Chapter Thirty-Five
The two teens finally made their way into the hospital—a mere thirty minutes after the car had been parked in the parking garage—stopping at an informational desk that was straight ahead off the elevator they just exited. An older gentleman stood behind it, a friendly smile on his face as the two approached him. He nodded, after Nicky was the one to voice the question, and advised them that where they were headed was located on the second floor with a waiting room and nurses' station separating the regular wing of rooms from the ICU rooms.
Taking another set of elevators—clear across the hall from the one that they had moments ago got off of—up to the second floor like they'd just been advised to do, Nicky took that time to wrap her arms around Lorna's smaller body. She pulled her closer, brushing her lips gently atop her head and kept the embrace until the machine came to a stop at the floor above the previous one. A bell rung to alert them that they had arrived on the floor they'd clicked on and the doors swiftly pried open.
As predicted, the waiting room was right there in front of them when they hopped out of the elevator. A nurses station slightly down the hall on the right and a bay of patient rooms beyond that. An uneasiness slowly began to form in Lorna's body at the realization that she was back standing in a hospital. The one place she vowed to never enter again after the death of her mother. It took a few seconds of coaxing for Lorna to find the will to move her legs once more, she followed behind Nicky to keep her from being able to look at her.
Her eyes kept focus on the tile below as she held her pace. The pattern of it similar to all the other tiled hospital floors she'd observed at the several that Mrs. Morello had stayed at throughout her cancer diagnoses. She didn't look up until she walked right into Nicky's back and nearly made the both of them fall to the ground from her own clumsiness.
The collision immediately had Nicky turn around to peer her girlfriend over. It was clear to her how shaken up the shorter teen was as she stood there, her eyes widened and staring straight ahead like a deer in headlights. A sigh escaped her to see that; she quickly enveloped her arms securely around Lorna's waist, pulling her in for a warming embrace. "You know we don't have to do this, yeah kid? If ya changed your mind and don't wanna see your dad, that's okay. We don't have to. I don't want you to be scared," she huskily assured the younger girl. Her eyes gazed down at her in nothing but the utmost compassion.
"No, no, I want to do this. I just—I hate hospitals is all," Lorna quickly replied, forcing herself to stand up straighter to exude confidence.
Albeit confidence being the furthest thing from her mind at that particular moment. None of what she felt at that point had anything to do with confidence or her father, she observed. It had everything to do with her mother. Her mother who took her last breath in a hospital similar to the one they stood in now, hell that hospital might have even very well been the same one Stansie died in. She couldn't remember either way, though, with her mind too focused on keeping her thoughts in check.
Nicky sighed, not entirely convinced but said nothing further on the matter. There was no sense in causing an argument right now, she figured. Lorna didn't need to have another breakdown so soon after the earlier one. Instead, she settled for gently guiding the brunette over to the waiting area where she had caught sight of Franny, sitting cross-legged on a chair near the window. The pair made their way over to her and she helped Lorna to sit down right beside her older sister.
Hearing the commotion, Franny looked up to find the cause of it and quickly took notice of Lorna and Nicky. There were faded tear stains on her younger sister's face, she instantly observed, and immediately the pang in her chest only intensified. She acknowledged that that was her own doing; she was too harsh on Lorna, too rough with her words and she regretted her previous actions quite immensely.
Her hands rapidly reached over to the younger brunette and cupped delicately around her cheeks. She sighed, observing her face meticulously and seeing the very faint trepidation that tried to stay hidden. Of course there was fear, Lorna despised hospitals ever since their mother was found to have had the cancer. "You been cryin', haven't ya Lorn?" Franny brushed a thumb soothingly along the flesh of her sister's pale cheek and then pulled her in for a maternal embrace. Despite her sister's naivety and very clear denial, Franny would always be there to comfort and take care of her no matter how exhausted the girl made her.
"I'm good," Lorna bounced her shoulders up in a shrug but gladly returned the hug, letting her head instinctively rest against Franny's shoulder. She exhaled sharply, shutting her eyes for a quick moment. The sterile environment of the hospital gave her the creeps. Her hands rapidly grabbed at her older sister's shirt, almost in an involuntary manner. She didn't realize she'd done that until the sensation of cotton hit against her skin.
Tightening her hold on the small teen, Franny bit down on her lip. If she heard Lorna say she was good one more time…Just breathe, she interrupted herself with an easy command. Now wasn't the time or place to be stirring up an argument with the young girl, she pleaded with herself. And the fact that Lorna had spent time crying convinced her that arguing with her would do nothing but cause more distress for her, she breathed out. Lorna had enough going on right now, she didn't need to get on her case about the word good. Even though it was clear as day to Franny that her sister was the opposite of good.
