Thank you everyone who read and reviewed! I'm sorry for leaving an evil cliffy that had you all screaming. But I'll make it up to you. Voila! The next chapter. In case you don't know where it is, look down the page and you'll find it :D

Oh yeah, and sorry if the chapter doesn't sound too professional in medical terms, I'll try to make it work but as some of you might know, I am not a doctor.

The gang were waiting outside the OP room in the hospital. They were all sitting in either tense and nervous positions or lay across a couple of chairs with a pensive look on their faces. Either way, they were not that comfortable knowing TJ was in the operation room because of them. "What happened?" breathed Spinelli finally breaking the silence.

"It was all my fault! I blame myself!" shouted Mickey.

"It was all of our fault," spoke Gretchen.

"If he didn't want to talk, we shouldn't have tried to make him," said Vince spitefully to himself.

"And now look what has become of our fallen leader?" asked Mickey overdramatically.

Spinelli jumped off of the chair and walked over to the door to the OP room. The others joined her. They saw doctors standing next to each other, one looked at the other one and suddenly caught sight of the group looking through the window. He muttered something to the other doctor and walked towards the door.

The gang ran back and sat down at their chairs each with a magazine in their hands or playing with their nails. The doctor stepped through the doorframe and towards the gang. "I thought you'd be curious to what happened to TJ."

"Of course," Gretchen said solemnly as everyone looked up or sat up in their seats.

"Well, so am I, can you please explain your part of the story," the doctor asked cheerfully, maybe he was trying to be nice to little children or maybe he was like that all the time.

The gang took turns explaining but making sure to leave out how they were involved.

"Okay then," spoke the doctor a little less cheerfully, "You know, 75 of teenagers wish they'd have paid more attention to the road each week," Vince was about to interrupt when the doctor, Doctor Coleman continued, "TJ has had some very terrible injuries, some might ever take weeks to fully recover."

"What's wrong with him, doc?" asked Gus.

"Earl just took him to the X-ray room but we're pretty sure that he has a broken arm, a pair of broken ribs and a sprained ankle."

"What are you going to do to him?" asked Gus speaking for the first time.

"Well we're not sure yet but we'll tell you when we're finished with the X-ray."

Doctor Coleman left to go to the X-ray room. Gretchen decided to break the silence, "Shouldn't we call TJ's parents?"

"I'll go do that now," Spinelli left her friends as they sat back down in the waiting room.

---Recess---

The phone conversation was rather short and rushed. This is pretty much how it went.

Ring… ring…ri-

"Hello, Detweiler's residence, how may I help you?" asked a female voice.

"Hi, this is Spinelli," she began.

"Oh, hi, Spinelli!"

"Listen, there was an accident," Spinelli quietly scorned herself at the mention of the word, "TJ is in the St. Mary's hospital." The person on the other end of the phone gasped loudly. (A/N- I made up the hospital name coz I don't know any.)

"What happened?" she asked.

"Car crash. Details are sketchy right now but the doctor thinks it's a broken arm, sprained ankle and stuff like that. Teej's in the X-ray room right now."

"I'll be there soon."

The person on the other end of the phone hung up. Spinelli sighed and turned back towards the waiting room.

---Recess---

"So, how did his mum take it?" asked Vince when Spinelli returned.

"Well, she said she'd be here in a minute and I'm pretty sure she started crying in the background," sighed Spinelli as she dropped onto a chair. Just then Doctor Coleman and his partner, supposedly Doctor Earl, entered the waiting room wearing sad and devastated looks on their faces. In those expressions was mixed in the look of dread, as if they had something to say but they didn't want to put it into words. "Well, what did you find out?" enquired Spinelli.

"Well, as we predicted, TJ's arm and two of his right ribs are broken, as well as a sprained ankle but we have discovered that he may have some mental problems. Shouting, screaming and rage disorder. He hit his head and did quite a number. Nothing physical though. You just might expect a little anger in his voice, if he starts shouting at you, please don't take it personally for TJ's sake," Doctor Coleman answered.

---Recess---

(A/N- just so you know, I don't know TJ's mum's name – actually, I'm not sure she has one. I'll just call her 'TJ's mum')(A/N- as you may have noticed, I'm not American. I spell mum without an O)

TJ's mum was frantically running around looking for the keys to the car. Becky came in and started preparing dinner. "Want me to make any seconds?" asked Becky.

"Not now, I can't eat."

"Oh come on. This isn't another one of your diet ideas, is it?"

"No, I have to go see TJ."

"Arh! The dweeb and his brat friends need a ride to Kellso's again? Seriously, mum! You have to say 'no' to that little hooligan sometimes! Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you, yesterday, TJ thought it would be funny to go into my room and take all of my stationery! And now I can't find it." Becky was going to say more but her mum cut her off.

"This is serious, Becky." She stopped and looked Becky eye-to-eye. "Your brother is in hospital," she breathed barely audibly.

"Wh-what?"

"Your brother had an accident and he's in hospital."

Becky stood staring into space pensively and then turned and opened a drawer. She grabbed the keys to the car and turned back to her mother, "Let's go, I'll drive."

In the car, the pair didn't say anything to each other. Becky kept her focus on the road and her mother just sat twiddling with her coat button. "So, what happened?" asked Becky after a while.

"I don't know. All I know is that some of the injuries are quite serious. Spinelli called me ten minutes ago. St. Mary's hospital."

Becky found a parking space and drove back in reverse until she was content with the position of the car. They got out, locked the door and headed towards the reception where they found a friendly looking blonde woman who quickly showed them to a waiting room outside a OP room. They found the gang there who greeted them warmly yet absent-mindedly. "So, you gonna tell us what happened?" Becky asked the gang.

