feeling—nothing, no happiness, no sadness, no anger. Day through day, it's only pain, it's only burning, and if it could all stop for a while then I could maybe think properly, see my life properly, see how much it broke and shattered and crumbled in my hands.
"Danny!"
The shrill shriek pierced through the quiet, ringing in my ears so loud that I jerked and dropped the bottle of pills. A slender hand reached down and picked it up, and I didn't dare look up to see my sister's disappointed, agonized, and heartbroken face. I had caught a glimpse of it when she was straightening herself.
"These are sleeping pills," she said quietly, strained. "For naps and when you have insomnia. Also for nightmares that keep you up. Are you getting nightmares, Danny?" Her voice was steady but seemed unstable at the same time, a sort of paradoxical moment that made sense.
"Not really," I answered her, which was not technically a lie. The first week I'd been plagued with them. Soon enough though, it was only darkness, me stumbling blindly, reaching out for something that wasn't there. Blank. Completely void.
She spoke again, and this time I could see a drop fall to the floor. Of her tears. "And I suppose that you weren't only going to take one, were you?" When I didn't answer her, more tears fell. I felt a sick twisting churn in my gut, like someone had stabbed me with a fork. "Danny! Answer me, please. Please." She repeated the last word like a broken mantra, and I bit my lip.
"Maybe," I replied vaguely. "I was thinking about it."
Hearing me admit it made her sob harder. I felt like throwing up. Getting rid of all the pain and ash and charred remains in my stomach. Getting rid of everything.
She dropped the bottle of pills and I stared at it on the ground, where it rolled toward her feet. Instead of picking it up, she stared at it, sniffling, tears rolling off her cheeks and creating wet spots on her shirt. "Why?" she said in a whisper, looking like she was moments away from a breakdown. "Why? Danny, why?"
"Maybe I just don't want to deal with it anymore," I replied, moving past her and up the stairs, every step reminding me of the twine in my chest and torso, before I fell on the bed with an audible thump. I sat there, closed my eyes, and I was as knocked out as if I took a pill in the first place.
.
Jazz wouldn't talk to me the next morning, and I couldn't blame her. She looked like death itself; pale skin, circles under her bloodshot eyes, thinner than usual. I felt the sharp stabs of guilt, knowing that I was the one that caused her to go this far, but I couldn't do anything about it; instead, I slumped against the seat of her car, still pulsing body heat, still alive.
I didn't go to my first period class, surprisingly. We were thirty minutes early, which I had no idea about until I took a glance at the clock; Jazz must've turned it back so that we would be early. I had no idea why, though. She took my arm and dragged me over to the main office; I got a bad feeling at the pit of my stomach.
Just as Jazz was about to open her mouth to say something to the secretary, Principal Ishiyama emerged from her office. She was a woman of average height, small, pointed eyes, and dark hair that was always pulled away from her deeply wrinkled face. She was strict, all right, and I knew that this wasn't going to be a meeting about academics as soon as I saw the shiny skin of Mr. Lancer's head in the room.
"Ah, Jasmine," Principal Ishiyama said coolly, focusing her eyes on my sister. "I've been expecting you and your brother. Come in, come in." She ushered my and my sister inside, where I was met face-to-face with Mr. Lancer and a few other teachers were there too, but I only registered my English teacher's face. Most probably because I had not spoken to him—he was absent yesterday—since the day I told him that I couldn't trust him. He kept his burning eyes on me, and I ignored it.
Jazz sat down in one of the plush chairs, me following soon afterward in a sort of robotic motion. Principal Ishiyama sat in her own chair and crossed her fingers, staring at us with apprehensive eyes. "Now, Mr. and Ms. Fenton, may I ask why you have asked for an appointment with me?"
"I did," Jazz blurted out. "Not Danny." I twitched, almost feeling the questions at my back; why was I here, then. Jazz continued, "But it's about him, so he has to be here."
This was news to me; I turned to stare slightly at Jazz, questioning and confused, but she ignored me.
Instead, she said to Principal Ishiyama, "I want to take Danny out of Casper High."
A stunned silence fell in the conference room. All eyes were on Jazz, including mine, most probably thinking: what the hell just happened here? Because I knew that I was.
I let out a soft, "Jazz..." before I even knew it.
"W-well, this is quite shocking news," Principal Ishiyama stuttered. "May I ask on basis you would like to take Daniel out of school? And how you suppose that you can instead of your parents?" In a moment, she had regained her cold and calculating persona, even though the other teachers had yet to say anything. What could you say to that?