Watching the two with attentive eyes, Nicky sat in the chair right beside her girlfriend. She shook her head at the comment Lorna made just seconds ago. Lorna was far from good, she knew. And it broke her heart that Lorna was so afraid to admit that fact, so clearly afraid to let herself fall apart. Afraid to admit that it was okay to fall apart sometimes. Nicky sighed sadly, turning slightly in her chair to face the other two. She placed a hand on Lorna's back and gave it a soft pat. "You're not good, kid," she whispered affectionately, letting her eyes peer her over with a sadness lurking in them.
The comment may have gone unheard by the smaller brunette but it certainly hadn't missed Franny's ears. She looked across at Nicky and gave her a sad smile in return. It was beyond obvious to her how much the redhead seemed to truly care for her younger sister—that realization alone was enough to melt Franny's heart. Lorna was the closest thing to her, after her little boy, and to know that she had someone like Nicky who clearly appeared to love her so fiercely, it made her feel a sense of peace. Lorna deserved that kind of love, she affirmed silently. Because, in spite of her shortcomings, Lorna loved with all of her heart and would—without a doubt in her mind—would love back with just as much intensity.
"I appreciate you," Franny mouthed silently to the redhead who sat on the other side of her sister.
Lorna finally lifted her head from Franny's shoulder and sat up straight in her seat. Her eyes wandered around their surroundings, faint sounds of beeping monitors were easily picked up by her rather sensitive ears and it immediately reminded her of all the times she spent at her mother's bedside. Those same beeping sounds were heard as she'd sit holding Mrs. Morello's hand, listening to her rattled breaths. It almost soothed her to hear the beeps as she sat there in the waiting room, now.
Her eyes found their way back to Franny and she nudged her gently, yet with a slight impatience as well. "Did ya see dad yet? Is he in pain?"
"I mean I found the room he's in and they appear to have him on some strong pain medicine," Franny muttered, rolling her eyes at the statement she shared.
In a twisted way, or maybe out of her crave for revenge, she would have rather they didn't give her father any medicine for whatever pain he may have been in. He deserved to feel that pain—after all the abuse he caused Lorna and herself, oh god did she want him to be tortured for that.
"Oh," Lorna deadpanned, letting her eyes peer down at the hands she sprawled out on her thighs. She secretly had hoped their father could feel some of the pain. Like the pain he inflicted on the two of them. She clasped her hands roughly together and bit the side of her mouth unhappily. A frown took up form on her face. It wasn't fair that Mr. Morello got medicine to take away his pain while she and Franny always had to suffer through the mental anguish his abuse had caused them.
She ominously jumped up from the chair she sat in and started briskly walking away from the waiting area, down the hall towards the wing of patient rooms. After making a quick pit stop at the nurses station for her father's room number, she continued on the path until she found the number above one of the doors and slowly made her way inside of it. The room was colder than the hallway and waiting room, she rapidly came to find out. Her body instinctively shivered as she shut the door behind her.
The bed with her father on it sat in the middle of the room. It was a one patient per room occupancy hospital and the room was rather nice, she noticed. And that only added to her anger. The anger she so desperately wanted to take out on the very man who lay sleeping on that damn hospital bed in front of her very eyes. She stood at the side of it, hovering over the railing and letting her eyes glare darkly down on Mr. Morello's sleeping form. There was no sign of any pain or discomfort on his face and that boiled her blood.
Why did he get to lay in that hospital comfortably while she and Nicky suffered mentally from his traumatizing behavior? It wasn't fair, she thought, it wasn't fair at all. She held her hands out, very slowly bringing them closer to his face. His neck looked enticing to wrap her hands around, squeeze it until he couldn't breathe anymore. She swallowed uncomfortably at the thought. What the hell was she thinking? What the fuck was she doing? Before her hands could reach around his neck like she so craved, she quickly retreated them and rested her arms at her sides. She couldn't kill another person, she reasoned with herself, even if she felt her dad deserved death. It wasn't going to be at her own hands. She shook her head and inhaled deeply.
Two eyes popped open and glanced up at her with confusion. Lorna looked back down, realizing her father was awake and gradually backed herself away from the bed. The confusion on his face swiftly morphed into rage as he yanked the oxygen from his mouth and then reached his hands up towards Lorna's neck, pulling on the flesh so tight that it made her fall onto the edge of the bed. He tried to grip onto it once more but she fought him off and then the door to the room creaked loudly open.
