We Used To Be Friends

Chapter Seventeen

A/N: Thanks to everyone who is reviewing this story. Hope you enjoy this chapter and I apologize now for the cliffhanger that's at the end of the chapter.

Weeks Later

Each day I say that today
Won't be like yesterday
But it stays this way
Today and every day I pray
That today will feel a different way
But it stays this way

The brick wall was cold and unwilling to yield when she was forcibly pushed into it. Her exposed skin clashed with the rough exterior of the wall and she was sure that it hurt, or at least it would have hurt if she weren't already numb. Her body seemed ready to shut down and she let it. She only wished her mind would give up too. Scrambled thoughts weaved their way around her mind as she desperately attempted to think about anything except what was going on. Flashes of light and movement bombarded her eyes until finally she couldn't take it anymore.

"No!" Lucy screamed as her eyes jerked open and searched her surroundings. She wasn't back in that alley; she was sitting in her bed. She was safe in her room. It wasn't happening again; it was just another nightmare. It had been almost six weeks since the attack, and she was almost getting used to the nightly terrors that haunted her. After wiping the sweat from her forehead, she silently thanked God that Carter had the night shift and wasn't here to witness another of her nightmares. He was already getting suspicious, and the last thing she needed was to peak his curiosity again. Some nights she woke up without screaming, but then there were nights like this that the nightmare was so real she couldn't help but scream. Her breathing had gone back to normal again, and she laid her head back on the pillow. Tightly pulling the covers up to her neck, she took a couple of calming breaths in hopes of relaxing her frazzled nerves. Calming breaths never seemed to help her, but she kept trying anyway. As she laid there in the dark, she thought back upon the past six weeks. After the first week had passed, she found out that it wasn't going to be easy to forget what happened to her. She quickly gave up on trying to forget and focused her attention on trying to move on; however, moving on wasn't easy either. She was very cautious and, even though Carter, Dave, and Shelby were all suspicious, none of them had any clue what was going on with her—and that's just the way she wanted it to be. Although she realized that they cared about her and would want to help her, she didn't know what they would be able to do for her. None of them had gone through this so what use could they be to her? As she pondered this, she recognized the now familiar rumbling of her stomach. She jumped out of bed and ran into the bathroom, managing to put the toilet seat up before she proceeded to vomit for the sixth time in twenty-four hours. After she was done, she stood up and rinsed out her mouth with some mouthwash to get rid of the bad aftertaste. When she had gotten sick earlier at the hospital, she told Susan that it must have been from some bad leftovers she ate, but that was impossible. She hadn't eaten any leftovers in a long time in fact she wasn't eating much at all. She just wasn't hungry most of the time. Something else was causing her illness and she prayed that she was wrong, even though somehow she knew she wasn't. Sighing, she climbed back into her bed and tried to go back to sleep.

Carter entered the apartment and crashed on the couch. After having to deal with seven traumas, he was exhausted. But his thoughts ran back to Lucy, like they usually did. He was even more worried about her now. She still wouldn't open up to him about what was bothering her, even though it was obvious to him and everyone else that she wasn't acting like herself. Anytime he would ask her, they would end up getting into an argument and she still wouldn't open up to him. At first he thought that maybe Dave was right. Maybe Lucy was just upset about his new relationship with Abby. But as time went on, he rejected that theory because it didn't make sense. Lucy was having nightmares and isolating herself. But she wasn't just withdrawing from him. She was also withdrawing from Shelby and Dave, and she rarely wanted to leave the apartment. He rarely ever saw her eat anything, and she loved to go to her room and sleep. The signs of depression were abundant, while the cause remained a mystery to him. He wasn't sure how to help her anymore, or even if he could help her. Shaking his head and sighing, he got up from the couch and headed to his room to get some sleep.
Later that day, Lucy walked up to the admit desk, looking for another patient. But she found Shelby standing there talking to Dave. For a moment, she thought that she could turn around without them noticing her, but she was wrong.

"Lucy! Hi!" Shelby called out to her. She hadn't talked to Lucy in a few days, and hadn't seen her in over a week. That was very unusual because they used to talk everyday. But Lucy had become distant, and she wasn't sure how to help her friend.

"Hi." Lucy replied, giving them a small smile. "What's up?"

"Not much." Shelby replied. "I was trying to convince Dave to go out to a late lunch with me, but…"

Dave interrupted. "But Weaver has been on my case all day today for some reason and I don't want to give her another reason to yell at me."

Shelby turned back to Lucy. "So would you like to go to lunch with me? We haven't had a chance to talk much lately."

Lucy wasn't sure what to say. She wanted to go spend time with Shelby, but not if she was going to insist on trying to pry information out of her. Besides that, she wasn't sure that she would be able to hold down food. "I don't know. It's rather busy today…"

"I think we can handle it for awhile. You haven't taken any breaks today." Dave reminded her.

