CHAPTER 11:

Fiona looked up after hearing a door open. She saw Marissa storm out of it, head kept down, arms folded across her chest. Fiona got up to follow her. She lengthened her stride and Fiona had to jog to catch up.

"Marissa! What's going on?"

"Nothing. Leave me alone." Marissa uttered, getting into the elevator. Fiona watched as the doors shut, breaking her eye contact with Marissa.

Marissa rushed out o the hospital, tears building up in her tear ducts, wanting to fall badly. She held them back with all her will power. She couldn't believe her own mother had shot her father, all for money. She knew her mother's job involved killing, but killing her own husband? That was way past the norm. Marissa wanted to break something, to vent her frustration. If only her parents had not gone off to Qatar, she would have lived a normal life. It wasn't that she didn't love Fiona and Cooper but it wasn't the same as having her biological parents. Fiona tried her hardest, but she really, really wasn't mother material. Throughout her life, Marissa had always had questions about stuff, but she never felt completely comfortable asking Fiona, fearing she would get rather uncomfortable and awkward about it. Marissa had sought her answers from her close friends, and they seemed to get her by. Cooper on the other hand, had been a somewhat sufficient father-figure. He always helped her with school, gave her guidance when she needed it and taught her a lot about cars considering he owned like twenty of them in the garage at his apartment. Thinking of said apartment, Marissa went to the bus stop and decided to take a visit to good old 316R.

Fiona walked back into Cooper and Jennifer's room. He was writing in his journal as usual and she was looking abstractedly out the window. The doctors had meanwhile been in and removed more of the bandage on her face. She now only had half of her face covered. Fiona saw the one cut. It wasn't too bad, one that wouldn't require immense stitches. Suddenly, a new doctor walked into the room. Fiona looked at him from her seat. He was tall, had dirty blonde curly hair, and was middle aged.

"Hi Ms. Mui, I'm Dr. Mark Sloan, head of plastic surgery here at St. Mary's." He took out her chart. "It says here that you wanted me to come down and stitch up your face instead of some one else."

"Yes, I'd like there to be no scarring."

"Okay, now you do realise that this isn't covered by your insurance, correct?"

"Yes, I do know. The man who got me into the accident is paying for it." Jen smirked as she cast a glance over at Cooper who smiled awkwardly. Dr. Sloan nodded, closing the binder that was her chart. "Okay, well, I'll take you into an in-patient procedure room and we'll get this done, all right?"

"Good. It's about time."

Marissa arrived at Cooper's old apartment block after a half an hour bus ride across town. She arrived at his front door, reaching into her purse, fetching her keys. Cooper had let her have one, in case she couldn't find him and he was asleep here or in the back at the garage. She let herself in, the smell of overused Febreeze filling her nostrils. It was a pumpkin spice smell, one that he used around Thanksgiving and Christmas. She walked in further, closing the door. She couldn't be bothered to turn on the lights as she flopped down into the bed. She pulled the covers over her and slowly fell asleep.

An hour had past and Jen finally returned to her room, her face only bandaged in places where she just had it sutured. Fiona could finally see just how much she had aged over the last decade and bit. She started to get the wrinkles that women in their forties had; bird's feet around the eyes, and more severe laugh lines. Other than that, nothing much had changed. She was still pretty near the same. Fiona set down the magazine she was reading and went over next to Jen's bed. Jen was still looking rather distant after Marissa had gone.

"You all right?"

"No. My own daughter hates me."

"Can you blame her?" Jen turned her head and stared Fiona directly in the eyes.

"I suppose not. But…she didn't know her father anymore than she didn't know me…Maybe she'll come around."

"I hate to say this but, I really doubt that." Fiona said worriedly. "Like you, she's stubborn as a mule and one her mind is made up, there is absolutely no changing it."

Three Weeks Later…

"Well Ms. Mui, your CT scans show that the bleeding that had occurred in your brain after the accident is clearly been resolved and also, the bleeding in your abdomen is gone as well. You should be clear to go home." Dr. Shepherd stated in a crisp clear voice. Jennifer smiled.

"It's about time."

Jennifer called a cab and went back to her own house. It didn't feel like home much, considering she had only lived in it for three years. She walked in. Fiona wasn't home, but Cooper was. His arm was still in a cast from forearm to upper arm, holding it in an 'L' shape. He was walking with better coordination and he appeared to be doing quite well.

"It feels so weird to be here and to call this place home. I've barely lived here."

"Yeah…listen, we've been living here for the past twelve years….all our stuff's in the main bedroom and…"

"It's fine Cooper, I'll sleep on the couch. This place is practically yours now anyway."

"We paid the mortgage with the money you and James put together." Copper retorted.

"Okay, you did but still. You've lived here more than I have so…I'll take the damn couch." Jen laid down on the leather couch, kicking her feet up on the arm rest. "Where's Fiona and Marissa?"

"Fiona's out looking for Marissa. I know exactly where she is though so it's all right. Fiona's worried sick but…the girl needs her space."

"Where is she?"

"In my apartment. I gave her a key a long time ago in case she ever needed space, especially since her and Fiona had been fighting a bit back then."


"Fighting?" She asked curiously, turning her head so she was looking at Cooper.

"Yeah…the usual stuff; fighting over the state of her room, the way she dressed, what she did after school…that kind of thing."

"Oh. I thought you meant she was being difficult."

"To Fiona, that was difficult to the extreme. It had even brought her to tears once." Cooper chuckled. "But they got over it. That was last year. Now it's…" He paused.

"What? Me? I know. But I want to make things work out, I really do. If it takes her another year to speak to me, so be it. At least she would be speaking to me."

"You have a valid point. But can I ask you something?" Cooper meandered into the living room, sitting down on the love seat on the other side of the room.

"Go ahead." Jen watched him as he gave her a look. "Do it. I've got nothing to hold back."

"Why? Why'd you shoot him?"

"Well…I mean we had been fighting ever since we arrived. He had done a whole lot of pre-organising behind my back without asking first. I told him we were doing it freelance and he went to the Allied Nations instead. It was that, and the contract he arranged to do that I refused and then we got into a really big fight after I used these…" Jen looked down at her breasts. "To negotiate a better payment from the Saudi Arabians. He got mad and so did I and then he called me…a…" Jen bit down on her lip, sighing as she closed her eyes. James' voice echoed in her head, the words embedded in her mind. "A vindictive, manipulative, bitch." Cooper winced.

"Wow." It was all he had to say. He knew now why she had been so angry. Why she actually went through with pulling the trigger, well, he was sure she'd explain that too.

"So, how'd that lead to you putting a bullet in his head?"

"Well I did the contract and he happened to be lucky number twenty-five; the last one keeping me from my one hundred forty five million. And as I looked through the scope, I recognised him, but…I didn't see him as the man that I loved and married and bore his child. I saw him as another stupid A.N. soldier and it was almost second nature to pull it on him. I never even found his body, considering the force knocked him back so far into the bushes at the side of the road. Oh God…" Jen rubbed her face. Cooper nodded.

"I get it." Jen pulled away her hand and raised an eyebrow.

"You do?" She exclaimed.

"Yeah. It might be ethically wrong, but you had to do what you had to do and what he said, that was…unforgivable. So…yeah…I get it." Cooper shrugged casually.

"You're the only one. Maybe you should try and get through to my daughter and Fiona."

"I'll see what I can do."