Title: More Than You'll Ever Know
Summary: All Adam's dad wants is for Adam to make pro-hockey. All Adam ever wanted was a friend. A friend to stick by him. He'd lost one before, and when she comes back, sparks fly, but not for the better. This chapter: Jessica finds out a little something about herself.
Main Duck: Adam Banks (not in this chapter)
Rating: PG-13 for language and later violence
Time frame: After D2, before and during D3 maybe after D3 if I feel like it and if you give me reviews =p
Author's Note (more like plead): Thanks for all your reviews: duckslover99 (Update your story soon!), adoptedsin (Really? You like my dialogue? Thanks!), Beautyqueen321 (There will be romance later on in the story…can you guess between who? But I'll keep your advice in mind. Thanks!) and Kelly (Thanks for sticking with this! You rock!)
Disclaimer: Nope, don't own 'em. I just own Jessica and Ethan so far. Now I also own Larson's brother and sister.
Jessica
It's hard to know what happened exactly since I was in a state of panic anyway. All I know for sure is that if my older brother Ethan hadn't gotten away for two seconds to call 9-1-1, we might have never made it out of that hellhole.
My mom is a nurse. It's ironic because she drinks, smokes, and I don't even want to know what else. Some days, she'll come home and act as your everyday mom. But other days, she came home drunk. And when mom was drunk, you had to be extra careful. That particular night, Ethan and I slipped. We crept into the house at 11:35 PM, five minutes after our curfew (funny how Ethan's three years older and has the same curfew as me) and mom totally flipped. Normally, she would have let it go. But this time mom was drunk. And probably on some illegal drug too.
*Flashback*
"Where the hell have you two been?" she screams as we shut the door. Gulping, I glance over at Ethan. He's looked as scared as I feel.
"Sorry. The crowd was hard to get through!" Ethan apologized. We went to a post new years dance and then to the big party afterwards. It took awhile for us to find each other and a little more time to get through the crowd.
"SORRY?!?!" she screeches, "I work my ass off everyday just to come home to find that not one, but both of my kids have missed curfew!"
"I said we're sorry!" Ethan protested with a hint of annoyance in his voice. He immediately regrets it. The fist came at him full force. Especially for nurse, my mom hits hard. Trust me, you don't want to feel her wrath.
Mom starts beating Ethan. Finally, I had enough and scream, "Stop hitting him dammit! We said we're sorry! We'll be more careful next time!" I explode. Ethan backed me up, "Yeah! Besides, we're not the ones who go drinking and neglect our kids!"
"Yeah!" Mom was so furious smoke was coming out of her ears. I gulped and wished, no hoped, she wouldn't do anything. All hopes vanished immediately. Without warning, she picked me up and chucked me across the room. Sure, she'd done this before, but never in my whole life had I hit anything besides the wall. And it killed. As I crumpled to the ground, I felt pieces of the lamp sprinkling over me.
For the next twenty minutes, she beat Ethan and I. Silently agreeing to do something, I started fighting back (not a good idea) while Ethan made the phone call. The police arrived ten minutes later, but they were the longest ten minutes I've ever sat through.
*End Flashback*
"Kids, someone's coming for you two tomorrow." The lady from the reception desk at the orphanage told us. We didn't say anything. It was great to get away from our mom, but we were scared to be separated. Not only did we look like we'd been to hell and back four times, we were hurting too.
"Ethan? Jessica?" a counselor called out. Ethan stood up, with me close by. He led us into a big room where many kids were playing.
"Hang out here. Tomorrow morning…" I cut him off, "We were informed. But, do you know if…if we'll be separated?" I asked as politely as I could.
"Yeah, I know. As far as they've told me, there's one person coming for the both of you." He smiled and left the room. I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. Ethan and I sat together on the couch and watched some comedy flick. To tell you the truth, I wasn't really paying attention.
"Jess?" Ethan asked quietly.
"Hmmm?"
"What are we going to tell our friends?"
I swallowed, thinking that he was right. I shrugged, racking my brain fro things to tell Danny and all of my other friends.
Soon, a doctor came by to check up on us, breaking us out of our thoughts. It was a miracle we weren't dead or something.