She sighed, knowing that she wasn't going to be able to get out of this one when there were two people lobbying against her. "Ok. Just let me get my coat." She moved away from them and headed into the lounge.

"Maybe you can get her to talk to you. Carter says he's not having any luck getting her to open up." Dave told Shelby once Lucy was out of earshot.

"I doubt it. If she won't talk to Carter, then she probably won't talk to me." Shelby replied. "I just don't understand what's happening to her. She's changing, and it's not the good kind of change. Everyday I feel her pull farther away."

Dave gave her a hug as a sign of comfort. "I know, and I'm sorry. I wish I had the answers."

Shelby pulled out of the hug and smiled sadly. "So do I."

Carter finished washing the dishes and looked around the apartment. Neither Lucy nor him had cleaned in a while, and it showed. Since this was his day off and Abby was working, he decided that he would spend the day cleaning up the apartment a little. Maybe that would make Lucy smile and not be annoyed with him for once. He remembered that Lucy kept the vacuum cleaner in her closet, so he walked into her room and opened the closet doors. When he reached inside to pull out the vacuum, another item came out of the closet. He bent down to pick it up so that he could put it back, but stopped when he saw what it was. It was one of Lucy's black dresses, but it was all torn. It looked like someone had been trying to rip it apart. Holding it up, he carefully examined it. Finding this dress was troubling to him, and he wondered if he held answers to Lucy's secrets. His mind didn't want to travel down that road, but he began to wonder if Lucy was attacked. It would definitely explain a lot of her behavior, but it couldn't be true. Could it? He folded the dress back up and returned both it and the vacuum to where he had found them. He didn't feel like cleaning anymore.
"So what have you been up to?" Shelby asked Lucy as they sat in one of the booths at Doc Magoo's. "I haven't seen you much lately."

"I've just been busy doing some things." Lucy lied. "But, I'm sure you're busy too."

"Yeah, but you just seem to be avoiding me." Shelby replied.

"I'm not avoiding you." Lucy shook her head, denying Shelby's accusation even though it was the truth. She was trying to avoid everyone, including and especially Carter.

"Ok." Shelby relented. "You're not avoiding me. You're just so busy doing nothing that you can't pick up the phone and call your best friend." She was starting to get angry now. If being a kind, compassionate friend wasn't going to make Lucy confide in her, perhaps being mean would get her to spill her secrets.

"That's unfair!" Lucy objected. "You don't know what I'm…" She stopped mid-sentence, realizing what Shelby was doing. Mentally, she chastised herself for almost falling for the trap Shelby laid out. She was about ready to let Shelby know why she was avoiding her, and it almost worked. "Nice try, but it won't work."

"What won't work?" Shelby asked innocently.

"You were trying to trick me. You've been doing that ever since the fifth grade. Did you really think I'd fall for it again?"

Shelby chuckled. "You almost did."

"Almost doesn't count." Lucy informed her friend. "Can we please change the subject?"

"Let me say one thing first." Shelby replied. "I don't know what's going on with you, or why you are so adamantly refusing to let anyone in right now. But you can't hide out forever. Whatever you're hiding will come out eventually, and Carter, Dave and I will right there next to you, ready to help you because we're your friends. All you need to do is come out of that dark cloud you're living in."

Lucy wasn't sure how to respond to that. Part of her wanted to confess everything to Shelby, but something stopped her. Maybe it was that fact that if she told Shelby what happened, then it would make it real. So far she had managed to escape saying the 'r' word, and she would like to keep it that way. "So what are you having to eat?" She asked, changing the subject to something more neutral.

Carter looked over at the door from the couch when Lucy arrived home from work. "Hey." He greeted, hoping that she wasn't in a horrible mood.

"Hi." She greeted back, adding a small smile.

"How was your day?" He asked.

"It was ok." Lucy shrugged. "And yours?"

"It was ok too." Carter replied, realizing that it had become incredibly hard for them to talk to each other. In the past, it had been easy to talk to each other, but those days were gone. "Your favorite movie is on. Wanna watch it together?"

It was a tempting offer, but she had to decline. She had other, more important things to do right now. "Thanks, but I'll pass. I have some things to take care of."

"Ok." He nodded. He would have liked it if she would have stayed and spent some time with him, but instead she had rushed off to her room. He wondered what she was doing.

Lucy impatiently tapped her foot while she waited for the five minutes to expire. She had "borrowed" one of the test kits from the supply closet at the hospital. After checking her watch for what seemed like the millionth time, she was pleased to find out that the five minutes was over. She could now look at the results. But as she neared the test strip, she began to be afraid. What if it was positive? What was she going to do then? She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before looking at the test strip that would determine her fate.

Song Lyric: "Weight of the World" By: Alana Davis