Chapter 12.

"Jill! Jill, wait up for me!"

"Come on Kris, run faster!"

"My legs don't go any faster! Wait-oh!"

Seven-year old Jill turned around when she heard her five-year old sister break down in tears. She was laying on her stomach, and as she rose, Jill saw that Kris had sand in her entire face, eyes, mouth and nose.

"Kris, don't cry, it's just sand!" Jill said, hurrying forward to her sister, gently brushing off her face.

"I swallowed it." Kris sobbed, brushing off her hands towards her legs.

"Kris, you have to toughen up."

"But Jill, I will never be as tough as you are."

"Come on kiddo, of course you will. Now hurry up, we're going to miss it!"

Kris smiled, brushed off the last of the sand and began running after her bigger sister again. Just as they got up to the road, the ice cream truck pulled up.

"Hey girls. Do you want the usual?" The Iceman as Jill and Kris called him asked the girls.

They nodded smilingly and he gave them to big vanilla ice creams- Jill's in a cone and Kris' in a cup, and Jill handed him his money. They then walked slowly back to the house, where their parents were sitting on the porch. Kris put the ice cream on the table and climbed up into their fathers lap, as Jill jumped up into their mother's.

"Is it good?" The girls father asked them, leaning over Kris' shoulder. Kris smiled and nodded, and shoved the spoon towards his mouth, and he took it smilingly.

"Yummy!"


Kris woke up when someone squeezed her hand. She lifted her head from the bed, and met her sister's eyes.

"What were you dreaming?" Jill asked.

"I dreamt that you and I were buying ice cream from the Iceman." Kris smiled and yawned.

Jill smiled quietly, looking at her sister.

"What are you thinking of?" Kris asked.

"How did you grow up so fast?"

"I don't know. It feels like yesterday when we were small kids playing on the beach."

"I miss that time. It was nice."

"It was."

Jill smiled and looked around in the room, noticing them being alone.

"Where are the others?"

"Cafeteria. Ella was hungry, and I told the others to follow her. I have filled in your release papers and gotten your medicine so you're good to go."

"Medicine?"

"Painkilling and cortisone."

"Cortisone?"

Kris suddenly remembered that Jill had been sleeping when the doctor was in the room."

"Yeah, the CT showed some swelling around the brain, but it will pass within a week or two. The doctor prescribed some cortisone to bring the swelling down."

"Oh, okay. So, I'm free to leave?"

"Yeah. The entire team is in John's room, so if you want to I can take you there."

Jill nodded. "I'd like that."

"We haven't had time to get you any new clothes, but Kelly brought some from her luggage, you two have pretty much the same size."

"Great."

Kris helped Jill to get changed, and after arguing, Jill sat down in the wheelchair. Kris took the rest of the things and pushed Jill over to John's room. Andrea and Justin were sitting on John's right side, Jess and Mike on his left, Jess resting her foot - that had been placed in a cast - in Mike's lap, they all looked up and happily greeted her as they came in.

"Where's Anna?" Jill asked as the gang rose and gave her hugs.

"Her fiancé came about half an hour ago and brought her home. She told us to give you her love."

Jill smiled and looked over at John. He was sitting up in the bed, resting against the pillows, his eyes half closed. Jill rose from the wheelchair to the sound of Kris' protests, and walked up to the bed. He opened his eyes as she put a hand on his leg.

"Hey, Johnny, how are you doing?"

He slowly opened his eyes more and gave Jill a hardly noticeable smile.

"I'll… be all right…"

"Of course you will." Jill said, sitting down in a chair next to Mike.

"Jill, I'll go down to the cafeteria, you guys maybe want to be alone for a while. I'll be back in a while."Jill smiled to her sister.

"Thanks Kris."Kris smiled and left the room.

"You feeling okay Jill?" Mike asked, putting his hand on Jill's shoulder.

"Yeah, just dizzy." Jill said and gave Mike a smile before turning towards Jess.

"Kris said it was broken?" Jill said, nodding towards Jess foot.

"Yeah, but luckily it's nothing complicated. No surgery or lasting problems."

"That's good." Jill smiled. "How did you hurt it anyway? Well, I guess during the crash, but weren't you sitting down?"

"It was fine until I raised, I fell over Andreas purse that had fallen out, and I just twisted it bad. So ridiculous." Jess said, and her face got red with embarrassment.

"How did Anna hurt her ribs?""She was standing up when the plane began to tilt, and she hit her ribcage into a shelf."

Jill winced and nodded, in the same time as the doctor and a nurse came in to look over John's vitals.

"Good to see you up and awake Ms Munroe." The doctor smiled as the nurse looked John over.

"It's nice to be up."

"When do you think he'll be released?" Andrea asked, with her hand on John's.

"It will be a few days, but the fever has gone down a lot since he was brought in."

"When are you guys going home by the way?" Mike asked, looking from Andrea, to Mike and then to Jill.

"I'm going to wait for John, definitely. I talked to his wife the other day, she's on her way here with their kids." Andrea asked.

"I promised my wife to go home with the plane that leaves in the morning, she can't fly since she's in the third trimester." Justin said, smiling as he thought of his wife and the baby she was carrying.

"My friends said something about that plane too." Jill nodded.

"I'm sorry to ease drop, but Ms Munroe, there's no way you can go on an airplane by tomorrow. I spoke to Mr. Townsend, and I told him, so I though he'd passed the information on. If you would go on an airplane now, the increased pressure in the airplane, particularly on take-off and landing, could exacerbate the bleeding, and also increase the cerebral edema that you all ready have, and could cause a seizure, or maybe coma, which would be resulting in possible brain damage."

"Cerebral what?" Jess asked.

"Cerebral edema. Swelling in the brain."

"So… I guess no flying for my sake?"

"I would not recommend flying until maybe two weeks."

Jill nodded.

"Okay then. Then I'm not going home yet."

"See it as a chance to see the island." Andrea smiled.

"Well, I have always wanted to go here and discover the world."

"And now's your chance."