Disclaimer: I am not Rick Riordan. And so, accordingly, I do not own any works credited to that name. (Or to related names. i.e. Uncle Rick.)
Previously on More Than A Mortal:
I faintly heard someone yelling for an ambulance to be called. I felt Kiernan collapse against me, likely from the shock of it all, and you know, getting shot, just as my eyes slipped closed and I lost consciousness.
When I woke, I was in a hospital recovery room. Kiernan was in the bed beside mine. He looked to be just waking up as well.
"Great, you're both awake." A nurse said. She handed Kiernan and I each a little cup of ginger ale and a cracker. I drank quickly and ate the crackers. I was still hungry, though.
"Lyric, we'll call your mother in. Kiernan, we can only bring in one of your parents. Do you have a preference?" The nurse asked.
"Lydia." Kiernan said. His voice was dry and raspy.
"Your sister?" The nurse asked. Kiernan nodded. "Alright, I'll send for them."
A few minutes later, my mom and Lydia were both in the room. They both looked like they'd been crying. Mom immediately hugged me, but Lydia couldn't do the same to her brother, seeing as there was a huge bandage covering his side.
"So, what happened after the both of us passed out?" I asked. My voice was a bit raspy.
"They called an ambulance for you two. Your father was dead. Shot seventeen times in the head and chest. That's what happens when you shoot with so many officers around." Mom said, stroking my hair.
"He's really gone?" I asked.
"He's really gone." Mom confirmed. I let out a shaky laugh.
"One less thing in this world to worry about." I said.
Lydia came over and hugged me, telling me she couldn't believe I hadn't even flinched at a knife being hired in my hand, couldn't believe I just pulled it out like that. I only smiled at her sadly. Six years of my father and a year of horrid foster homes had toughened me up to considerable amounts of pain.
The nurse came back in a moment later. "Alright, you're both on pain medication right now. You'll be sent home with some more, take as needed, but do not take more than one tablet per three hours." The nurse told us. She then told us each about our injuries.
"You're lucky the knife missed everything important in your hand, and hit at such an angle that it didn't sever any bones. You are also lucky we had your blood type on hand, as you were close to bleeding out. You shouldn't pull something like that out yourself, next time rush to a doctor if you can. If you do need to pull it out, wrap something around the wound and put pressure on it." She told me. "You also won't be able or allowed to use that hand until further notice. You've got a checkup on next Tuesday, though you seem to be healing at a bit of a miraculous rate."
Then she went over to Kiernan. "The bullet hit your side, but didn't go very far in. In that, you were extremely lucky. If it had gone any farther, it very well may have gone far enough to pierce a lung. You'll have to take it easy for the time being, so you can't continue to play football. You, too, seem to be healing at a bit of a miraculous rate."
Then the nurse spoke to both of us. "Keep your injuries wrapped up. Neither of you have any stitches or staples, as your wounds should be able to close on their own. After showers, you'll need to rewrap your wounds right away. And be careful when touching your wounds, you don't want to aggravate them or cause more trouble."
We both acknowledged that we understood. The nurse left, and Mom told us we were both allowed to leave today. She told us clothes had been brought from our houses for us to change into, and then she and Lydia left. The bags were beside the beds, on the little table in the center. I took mine and turned away from Kiernan, while he turned the other way.
I, of course, ran into trouble right away. Mom was probably in a rush when she was grabbing clothes for me, because she hadn't thought to grab a sports bra, which I would've easily been able to put on. No, she had grabbed a strapless bra that clasped in the front. Being in the front made things a little easier, but I still was unable to clasp it, only being able to use my left wrist to hold the bra against my chest while I fumbled with the clasp with the other hand and the bra kept slipping. After I few minutes, I started cursing at it.
"Lyric?" Kiernan asked.
"Yeah?" I answered.
"Having troubles?" He asked. I didn't say anything. "Do you need help?" I didn't answer.
Kiernan moved to stand in front of me. I blushed a little. I'd never been this undressed in front of someone before, except in a towel, coming back from the shower, but that was a bit different. Kiernan was in a similar state of undress, wearing only a pair of light gray sweatpants that hung low on his hips, and a large bandage wrapped around his chest, so that it could stay on his side. I couldn't help but notice, though, that the visible parts of his chest were well defined.
"Do you want help?" Kiernan asked. I shook my head, gaze glued to the floor, still clutching the bra against my chest. "Are you going to be able to get it on your own?" I shook my head again. Kiernan reached up and took the ends, pulling them closed and clasping my bra for me. I squeezed my eyes closed and blushed even harder as his hands brushed my chest. After he clasped it, Kiernan moved away. I noticed him staring, though, at my chest, as I pulled on sweatpants and a tank top.