Jazz replied just as frostily. "I'm eighteen, and I'll have you know that just last week I got full custody of my little brother." The last part was almost snarled, and Principal Ishiyama looked taken aback at Jazz's hostile exterior. "And...no offense, Principal, but the reasons why is really none of your business."
I was pretty sure my jaw had dropped open by this time.
Principal Ishiyama looked stunned, but then her face reddened and her throat cleared. "Well, Ms. Fenton, since you'll give me no basis or reason why Mr. Fenton should be taken out of school, I'm afraid I can't allow you to relinquish a child's right to learn—"
Jazz's face turned a blotchy red. "You have no idea what we're going through!" she said hotly, but Principal Ishiyama continued as if she hadn't heard her.
"—and I'm afraid Daniel will have to stay in school. Unless you can give me a good reason why he shouldn't."
"He can't live here," she choked out, looking my way, tears gathering at the corner of her eyes. "I know for sure that he feels suffocated here, like he can't breathe, because everyone is noticing how he's changed. Because the pressure is getting too much and soon enough, he'll break, and then what's going to happen? Can you tell me that, Principal?"
the woman opened and closed her mouth looking between her and me. "And how can you be so sure of this? It looks like Daniel is fine to me—"
"Fine? FINE?" She pointed an angry finger at me, while I sat motionless. "DOES HE LOOK FINE TO YOU? He doesn't eat, he doesn't talk, he won't sleep, he won't tell me anything! He won't talk to Sam or Tucker, he's not trying to heal, he's slipping! He's breaking! ARE YOU SO BLIND THAT YOU CAN'T SEE THAT OR ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE ME MADDER THAN I ALREADY AM?" There was several bewildered faces, shocked beyond recognition as Jazz yelled, her hands clutched in tight fists, standing up in the middle of her rant with her eyes lit with anger—irrational anger.
Principal Ishiyama paled, looking like a gaping fish; her mouth opening and closing. Who knew, Jazz Fenton, the school's poster child would one day be yelling at the principal with her semi-vegetative brother at her side, looking like hell itself. For a moment, there was the only sound of Jazz's labored breathing, and then Principal Ishiyama tried to calm her down by saying, "Now Ms. Fenton, we can work this out—"
"He tried to kill himself yesterday," she said in a broken whisper, sounding drained of energy. She fell back into the chair, holding a hand over her eyes while I didn't move a muscle, even though I wanted nothing more to hug her right now, comfort her like she did to me. But I couldn't make myself do it; I stared at the spot in front of me blankly. Again, Jazz repeated, "He tried...t-to kill himself..." And once she started crying she couldn't stop.
Principal Ishiyama looked between me and Jazz, a truly horrified look on her face before it softened. She opened the drawer beside her, saying softly, "I'll get the papers to you tomorrow."
Jazz nodded wordlessly and wiped her eyes on her sleeve, standing up and placing her messenger bag on her shoulder, walking out of the room without dismissal. Suddenly, the air in the room got tense, as I still couldn't move my limbs. My mouth felt dry like sandpaper. I felt the harsh eyes of everybody on my form, and it reminded me painfully of surgeon lights.
"She knows because she's going through the same thing," I said suddenly, quietly, enough for them to hear.
"What?" Principal Ishiyama replied, baffled.
I looked her in the eyes and she blinked in shock. "You asked her earlier how she could possibly know what I was feeling," I reminded her. "I told you it was because she's going through the same thing." I let out a small, sad smile. "It's just that Jazz is much more stronger than I am; she always will be, she always was."
.
I exited the office to see Jazz's back, tense, staring blankly at the glass case that held all of the school's accomplishments—courtesy of the students. Her face was a mixture of troubled and angry; her cheeks were a blotchy red. She had been crying, at least shed a tear or two. I walked up behind her, my footsteps quiet, my back and arms feeling oddly empty without a bookbag to be holding.
She saw me through the glass on the other side. Licking her lips, she shut her eyes for a minute and looked up, still not turning around to face me. "It's so hard," she whispered, biting her bottom lip. "I don't know how you do it, Danny."
For a moment, I let a ghost of a smile flicker on my face. "Practice."
She blinked at my lame attempt at a joke and then chuckled dryly. "Oh, shut up." she sniffed. "You're so much taller than me now. So many things are changing..." Her eyes shifted toward me. "And I can't do anything about them."