Nicky frisked her way in ahead of Franny and scooped Lorna up off the bed, carrying her back out of the open door. The sound of Mr. Morello's voice yelling out from his room boomed in her ears but it wasn't enough to halt her from running farther away. All that mattered to her, in that moment, was making sure she and her girlfriend were as far away from that man as humanly possible.
Left alone with her—who she now considered—demented father, Franny glared down at him as he lay there supposedly a fragile, sickly, man in the hospital bed. Mentally, she wanted to laugh at the thought of anyone ever looking at Mr. Morello and referring to him as fragile. For she knew he was completely opposite of fragile—a menacing, decrepit man just like his brother. She shook her head with a sigh, allowing her eyes to meticulously look over his entire body. How she longed for him to be in pain. That was the least he deserved after not only what he caused to take place the prior evening, but also for the years of abuse he bestowed upon both she and Lorna.
Rage boiled beneath her skin the longer she kept her gaze on him. Just being in the same room made the rate of her heart-beat increase drastically. It sickened her to stare at the man who spent a good portion of last night scaring two teenager girls with a damn gun. She felt tempted to strangle him right then and there. A deep breath taken in, she rationalized with herself that violence wouldn't solve anything. She couldn't afford to be carted off to jail for assaulting her father, not when she had a son to think about and an unstable younger sister who needed her.
"Why? Why did you think it was okay to chase Lorna and her girlfriend with a gun? What the hell's wrong with ya? I'm not letting Lorna stay with ya, anymore, I hope you know that. I mean not like you'll be able to do anything to stop that from happening, anyway, since you'll be in prison after they discharge ya," Franny gritted her teeth together to keep her voice from yelling like she had so heavily yearned to do. Her eyes, however, had no problem staring daggers down at the very man who inflicted such a rage inside of her.
The words she spewed out were fervently disregarded by Mr. Morello. He turned slightly on his side and reached his hand over to grab hold of the medicinal pain pump that was connected to a pole on the left of his bed. Using his thumb, he pressed it hard against the button which gradually released a dose of the morphine he'd been prescribed for his abdominal pain.
Franny observed the entire thing and that only added to her fury. It didn't sit well with her that her abusive, drunken, asshat of a father was laying comfortably in a hospital bed with easy access to pain medicine so that he could get relief while Lorna never seemed to get any relief for her mental pain. That simple fact brought the urge to strangle him back even stronger. She closed her eyes and inhaled a sharp breath. Strangling him wouldn't do anything of benefit, she reminded herself.
"Ya already answered your own question, dumbass. Lorna wants to have a girlfriend and be a dyke? Not in my house. I refuse to be the father of a little dyke girl," Mr. Morello retorted once he felt the effects of the pain pump start to kick in. Despite his eyes appearing bloodshot, he glared right back at his eldest child with a venom so intense it could easily kill a fly.
"Lorna is not a fucking dyke, first of all. She has a girlfriend who clearly loves and cares about her more than you could ever be capable of and you're our father. A piece of shit father at that," the brunette woman began, placing a hand over her temple to massage at the already forming headache. "And the fact that you would try to shoot her and her girlfriend because they're girlfriends further shows what a piece of shit you are. Don't worry, dad, you won't have to worry about Lorna being in your house period. She's moving in with me."
Eyes widened in a rage, Mr. Morello bolted up in the bed faster than a squirrel crossing the street to escape human contact. He shook his head rather violently while staring darkly up into his daughter's blue eyes. If she thought he was going to allow her to take Lorna from his house, she was dead wrong. Oh, no, he thought, there was absolutely no way he'd allow anything of the sort. Lorna didn't need to live with some dyke-enabling sister of hers, he silently affirmed.
"Over my dead body will I ever let that happen. You're not fit to take care of your sister, you're insane to even think that. Lorna ain't living under the roof of anyone who would fucking coddle her and enable her to be in a relationship with another little girl. That's fucking sick, Francine."
Franny balled her hands into fists, holding them unnervingly against her sides. More than tempted to swing them right into that man's throat. Anger steadily rose with each word that spit out of his gruesome mouth. "Sick? Ya wanna talk about sick? The only fucking sick thing here is you. You're fucking sick, dad, in the head. You could have killed your own daughter yesterday, ya know that? You coulda killed her girlfriend too. And ya know what? I'm more fit to look after Lorna than you are, that's for damn sure. She's clearly suffering with some kinda mental thing—and no, I'm not talking about her being in relationship with a girl so don't twist my words—and you haven't done shit to help her. I don't care what you say, I am not allowing you to have Lorna at home with you. You're just making everything so much worse for her and I can't let it go on anymore. Because one day you might actually kill her and I couldn't fucking live with myself if that happened. So fuck you."