"Are you going to need help walking?" I asked after slipping on my flip flops. Our parents had, thankfully, brought shoes easy to put on with our injuries.
"Quite possibly." Kiernan admitted. "Still a bit out of it from the painkillers they gave us before we woke up."
"Same here." I said.
Kiernan tried walking towards the door, but couldn't make it very far on his own. I went over and slipped his arm over my shoulders so that I could help support him. Before we actually left the room, though, Kiernan stopped at the door. I was about to ask what he was doing when he pressed his lips to mine. Then he winked and started to walk again, and I, supporting him, had no choice but to continue, too.
As we went out to the lobby waiting room area, Kiernan again pretended like nothing had happened, leaving me again very confused.
Thankfully, our families waiting in the lobby knew we were out of it on pain meds, and didn't smother us, just brought us to our homes and let us sleep off everything that had happened.
I woke up to my alarm at seven thirty on Saturday. Well, that's when I got up. I actually woke at around six. I wasn't in any pain, like when having a knife lodged in my hand didn't faze me, I had a high pain tolerance.
I took a shower, wrapped my hand up again, blow dried my hair, and put on a tank top and yoga pants. I wasn't going from school, so I could wear dance clothes to the studio.
I couldn't use my hand, so I couldn't drive my motorcycle, so Jay was going to be my ride for school and dance until I could.
When Maddie got to dance, she gaped at my hand. "What happened?" She asked.
"I was stabbed." I said with a shrug. She had a shocked look on her face.
"I've been hearing a lot of rumors about something happening by your house. What's the real story?" Maddie asked. Dance hadn't started yet, so we had time to talk while we used our extra time to stretch.
"Mom asked Kiernan and I to invite his family over for dinner, so we finished our song because we had very little left to do, and went over there. His parents sent him up to get Lydia, asked me a couple questions, and then Jay called me staying a man claiming to be one of my dance instructors was at the door." I started.
"None of our instructors are male. Not for our classes." Maddie said.
"Yeah. I told Jay not to let him in, and to keep himself and Mom away from the door. I hung up, and told Kiernan parents to call the cops and tell them there was a dangerous person outside their home, and told them to stay inside. Then I went outside." I continued.
"Dangerous person?" Maddie asked.
"I knew who he was. He tried pulling something like that once before, except he pretended to be an uncle and tried to dismiss me from school. All I had to tell the school was that I had never met my uncle, and besides, he lived fifteen hours away at the time." I explained. "So I went outside and I asked him how he found me. He told me I would speak to my father in English, as I had spoken Ancient Greek. I just asked why he had come, still in Greek. He said he came to collect his daughter, I said I'm not an object, he told me he's my father and he owns me, then told me again to speak English. I said he's the one who taught me the language, and he said I actually picked it up from my insolent mother, which confused me, because I've literally never met her. She gave birth to me and left him. He said to go with him, and I said I wasn't going to. During all this, he slapped me a couple times, backhanded me once."
Maddie looked horrified. "At this point, Mom and Jay came out. Jay stood in front of me, and Mom started yelling at him. He threw mom into the side of the house so hard she couldn't pull herself back up. Jay grabbed his arm, and then Kiernan grabbed his other arm. I don't even know when Kiernan came out. He said 'So that's what you do? You find out dear old dad is visiting and ambush him?' I yelled, saying I'd told them all to stay inside. That was the first time I had spoken English in front of my father yesterday afternoon, and he made a comment about it. I went back to Greek and cursed at him. He mockingly asked where I developed such a tendency to curse." I explained. I took a deep breath. "I was the only one who saw the knife. I shoved Kiernan out of the way. Instead of him getting a knife lodged in his abdomen, I got a knife lodged in my hand." I held up my left hand wrapped in bandages.
"Sounds like a horrid man." Maddie said. I could tell she didn't know what else to say. I laughed and agreed.
"Anyways, Jay grabbed his other arm while Kiernan pulled himself back up. I asked my dad want his plan was. To finally kill me? He raised an eyebrow and said 'Not a single word about the knife in your hand?' My response was 'What can I say? You've toughened me.' I don't feel pain, not anymore, not really." I said. "At this point, I pulled the knife out of my hand. Not my brightest idea. Especially because a ton of cops arrived right then. They hadn't used sirens so as not to alert the dangerous person called in. One cop had his gun pointed at me, told me to drop the weapon. After all, I held a bloody knife and was in front of a restrained man. I dropped it, showed him my hand, and told him not to worry, I'd just pulled it from my hand."
"What did the cop do?" Maddie asked.