"Not everything has changed."
"Yes they have, Danny." her voice was painful. "Don't you dare try to deny it."
I didn't say anything. It was too true for me to be in denial.
For a moment, I was over come with a feeling of madness. That was all I could explain it as; a moment of pure madness. For a moment, I felt like closing my eyes and letting myself drift into my subconsciousness; let myself float on an abyss of white, switch between blue and white and over again. Watch the world from eyes that weren't mine. Be Danny Phantom. Be a ghost. Be dead.
So tempting. So tempting... I shook myself out of those thoughts.
"I'm just saying that..." I was at a lost for words, even though I felt a need to say something. Jazz's face was uncharacteristically apathetic. I was looking at her through a looking glass. "Jazz, all I'm saying is that...you don't need to worry," I changed tactics. "You've been doing that enough these past few weeks. I..." I swallowed thickly, feeling a lump in my throat. "I need to get myself back together. I need to get some sense back into me."
Jazz spun around, red hair flying, her eyes ablaze. "Don't give me that crap, Danny!" she said loudly, almost yelling, her eyes watering up with tears. I was stunned. "Nothing will ever be normal again! Don't you get that? We're all so messed up! Me, you, mom, dad, everyone in the whole damned family! We're all broken! We're all...all flailing, trying to be something we're not! You know this! I know this! Nothing is going to change! Nothing with be the same! NOTHING!" By the end of her rant, she was yelling at me, hot tears falling down her face.
I felt a strange murmuring in my ears; like a buzzing, like a presence in the corner of my mind whispering dark things to me. "We can't just stand there and not try," I told her, knowing that I failing to sound convincing. After all, I felt the same way and she knew it. "I mean, we're just...just..."
(your fault)
(lies lies lies lies lies LIES LIES LIES LIES—)
"Living a lie," Jazz finished, sniffing. She sounded bitter. So bitter. It hurt to know that I was the one that did that. "We're all living a stupid lie. Pretending that we're okay. Pretending that nothing ever happened. Pretending that what mom and dad did wasn't wrong. Pretending that—that—they're still our parents! Pretending like they deserve to be our parents! Your parents! How you can you live knowing with what they did to you?" Her voice was pleading. Breaking. Crumbling.
The muttering got louder. It was giving me a headache. I couldn't think straight. All I could hear was Jazz and my name, my screams, the faint echo of ("Never our son...monster...") through my ears. Transferring their way into my brain. Worming their way into my heart. Breaking me. Burning me. Tearing me apart.
"I can't," I choked out. "I CAN'T!" Jazz jumped, startled at my loud outburst. I clenched my fists, nails digging so hard into my nails that they drew blood.
"I can't live with it! Do you know how many times I have to wake up in the morning, pleading, waiting for this all to end? Wanting all this—this—this hurt to stop? Do you know how hard it is to face mom and dad every single fucking day and know that they—they—t-they—" My voice wouldn't work properly, but I couldn't stop. My eyes were lined with red; my vision of blurry. Voices murmured. They wouldn't stop!
("STOP IT!")
"I want it all to end! I want this all to stop! You don't know how many times I looked everywhere around me, wonder how easy it would be to die, how I could just reach out and end it all. That's all I want. I don't want to be fixed. I don't want to be analyzed. I know I'm psycho. I'm messed up, Jazz. THEY MESSED ME UP. THEY TOOK MY LIFE AWAY FROM ME. THEY RUINED ME! LOOK AT ME!" I jabbed my chest so hard that it hurt. "Look! I can't do anything right! You said it yourself! I'm not normal! I can't go a day without thinking about it, can't go a moment without feeling it all over again, can't go a second without hearing their voices."
At some point, I had started to cry—tears, fresh and warm, rolled down my cheeks. My voice was hoarse from yelling; but it was the only way that I could get all these ugly feelings out of me. I needed them out of me. I needed to let it go but it was forever branded to my skin.
"Danny..." Jazz whispered, her knees weak when she fell to the floor, her hands covering her mouth. "Danny, I'm s-so sorry, I d-d-didn't know..."