Sat in the car, Franny turned her head to focus her eyes behind her on the two teens who hadn't said much since they had all gotten in the vehicle only moments earlier. A sigh expelled from her lungs. The whole ordeal continued to increase the exhaustion that she'd felt. She reached her hands up to place over each of her temples, a nervous habit she hoped would calm her flaring nerves. The only positive thing that came out of all of what happened was that she finally was able to get Lorna the hell away from their father.
"We're gonna stop at dad's house so ya can pick up some a your stuff, okay Lorn?" She questioned with a furrowed eyebrow.
The younger brunette gave a small nod; her arms wrapped warmly around her girlfriend's shoulders. It hadn't taken her long to realize just how distressed the entire situation made Nicky feel. The pang in her chest increased sufficiently to observe such a fact. A fact that she wished didn't have to be one in the first place. She exhaled slowly and peered up at her sister with an unreadable expression on her face. To hear her sister's suggestion instantly brought a small sense of relief. The only good thing that seemed to come of everything.
"Are ya sayin' I'm getting my stuff so I can move in with ya?" The thought alone comforted her immensely. Living in a place where she hadn't needed to constantly worry whether she was going to do something to piss Mr. Morello off enough to result in physical harm sounded merely too good to be true. It'd been too long since she remembered a day without any of his drunken rages. But she longed for those days before it started.
Franny easily noted the sheer surprise in the younger girl's tone and it both broke her heart and filled her with a warmth. She loathed that Lorna had spent the majority of the past few years in such a great fear of being in their own home. That she had to fear for her life living under the same roof as their own father. Oh, did, that cause such an uproar of anger within her. No child deserved that kind of existence, she thought. With a sigh, she tussled the swirling thoughts aside and focused on the present.
Eyes peered directly behind her into Lorna's, she fixed a smile on her face and nodded her head intuitively. "Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. Ya think I'm letting ya go back to dad's house after the stunt he pulled yesterday? Hell no. I don't trust him anymore. I shoulda done something sooner, Lorn, really. This whole thing coulda been prevented," she pointed out, turning slightly to peer straight ahead through the windshield. She felt sick with herself for not stepping in earlier; a lump sat in the back of her throat to think that this all could have been prevented had she listened to her instincts sooner.
"It's not your fault, Fran," Lorna muttered, a frown melding onto her face as she looked across the seats in front at the back of Franny's head. She tightened her arm around Nicky's shoulder and felt the pain in her chest slightly increase. It was blatant to her that both of the two people she cared so intensely for were hurting quite a considerable amount now, and she wanted nothing more than to take it all away from them. Neither of them deserved that pain.
Aware, now, that Franny appeared to be blaming herself for what happened—it only made Lorna's guilt stronger. She reached a free hand in front of her to place on the seat where the older brunette was sitting. "You didn't do nothin' wrong, Fran. I don't blame ya for what happened yesterday—I mean, I didn't even know dad had any guns. He's a lot scarier than I thought. I-I just wish he was normal again."
Having sat silently for the past several minutes, Nicky finally found it in her to voice her concerns once more. One hand she carefully reached over to cover lovingly atop her girlfriend's while lifting her head just adequately so that her eyes were able to gaze right into Franny's. The comment that was shared made her wonder exactly how long Lorna had been dealing with that kind of terrifying abuse. She bit down on her lip to control the boiling anger. There had to be a reasonable explanation as to why Franny wouldn't have done anything before now, she tried to assure herself.
"So, uh, this kinda thing has been going on for a while?" Nicky inquired, looking between the two brunettes with an expectant mien on her face.
Receiving two nods in response to her question, she nodded as well and bit down harder on her lip. It enraged her to hear that Lorna had been dealing with that for an undisclosed length of time and she had no awareness of any of it. And that Franny did have awareness of what was happening but obviously did nothing to stop it. She swallowed a distasteful amount of saliva, shaking her head in an anger. "How come you didn't call the police, Franny? Or have Lorna move in with you earlier? I just—I don't fucking understand how you could know she was being hurt by your own damn piece of shit father and not do a damn thing about it."
"Nicky, please don't blame Franny. I-I know it doesn't look good but-but she—"
"No, Lorna, your girlfriend is right to say that," the older brunette quickly interjected. "I shoulda done something a lot sooner than now to help you. I was a coward for not calling the police or letting dad threaten with his meaningless words. But I let that happen anyway and I'm so sorry I failed ya, hon."
