The Fifth Age
By Glorfindel's Girl
Chapter 12: Emergency Room Eavesdropping
Disclaimer: Well, don't own these folks, because they own themselves. So there. Not making any money. Happy?
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Wilson N. Jones Memorial Hospital, Sherman, Tx.
Adrienne's eyes followed Sarah's progress as she paced to the window, past the long row of chairs, to the door, and back. Occasionally her friend would stop and sigh heavily, tapping her hand against her leg before resuming her progress. Obviously, Sarah was extremely agitated.
"Will you please stop for crying out loud?!? Jeeeez," Adrienne said as Sarah began her sixth route around the room. Sarah paused and leaned against a wall, crossing her arms over her chest.
"I hate hospitals," she said. "Hate them. They're too cold and sterile. Bad energy. Nothing but death, pain, and sickness."
"Dude," Chris suddenly interrupted, looking up from a two month old copy of Sports Illustrated. "Calm down." However, neither girl could help but notice the way his hands trembled as he held the magazine.
Sarah sighed heavily, and finally sank down into a chair. She leaned forward, resting her head in her hands. "Look, I'm sorry I snapped at you guys in the car," she muttered.
" 'S all right" Adrienne replied. "Totally appropriate."
"Gods, are they freaking done yet?" Sarah asked, standing again and looking through the window at the emergency check in counter. Silvia and Dominic Soubirous were still standing there, filling out paperwork on their daughter. They had arrived just a few minutes after Sarah, Chris, and Adrienne pulled into the emergency room entrance. Really amazing, considering that they lived about twelve miles away from the hospital.
As though on cue, Silvia passed the clipboard she had been writing on to the nurse behind desk. The nurse nodded, and pointed across her desk at the waiting room.
An uneasy silence descended over the three as their friend's parents entered the waiting room. Silvia and Dominic sat down together, directly across the room from the three young people. Chris suddenly seemed to find an article in his Sports Illustrated extremely interesting, and Adrienne had apparently found an equally interesting spot on the wall. Only Sarah managed to make eye contact with Mr. and Mrs. Soubirous, but then again, she had known them longer than Chris and Adrienne had.
"All right, people," Silvia said suddenly. Chris and Adrienne flinched and looked up, albeit reluctantly. "Tell me what happened. One at a time."
At this, they launched into a recount of Kelly's behavior at the mall, with Sarah telling the majority of the story, with Chris and Adrienne occasionally interrupting to provide some small detail or other. When they finished, Dominic nodded slowly.
"Okay," he said, sitting up straight, "That's exactly what happened? You're not leaving anything out?" He regarded each of them slowly. He had the same intense, piercing gaze that Kelly did. It was quite unnerving.
"Well," Sarah began, "After she zoned or whatever you want to call it, she was trying to talk to us…but she wasn't making any sense."
"What do you mean?" Dominic cut in. "Was she incoherent?"
"No…it sounded like she was speaking another language. And it didn't sound like the kind of stuff someone who was incoherent would come up with. I don't know how to describe it…but there was some depth there or something. It sounded like an actual language."
"What did she say?" Silvia asked.
"I can't remember," Sarah admitted. "Im hir ntúl si something. Something like that."
Silvia nodded slowly, and Dominic made a move as though to say something more, but was interrupted by the waiting room door swinging open. A middle aged doctor with slightly graying hair stepped into the room.
"Mr. and Mrs. Soubirous?" he asked. Dominic and Silvia nodded as they stood and shook his hand. "I'm Dr. Keen. Please, sit down. I have some questions I need to ask." He waited for them to be seated again, then pulled up a chair and sat directly in front of them, presenting his back to Sarah, Adrienne, and Chris. All three felt mildly insulted.
"What happened to my daughter?" Dominic asked, his eyes deeply troubled.
"That's why I need to ask you some questions," the doctor replied. "We're not exactly sure what is wrong with your daughter. Now before you say anything, she has been stabilized, and is apparently improving. But we're not sure what caused her…condition."
"All right," Dominic replied, though his expression remained grim.
"Have you ever known your daughter to use mind altering drugs of any kind? Did she use illegal drugs or have access to any psycho-somatic medications she could have abused?" The way the doctor said it was more of an accusation than a question.
"What?! No!" Sarah and Chris exclaimed suddenly.
"Kelly would never have done that!" Adrienne burst in. The doctor turned round to face them with a rather bemused expression.
"These are Kelly's three friends who were with her," Silvia explained. "Sarah, Chris, and Adrienne." The doctor nodded.
"I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave the room. Matters of confidentiality."
"I don't have a problem with them being here," Silvia said.
"Be that as it may, Mrs. Soubirous," the doctor cut in, "It's hospital regulations. They'll have to leave the room."
Dominic nodded at the three. "Give us a few minutes."
All three muttered different affirmations, and skulked out into the hallway.
"Does your daughter have a history of psychological disorders?" they heard the doctor ask just before Adrienne pushed the door to, leaving it open just a crack. They leaned against the counter of the nurse's station, and stared at Kelly's parents and the doctor through the window.
"Can you hear what they're saying?" Chris asked after a second.
"Not if you keep talking," Adrienne shot back. But despite Adrienne's aggravation, it was pointless. They couldn't hear a word of what was being said. After an agonizing fifteen minutes, Kelly's parents stood and shook hands with the doctor, who held the waiting room door open for them. Dominic looked worried, but Silvia smiled, and wrapped her arms around Adrienne, Chris, and Sarah.
"Don't worry, guys. The doctor says he thinks she's going to be fine. They just want to keep her tonight and tomorrow for observations," she said. "She'll probably be home tomorrow evening."
"What's wrong with her?" Sarah asked.
"They're still not sure," Dominic said, frowning heavily. "He said that when she came in here, they thought she was in shock…possible drug overdose or something. But now he says that she looks almost like she's suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome or something."
Silvia tightened her grip on their shoulders. "She'll be just fine. We're going to go see her now. But you guys go on home. Get some rest. As soon as we know anything, we'll give you a call. Promise."
The sun was warm on their faces as they stepped outside into the parking lot, and the Texas heat rose in waves from the black asphalt. The mood was somber as the three friends piled once more into Sarah's car. They drove to the mall in silence, and Sarah dropped them off at their respective cars. Then they all went home.
None of them slept well that night. Chris lay awake in bed, staring at the ceiling, Sarah tossed and turned, her dreams dark and dangerous, and Adrienne finally gave up on sleep and stayed online talking to her boyfriend, Sebastian, seeing if he could make sense of the weird events of the day.
If any of them had thought to go outside, they would have seen the evening star shining unusually bright, as meteors shot from horizon to horizon in one of the biggest and most unexpected showers in a decade.