"Of course you didn't know," I said, breathing heavily, almost spitting out the words in my anger, unable to help myself. "No one knew! No one knew how I was feeling! No one fucking bothered to ask! You don't know how it feels like to see the people that cut you open every day, look at them eating and drinking and wish that they would just die. Make them suffer, just like I did. Make them feel the pain, the helplessness that I felt when I was on that table. A-and..." I felt myself crying again. "...I'm not supposed to feel that way. They're my parents. Jazz. Our parents. I shouldn't hate them as much as I do. But I do. I can't help but want to wish that they would just drop dead."
The voices stopped.
Every single one. Not my mother's incessant, harsh tone in my head, nor my dad's cold words. Not the buzzing of a migraine coming along. Nothing. Like Jazz said. Nothing. Nothing. Blank. Empty. Worthless.
I was breathing heavily, my face red and a drip drop of blood from my palms down to the clean, tiled floor. I blinked, and then the blurriness cleared from my eyes. Jazz was staring at me with her wide, glassy orbs, disbelieving and not bating a breath; this was the first time that I had expressed my feelings ever since the incident, and she was still in shock from my negative feelings.
But then the force of another revelation hit me.
Everyone there were people staring at me. Shock. Stunned. Revulsion. Disbelief. Horror. Disgusting. No way! You're not serious... All quiet. So quiet. Nobody was saying anything. I choked on nothing; on air. The blood was rushing to my head, my heart beating so fast and so loud in my chest and ears that I thought it would explode. My head hurt. My limbs felt numb.
No.
They knew.
No. No. No. No no no no no no no.
They knew.
And it was all my fault.
I could feel myself hyperventilating, wanting air, feeling cut off from it. Nothing. Nothing. I was disappearing, fading, but still there, and that's what hurt the most; I was still there. I was here. I was so stupid.
I heard someone call my name. "Danny..."
And then I turned and ran.
I ran until my legs hurt and the wind blew through my hair and stung my tear-ridden cheeks. I ran until I couldn't hear their cries of "Danny!" behind me. I ran until my lungs felt like they were ready to explode. I ran until I had to stop somewhere and throw up. I ran until my stomach hurt and my waist hurt and my torso's hurt. I ran until I stopped and I couldn't run anymore. I ran until I was stuck in the middle of the road.
They knew. They knew. All of them knew. All of them knew how messed up I was. All of them knew how damaged I was. As my head turned, I barely had time to breathe as I felt the hard side of something metal hit me, my body skidding across something hard and etching into my skin, burning me. Blood flew and splattered; I felt it on my face. My head hit something hard and I heard—felt—something crack.
Darkness overwhelmed me. I never wanted it any more than I did now.
.
(liar. you're what you hate most.)
"Certainly not my son! You lying, filthy, disgusting—"
tear you apart
(dead. Danny Phantom is dead. )
molecule
"Please, please, just listen to me, it's Danny, Danny, you're son, please...please..."
(stop stop stop so much pain stop stop stop please, just stop it all, don't you love me? please)
by molecule!
snap.
(i thought you loved me i'm your son don't you love me?)
snap.
"Wait - waitwaitWAIT!"
(oh god it hurts)
"Filthy. Abomination."
snap.
(iloveyou.)
please don't do this.
pleasepleaseplease mom dad i loveyou
snap.
"No, no..."
(it burns please stop exploding painpainpainpain)
snap.
"I thought you loved me..."
(it's me, danny, you're son—)
"MONSTER!"
snap.
"Ectoplasmic scum..."
(...why?)
iloveyou. iloveyou. iloveyou. iwassupposedtoloveyou. ilovedyou. ilovedyou.
snap.
"...can I slice and dice him?"
(not your son. not your son. monster. ghost. not your son. not danny.)
(I hate you.)
snap.
(it hurts...i hate you.)
"Please..."
I hate you.
(not human. monster. not your son. not danny. monster. monster.)
I was supposed to love you.
(where did it all go wrong?)
(ghost. ghost. ghost. inhumane. ghost. i'm not me anymore.)
.
When I opened my eyes, I was met with the bright, harsh light of fluorescent lights. For a moment, my breath caught in my throat and I found it hard to breathe. It became clearer after I blinked.
My arms and legs felt heavy; I could barely move. Laid down on a soft, cushion-like bed, I realized that I was in a hospital room. It was eerily close to something else that tipped over the edge of my mind, but I tried hard not to think about it. My head felt like it was laced with lead; my eyes strained to see everything. When I breathed in, I noticed that something was over my mouth. Cautiously, I brought a hand to discover that it was an oxygen mask—and that I had a needle and tube sticking out of the back of my palm.