Lorna quickly picked up on the sniffling that mixed in with her sister's voice. The frown on her face grew dramatically. She focused her eyes down on the floor for a moment, trying to comprehend the current predicament they were all in. Nothing made sense to her anymore. It couldn't be her sister's fault. No, if anything, she told herself, it was all her own fault. Maybe if she'd been a better daughter—helped around the house more, listened more—none of the abuse would have happened to begin with.
Averting her eyes towards Nicky, she observed the oozing panic from her eyes and that only caused more apprehension to wash over her. She wanted to take the uneasiness away from both of them. But she couldn't. She couldn't even control her own emotions and pain, anymore, it seemed like. The world hardly appeared comprehendible to her now. She brought both hands up to her face and rubbed them viciously over both eyes.
"No, no. No, dad kept—he kept saying if ya did anything that no one would believe you anyway, Franny. You—you did try to help but there wasn't anything you could do, it would just make a whole custody court thing and that would just be a waste of time. They'd just say I should stay with dad anyway because he's our dad. Why waste our time?"
Lorna sighed, turning to fix her eyes on Nicky. She placed a tender hand on her cheek, softly turning it so that their faces were pointed in the same direction. "Nicky, I'm sorry that you're mad at Franny because of me and my dad. But-but Franny, she's a real good sista. Please don't hate her or blame her for what happened. She did really try, but dad wasn't nice to her either and-and she has a little boy to worry about—"
Taking Lorna's face in her hands, the redhead exhaled deeply and brushed her fingers delicately along the flesh of her cheeks. The anger instantly disintegrated as she took in the clear pain that emanated from her girlfriend's brown eyes. It brought a pang to her chest to observe how frantic and bothered Lorna was. "You have nothing to apologize for, kid. You didn't do anything wrong," she sternly assured her first and foremost, leaning closer to press a loving kiss against her forehead.
"I'm not mad at Franny, I just—I'm mad that she was aware of the abuse and I wasn't because she could have done something to stop it. If I would have known before now, I would have fucking done something immediately. I don't hate her, I just don't understand. None a this makes sense to me, kid."
Nicky's eyes peered back up and across at Franny. Eyebrows curved uneasily over her eyes. "How, how could you know that Lorna was being hurt by your own father and not do something to help? I don't want to be mad at you but I don't understand how you could just let her keep going back to a home where you knew she was being abused."
The older brunette nodded understandably. She couldn't blame Nicky's questioning or anger one bit. Because she was angry with herself as well for not doing anything more to help her sister. The whole gun incident the night before could have easily been prevented had she talked to the police earlier about their father's abuse. She swallowed uncomfortably. There was no answer she could ever give that would excuse her actions, she realized. No answer that would be good enough for Nicky she presumed.
"No, you have every right to be mad at me. You're right that I could have done something more to help her and I didn't. I don't have an answer for you that will ever excuse why I didn't do more. I tried to convince our father to just let her move in with me but he wouldn't listen, he just kept saying that she was underage and until she was an adult, she was his responsibility. And would make sure I knew there was nothing I could do to change that."
"But why didn't ya at least tell the police? I don't get it. Why would you just let the abuse continue instead of getting help?"
Lorna couldn't watch the interrogation any longer and threw her hands impatiently up in the air, waving them fiercely in her girlfriend's eyes to stop her from continuing. "Nicky, please stop. I know you're just upset because ya care but dad abused Franny too before she moved out. And he would scare her from saying anything, so, it's not like she just sat at her home in peace. Let's just not talk about this anymore, okay? I—I don't want either of you to be upset, I love ya both so much and I don't like to see either of ya in pain because of me."
With a sigh, Nicky slowly nodded and instinctively wrapped her arms around the smaller teen's waist. It hurt tremendously to know all that her girlfriend had been through and to not have been there to protect her from any of it. She rested her head atop Lorna's, turning slightly so that her eyes were gazing out the window. There was nothing more she yearned for, in that moment, than for all of her girlfriend's pain to dissipate away. She wished so desperately that she would have been aware of the abuse sooner so that she could have helped them. Maybe the events of the night before would have never even happened if she'd known how evil of a man Mr. Morello was earlier. A sigh tumbled up from her throat as she tightened her arms around Lorna's waist. At least, now, something was being done about it. She knew she couldn't keep focusing on what could have been. The past couldn't be changed but the future certainly could.