"Just use this and wrap you wrist and hand full time and everything. You have a cut under you eye, which should be healed in about a week or so. Use these eye drops to clear any pain. Also, you mighty feel throbbing in your leg. It should pass, but if it persists, call your doctor." The doctor had informed me. Then he turned to Ethan. I wasn't even listening. Of course I was lucky I hadn't broken anything, but what was wrong with me that I had to wrap my hand and wrist?
A counselor came over to teach me how to wrap it. Ethan was told to wrap his ankle and that if the pain didn't let up, he had to see the doctor. At least that's what he told me. After all medical problems had been taken care of, Ethan and I settled back onto the couch. Soon, we fell asleep there in a heap.
The next morning, someone woke us up at nine. They told us that we were being picked up at ten. I sleepily got dressed in my black jeans and purple tank-top. They had told us to take a change of clothes before we left the house. Ethan helped me wrap my hand again and we sat and waited.
"They should have let us sleep longer," Ethan grumbled yawning.
"Yeah…" I was still thinking about my friends. Ethan must have read my mind because he put his hand on my shoulder, "Why don't you ask if you can call Danny?" I sighed and walked to the reception desk, "Excuse me?" The lady looked up and smiled, "How can I help you?"
"I, uh, my brother and I just came last night. Do you mind if I use the phone?"
"Go right ahead. Press nine before you dial the number."
"Thanks." I picked up the phone and dialed 9 and then Danny's number.
"Hello?" Jason, Danny's brother, answered the phone.
"Jason? It's Jessica."
"Jess?! We heard sirens over at your house last night. When we tried to call earlier no one was answering. Are you and Ethan alright?"
"Yeah, we're fine I guess."
"What happened?"
"Can you get to Edina Orphanage in five minutes?"
"Orphanage? Yeah sure, we'll be there."
"Thanks. Tell Danny."
"Will do. See you in five."
"Bye."
"Bye." I hung-up and thanked the receptionist. I went back to the playroom to tell Ethan. He was happy that the Larsons were coming and insisted that we wait for them in the front hall.
Five minutes later, as promised, Jason, Sally (his twin), and Danny walked through the doors of the orphanage.
"Hey guys!" I greeted them.
"Hey." Was the initial response. All three looked confused.
"What's going on?" Danny asked. We sat on the bench against the wall.
"Someone's coming for us," Ethan told him.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Rewind. Start from the beginning. Why are you here in the first place?" Sally asked.
"Well to make a long story short, our mom got caught, we ended up here, they found someone who's related to us." Ethan compressed.
"Elaborate." Danny looked straight at me. I sighed, "This might take awhile."
"We have all day." I rolled my eyes, knowing they wouldn't let me off the hook until either me or Ethan told them everything. And since Ethan was looking at me too, I started, "You know how our mom works later?" They nodded so I continued, "She drinks, you all know that. Sometimes, nothing would happen. Most of the time, it was fine. But sometimes, she hit us. At first, it never happened too often. Maybe once every two months. Lately, though, she's been drinking, smoking, and as we just found out, doing drugs. She got really pissed off that we were out until five minutes past curfew. She started beating us more than ever before. Ethan got away for a minute to call 9-1-1. That's all I know because everything was just a blur. All I remember is hoping she wouldn't kill us." I let out a big breath as I finished. The Larsons were speechless. But that wasn't the end of my story. My mother abused me, but she wasn't the only one. My ex-boyfriend had too. We'd broken up about a week before.
I'm not sure how I got away from Zak Hill, but I did. He was fuming mad, but I'd had had enough of him sexually harassing me all the time. I was so scared of him. After we broke-up, he moved, but he screamed that he'd get me. I went home and cried for hours before I fell asleep that night. Adam was right. Adam was right and I should have listened to him, but he could have been nicer. That's when I started getting sad and bitter at the same time. I also started having horrible nightmares, but I refused to tell anyone. Not even Ethan.
Danny hugged me in the midst of my thoughts. One by one the three Larson kids offered sympathy. After all, they couldn't do much more.
"Jessica? Ethan?" A counselor called. We looked up, "Yeah?"
"You father is here." Ethan shot up from his seat. A not so tall man with brown hair walked into the room. He wore a long brown coat and wore dress shoes. I gasped at the same time as Danny. We knew who that was. It was the Duck coach. It was Bombay. And he was my father?
*Please Review! What did you think? Am I doing badly?*