Wincing, I put my hand out of sight. I didn't want to deal with this now. But for some reason, I was adamant on getting myself hurt terribly.
I breathed in and out, savoring the fact that there was no twinge in my chest when I breathed. I was in some sort of drug-induced, pain-free daze. It felt, in no other words, awesome. Wonderful. It was the most that I had not felt in weeks, days, hours. I needed this. My body twitched slightly, and I groaned slightly.
Out of nowhere, the glass doors before me—how had I not noticed them before?—slid open to reveal a stout woman with her hair tied back in a knot and loose, light blue clothes. She perked up at the sight of me, apparently conscious. Her eyes were motherly and she smiled.
"It's good to see you're awake," she said softly. Stepping forward, she placed a clipboard in a little slot at the foot of my bed. "My name is Sharon. Just press that little red button there if you want to call me, okay?" She pointed to something beside my headboard; I turned my head painstakingly to see the red button that she was referring to.
"I'm going to take some simple tests to make sure you're fine, okay?" Sharon patted my hand. "Do you want me to take off the mask? Or would you like to answer in nods?"
I motioned feebly to the mask.
She reached out and with the utmost gentleness that I hadn't felt in weeks, removed the mask from my face. Immediately, I sucked in a deep, shuddering breath and let out a hacking cough. Sharon was alarmed, reaching for my side, but I shook my head and waved her away slightly. I took another breath, hoarse, but when I focused it became easier. After a few moments, I was taking short, almost desperate gasps of air, but it was enough.
"What happened?" I croaked out, nodding my head slightly to I could look at Sharon. I sounded horrible; my words were slurred slightly. "How long have I been here?"
Sharon frowned at my attempts to talk to her. "You were hit by a car," she said offhandedly. "Hurt pretty bad, Danny. Can I call you Danny? You've been here for about four days."
I ignored the question. "Four days? What?" I almost yelped, which caused me to cough again.
"I don't think you should be talking," Sharon frowned. "You obviously haven't recovered fully yet. Do you remember anything from the past few days?"
"No." I told her. "Nothing."
"I'm not surprised," she sighed. "You were given a lot of anesthesia. Sedatives. Things like that." When she saw the questioning look on my face, she bit her lip and gave me a worried look. "The doctors had to perform...surgery. There was a pretty bad gash on your leg." Her eyes flickered toward there. "You healed pretty fast, though."
Following that statement came a feeling that I had not felt in some time; panic. For my secret identity, that of which I still believed to be dead. She said that I went through surgery; no doubt the doctors had seen...my scars. And no doubt that there would be someone to come in and ask questions. Questions that would lead to the wrong answers, and just perhaps the right ones.
"I'm a fast healer," I muttered, even though that must've been obvious by now. "How bad was I hurt?"
"Just a few sprains, the leg injury, a broken arm..." she trailed off, her eyes going toward my chest before she continued on bravely, "...and a ripped open stitch."
I felt my heart drop into my stomach. There was a large beeping, like a spike. "Oh."
Sharon's eyes flickered to the left, looking at something before back at me. She softened. "Danny..." For a moment, she sounded so much like Jazz...tears gathered at the corners of my eyes. I remembered what I said to her a mere four days ago; how hard must it have hurt? Jazz was trying to do the right now, falling in her own pit of despair while trying to pick me out of mine...and how do I repay her? By yelling at her, telling her all the ugly things that I feel.
"Oh." I choked out, my breath coming in shorter, faster, gasps. I felt something drop in me; blue, white, swimming in a haze of nothingness. I could hear my heartbeat in my ears, loud, constant, irregular.
"Danny?" I heard Sharon say, panicking. "Danny!"
I wouldn't respond to her; instead, I closed my eyes, feeling my mind float away into a place where there was no hurt.
.
The next time I woke up, there was someone next to me. It wasn't Sharon, but a tall, built man. He wore a smart coat over his shoulders and the color blue—thankfully, I was coherent. Whatever happened before shook me real bad, but now I was just a bit better. Whatever they had been giving me must've been working. I made a soft sound, wanting to get up, and the man's attention was on me immediately.
"Hey, kiddo," he said. "You're awake. C'mon, get up. Want help?" I nodded feebly and he helped me. I hadn't felt another human touch in a long time—it made me forget how warm it was. Or how cold I was. The man seemed to notice this, because his eyes flickered to the spot that he had touched to help me get up.