"He looked very surprised that I was so calm about pulling a knife out of my hand. One that had literally gone all the way through to the other side thought it wasn't a very big knife. Tiny little thing, but whatever. Anyways, he asked if he was the dangerous man. I explained and answered a couple questions. I spat at my father that Child Protective Services took me away for a reason when I was six." I said.
"I heard there were gunshots." Maddie said.
"Yeah, after I made that last comment, he elbowed Jace in the gut, ran like ten years, then turned around with a gun in his hand, pointed in our general direction. Told me to go over there before he shot one of my friends. I said no. He told me to stop speaking that language or he'd shoot me. I realized something, it reminded him of my mother, if she spoke it. I didn't care, and I told him so, ending with 'I won't stop speaking a language just because my psychotic father can't deal with his past.' Jay quietly told me that was not the right thing to say to an unstable man. He was the only one that understood what I had said, because I wouldn't stop speaking to Um dad in Greek." I said. "After Jay said that to me, I turned to him and started yelling, in English, about how my father had abused me until I was six and those were all my earliest memories, and I said I'd yell at him however damn much I wanted."
I glanced at Maddie. "I don't have to keep telling the story. It kinda gets a bit horrid after that."
"It's already horrid. Besides, I'd rather know the truth than all these crazy rumors. Some people are idiots, by the way." Maddie said. I just laughed.
"Well, the next thing I know, I hear a shot and I'm on the ground, with Kiernan on top of me. A whole bunch more shots ring out, and the chaos ends about sixty seconds later. I was about to ask Kiernan to move when I saw the blood on his side. My damn father shot him when he pushed me out of the way. I said something like 'he shot you'. Kiernan didn't even realize it at first. And then I said I was dizzy. I knew that was from blood loss. And I kind of just fell unconscious, and Kiernan collapsed on top of me." I finished.
"What happened to your father?" Maddie asked.
"He shot when there was a ton of officers in the scene. Yeah, don't do that. Or you might just get seventeen bullets to the head and chest. Mom told me after Kiernan and I woke in a recovery room in a hospital." I said.
After dance, I said goodbye to Maddie and went out to the parking lot where Jay was waiting to drive me home. When we got home, I took a shower and went upstairs, where I then proceeded to sleep all day. I did the same on Sunday, as I wanted to still go to school on Monday, but Mom told me I had to rest all weekend if I wanted to go.
When I got to school on Monday, people were whispering and looking at me strangely. Probably just thinking about all the rumors Maddie said were going around. I hadn't specifically heard any, but some of them were probably bad.
I was sitting at my seat in art class when Chelsey approached me. Kiernan and Jay were sitting at the table in front of me. "So you stab someone, accuse them of faking it, and then go fake your own wound?" She asked.
"I didn't fake anything." I said.
"You're lying. You made it all up." She sneered.
"I suppose if I made up this stab wound, I made up Kiernan's gunshot wound." I said. She glanced at Kiernan, surprised. "And if I made those up, I surely made up my psychotic father who tried to kill me. But if my own father was made up, how would I be here right now? Wouldn't I myself be made up?" I asked her. She just glared.
"I mean, I could unwrap my hand and show you, but I doubt you'd actually want to see it. It's a bit bloody." I said. She kind of paled, turned, and flounced away to her seat.
When I got to music, I waited for Kiernan, and then we went over to the teacher. She looked up when we approached. "We have a few concerns about performing our song." I said.
"You won't have to perform if you can't. We understand that you were injured." She said.
"I can still perform my piece." Kiernan said.
"And I can perform part of mine. I'm just worried I won't be able to hold my drumsticks." I said.
"If you are unable to use your hand by Friday, you can come to my classroom during lunch and play, once you are able, for your grade. Or, if you are able to perform Friday, you'll be allowed to play from sheet music or wherever you've written the music, you won't have to play from memorization." The teacher told us.
"Thank you." I said.
After dance, Kiernan came over, and we practiced as much as we could, menacing everything but the drums. But the drums were a big part of the song, so it was definitely a bit hard.
Tuesday and Wednesday passed much the same as Monday, except that I had to be very careful during taekwondo, and Kiernan and I had to go to the hospital for them to do follow-ups.
After the follow-up, I was told I would be allowed to use my hand, but that I would have to keep it wrapped up, and keep careful. Nothing too extreme just yet, so I'd still probably have to refrain from sparring in taekwondo, but I could drive my bike, the biggest thing I was looking forward to. I could also play the drums again.
And so Lyric heals extremely quickly. The doctors are amazed. I wonder why she has healed so quickly? Stay tuned to find out. (May or may not be revealed in the next chapter, but based off of what you might already know of my little mini-series, you can probably guess.)
Thank you to anyone who has reviewed, followed, or favorited! You are not inclined to do any of those things if you do not wish, but it would be much appreciated! I send my love to all of you!