The gang got an unwanted flashback. They wanted to block it out, but all of them failed.

---Flashback---

"TJ!" the gang screamed in unison. TJ was startled and lost balance. The skateboard went downhill. He didn't have time or opportunity to change course and he was gathering momentum fast. When he reached the traffic, he put his arms over his head protectively just before a large red and grey lorry honked at him and tried to turn direction. But the seconds were too few and the lorry collided with TJ sending him flying off his board to his left where he landed on a blue car and slipped off it's back to hit the ground painfully. Luckily, he wasn't conscious of that pain but the pain would come soon enough.

---End of Flashback---

The gang explained this in fewer words to the sister and her mother. They just stared out at the warmly pained drywall. This was a lot of information to take in all at once. Before the news kicked, the two doctors came in, one with a clipboard in his hands, the other pulling the glove off of his hand finger by finger. "Hello, you must be Mrs. Detweiler. Your son is in there," directed one of the doctors to a room a corridor to their left where one door stood right at the end. The gang got up and walked with Becky and her mum to the room.

They entered to see a resting TJ lying on the bed. On a chair to the side lay TJ's trademark shirt and jacket. The room was relatively warm and the bandages hiding TJ's chest could not be seen under the thick white blanket. A drip was attached to TJ's arm and a packet of AB+ blood hung on a peg by TJ's bed. A heart monitor was on the other side of the bed and was beeping regularly, the panel showed even movements of the heart as the blood pumped through TJ's veins, arteries and capillaries. The doctors entered the room after everyone was in. They saw the looks on the friends and family's faces and spoke up.

"TJ was very lucky. If the ambulance was called on a second later then he would he on a breathing machine now. Or worse," he added.

For the next few minutes, the group just floated around the bed – sitting, lying or standing anxiously waiting for some development to occur. Soon enough, everyone was asleep except one. Gus was sitting in a chair at the end of the bed just staring at TJ with his head in his arms. He sat listening to the regular beeping and noticed a slight change in speed. Looking carefully at TJ, he also noticed several beads of sweat rolling down his forehead. "Err… guys? I think there's something wrong."

Gus woke everyone with a start they glanced over at the bedridden child and quickly called in a doctor. This doctor seemed unfamiliar, she was on nightshift and had a clipboard that she was frantically looking over. She was a coloured woman with thick black hair tied back into a high ponytail. "I can't think of any reason for the sudden changes," she admitted to no one in particular. Everyone was panicking. Especially TJ.

---Recess---

TJ was standing on the top of the world, he felt perfect. Then suddenly and without warning, his friends materialised around him, they wore frowns and unfriendly expressions that were either unreadable or indescribable, they surrounded TJ and closed in. TJ looked for an opening and upon finding one between Mickey and Gretchen, he ducked between them and ran. He constantly looked back to see where his 'friends' were and unexpectedly ran into open traffic where he felt inexpressible pain but not physical, but mental. For the expressions his 'friends' wore were those that he had only seen in his nightmares, and rare ones at that. This was one of them. TJ was knocked over and pushed back and forth between several different cars and lorries until he completely blacked out.

He gained consciousness slowly and when he forced his eyes open, he found himself in total emptiness. His surroundings were black and all he saw was black. It pained him, the blinding darkness, it brought him thought that were never meant to be, terrible thoughts. TJ closed his eyes and tried his best to diminish these thoughts from existence. "No," he said to himself, "my friends would never do that to me." He thought over and over, he calmed down and slowly opened his eyes.

---Recess---

The doctor stood over TJ and examined him. "He seems to be calming down," she informed. TJ's vital signs were back to normal and the small beads of sweat were leaving though his brow was still moist. "I believe Dr. Coleman told you about TJ's mood swings changing for a while?" asked the Doctor.

"He said that TJ might shout at us sometimes and that we shouldn't blame him," confirmed Vince.

The doctor smiled and made one final tick on her clipboard, she was about to leave when TJ's eyes opened a crack. Everyone stared at him and gradually, TJ's eyes gained focus as he looked around at his surroundings and the people in the room. A small smile appeared on his freckled face, "Hey guys," he croaked, "How long was I out?"

Everyone just stared at him, TJ's mum swallowed a sob and ran up to hug her son the best she could without hurting him. TJ just groaned and gave her a small one-armed hug. The doctor looked at the pair hoping his mother would release him before any more damage was caused. "How you feeling?" she asked kindly.

"I've been better," he muttered as his mother set him back down. "So… any serious damage done?" he asked.

"Broken arm and ribs, sprained ankle, you knocked your head pretty bad," the doctor answered.

"What time is it?" asked TJ.

"Just about midnight," the doctor replied. All this time, everyone else was speechless. Just then, they found their voices.

"Midnight? Oh, man, my mum's gonna be worried sick!" Vince dashed out of the room, soon followed by Mickey, Gus and Gretchen.

Spinelli just sat there, staring at TJ. TJ noticed this and looked over at her, she didn't look away, she just kept staring at him. Becky came over to the bed and knelt down by it, "You want anything, TJ?" she asked.

TJ was going to retort by asked 'since when do you call me 'TJ'?' but stopped to see the obvious answer, "No thanks, I'm good."

Becky got up and started making her way out of the room, she looked back at him before she left and sighed. Spinelli just sat there. "What's wrong with you?" TJ asked her.

She paused before answering, "Nothing, look, TJ, I wanted to apologise to for today, we all do."

"It's no big, you didn't mean to. I was acting like a jerk to you guys," admitted TJ.

Spinelli cracked a smile, "You may have been acting like a jerk but we didn't have to go and nearly kill you. You were still our jerk."