"Can I call you Danny?" he asked.
"Yeah, sure," I mumbled, taking off my mask.
He smiled. "Great. My name's Detective Oliver John." The world 'detective' put me on high alert. "Now, kid, it seems as though you went through a really rough time; not just on the car accident, but something else as well." To his credit, Oliver didn't look at my torso, where the stitched wound lay. "Can you tell me about this?"
I pressed my lips together. Then, with a hoarse voice, I replied, "I wish I could."
His eyes flashed. Then, with an easy smile he said, "That's okay, Danny. Is there anything you want to know?"
I contemplated on that question for a moment. There was the obvious questions: how bad was I hurt? I got the answer to that. Am I mentally scarred? I don't know. Do you people think that this was a suicide? Probably. Am I suicidal? I have no clue. And then there were the more serious questions that were burning inside of me: why did this happen? Why didn't I tell them? Why was I so stupid, so desperate, so secretive?
In the end, I settled for, "Where's Jazz?"
Detective Oliver's eyes were carefully looking at me. "Wouldn't you like to see your parents first?" At the mention of Mad—mom and dad, I heard my heart traitorously skip, the beep alerting both of us that it had happened. I calmed myself quickly and said, "I've always been closer to Jazz than the rest of my family." Licking my lips, I continued, "M-mom and d-dad have always been...off on their own, inventing new things, getting head starts on their research." I sighed slightly. "Teenage stuff. Nothing huge."
Oliver nodded, understanding. He had probably figured out that my parents were ghost hunters. I wonder if he was thinking of asking me whether or not I loved my parents, wanted them to come secretly. I wonder what I would answer with.
"Jazz is in the waiting room." The side of the detective's mouth quirked. "Your sister is a fiery one, you know. Wouldn't stop going crazy over you. Cried all over a nurse after she yelled at her."
I winced at Jazz's eccentric behavior. It was becoming more familiar nowadays. "That's Jazz alright," I groaned instead, keeping the suspicion of Jazz's sudden change in behavior that I'm pretty sure anyone who ever knew her would notice.
"Would you like me to go get her?" he asked.
I nodded, the action hurting my neck. "Please."
A moment's notice later and Jazz came in, looking pale and stressed, worry mixed in with her features. Detective Oliver gave me a look that clearly read, "this talk is not over" before turning around and walking out the door to give us some privacy.
Jazz looked like she was about to cry, but pressed her lips together tightly and sat next to me in a hospital chair. She gripped my cold, colorless hand and squeezed it tight. "How're you doing, Danny?"
For her sake, I gave her a weak smile. "As good as to be expected. It's going to take longer to heal, though." I coughed, the action causing me to hurt my ribs. "My healing is all messed up, remember? I'm probably going to need weeks in here." My eyes flickered toward the glass door. "Besides, that detective is here and I know that it's about...the incident."
Jazz winced and bowed her head, a curtain of red hair falling over her face. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I should have known..."
"There was no way you could have possibly known," I said, gasping for breath slightly. "I was too stubborn to tell you...it's not your fault, Jazz...m'fault..."
Her head snapped up, and for a moment there was a burning fire in her eyes. "Don't you dare say that, Daniel James Fenton!" she whispered reverently, sounding so much like my mom when she was scolding me it hurt, "Nothing here is your fault. Stop thinking like that. You couldn't predict what would happen as much as I could." She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. "This is no one's fault." Except mom and dad's, was the echo that I could barely hear.
"Then why did this happen?" I was desperate to know why. Jazz always had the answers—surely she had the answer for this.
Instead, she gave me a pleading, searching look. Shaking her head slightly, she replied, "Maybe it was meant to happen, Danny." A sting in my chest. Noticing my hurt expression, she continued, "Maybe it was something that needed to happen. Maybe you and I don't like it, but it's already happened and we don't know why. All we can do know is...face it, get over it, and move on." Her voice never lost that soothing, soft quality. In the middle of her talk, she reached out and ran her fingers through my hair.
"Maybe even someday, we can learn to forgive mom and dad for what they've done." Jazz paused. "I hope you get better, Danny. God, you make me worry so much."
"I'm sorry." I said, unable to tell her anything else. Jazz seemed to understand and simply smiled at me, planted a kiss on my hairline, and left me to my own thoughts.
"It'll all be okay," she whispered. "We'll get through this."
