CHAPTER 12
Wordy stared down from the skyline of the hospital to be a secondary back up in case an explosive entry was required by Team One to protect the hostages inside the clinic from Penny Westler.
With Spike's assistance, Wordy begins to set up the camera pole to gain better visibility inside the room, and in doing so the old thinning foundation of the clinic's roof top slowly caves in unexpectedly.
He suddenly crashes down into the room falling 7 to 8 feet unassisted by a safety line. His accidental entry startles Penny into firing multiple rounds hitting Wordy in the leg.
"Officer down, Officer down" Sam yelled out, "We need paramedics in here!"
"What's going on guys?" Greg asked wanting the details of which of his officer's are down.
"It's Wordy, Boss" Spike replied. "Portion of the skyline caved in, looks like his been hit in the leg"
"Boss, I have the solution" Ed Lane whispered as he continued to focus his weapon on Penny.
"Copy Ed. Your call, your call" Greg responded. "Jules, you need to contain this."
Before Jules could answer, Penny begins to hallucinate mistaking Wordy who was laying on the floor holding onto his left leg for Gerald. She points the gun at his head in tears.
"Why Gerald? Why" she screamed in emotional turmoil as Wordy stared at the barrel of the gun being pointed at him at close range.
"Without you no life". She continued to say.
"Penny, you need to look at me" Jules said. "The man in front of you, his name is Constable Kevin Wordsworth."
"Penny, Gerald is not here. He was killed remember so that you could be free? She asserted.
"Are you telling me I'm crazy" Penny lashed out.
Jules nodded in disagreement. "No Penny, I would never call you crazy."
"But I think you're hurting and things are really confusing for you right now. Please, let me help you Penny." She continued to say sympathetically.
Penny looked down at Wordy, as he looked back into her eyes to help further identify with her.
"My name is Kevin Wordsworth, and I'm a husband and father to 3 young girls" he said in an attempt to connect with her and to help reassure her that he was not Gerald Duglin.
She slowly puts the gun down as Jules puts herself between her and Wordy. She motions Spike who is now also in the room to help Sam pull Wordy out to safety as she continues to talk to a distraught Penny.
"Good job, Jules" she hears Greg voice saying through her ear wig. "Keep getting her to yellow".
For several hours with Sam and Ed's weapons drawn and aimed at Penny, Jules continues negotiations attempting to get the gun from Penny who continued to threaten to use it on herself. Jules knew she had a connection with the young girl and even more so now as she listened to Greg and Lew interviewing Penny's parents and getting the details of what the last several months had been like for her.
"Mr. and Mrs. Westler, I need you to tell us everything that has been going on the last couple of months. We need to help your daughter choose to come out" Greg communicated to Penny's parents.
"We thought sending her to a normal school like the therapist advised us would help ease her back into society. And everything looked fine, until we caught Penny cutting herself and hiding food. We couldn't get her to eat or stop cutting….we had not choice but to take her here. We lost her once already, we can't lose her again."
"You're parents are telling me how difficult it's been for you." She told her. "High school can be really tough."
"My parents' don't know me and neither to those kids at school" Penny answered her back. "I'm tired of being forced to be happy, when I'm not."
"All I want is for those eight years with Gerald to disappear." She cried out. "But how do I tell my parents that I also miss him. I loved him"
"I feel like everyone is looking at me like I'm dirty. I am and I'm so ashamed. Do you know how much I hate myself? She continued to cry out.
"We thought she was okay. We want to know what happened and we want her to talk about it with us. But we didn't want to push her if she wasn't ready. We do care. We just want our little girl back."
"I know it feels like that Penny" Jules cautiously moved closer to her. "But you're parents they didn't know what to do either. All they want is for you to be happy."
"So when you cut yourself or binge and purge does it feel like your free? The pain you inflict, if you triumph over it, it feels so freeing and powerful doesn't it" Jules asked bluntly knowing if she hadn't caught the attention of her teammates before she definitely did now.
Penny looked at her in silence.
"As if for once you were in control and invincible" she proceeded moving even more close to Penny.
In bewilderment Penny replies back to her, "Yeah, that's exactly how it feels."
"I can't compare or even know what it feels like to have gone through what you have gone through" she said as she reached her hand to get Penny to place the gun in her hands.
"But I can tell you about a little girl, who lost her mom. And how all she wanted was for everyone to believe she was going to be okay and not affected by it. So she pretended she was, and grows up not realizing it's okay to be sad and that it is okay to make mistakes and for people to be upset with you. It's okay not to be perfect." She glanced over at Ed while still managing to keep an eye on Penny.
"It won't be easy Penny. But this place, it saved me from myself. I realized Penny that who I am it has to be enough for me and for everyone else around me. I thought that if I let my teammates know I was scared or sad, that they wouldn't like me anymore or think I was weak. So I would never tell them and pretend to be okay. Just like I did for my dad and my brothers" Jules sighed getting teary eyed herself.
"My boyfriend thinks I wanted to give him up over the SRU team. But the truth was, I didn't want to risk him not loving me or liking me anymore if I wasn't an SRU sniper and I was just a regular girl or on a different team." She said as she caught Sam's gaze.
There was dead silence within the team as they continued to listen to Jules looking as they looked at each other with a bit of shame for not realizing what was really going on with her.
"You're not crazy Penny. And you're going to grow up and become a remarkable woman." Jules added looking Penny in the eye.
"You just need help getting taught how to manage those feeling inside. Instead of handling things like you're still 8 years old trying to survive life with your kidnapper?" She is now an inch away from Penny and takes the gun from her.
Penny breaks down and started hugging Jules as she continues to whisper in her ear. "I'm not going to let you down or leave you once this is all over. I'm going to be here I promise". She continued to say as she hugged Penny back and notices the look of relief on her teammates faces.
"That's a really good job Jules" Greg whisper's in a fatherly tone.
*******HOURS LATER, SRU WOMAN'S LOCKER ROOM******
She hears a familiar knock on the locker room door as proceeded to organize her locker.
"Decent" she yells out as she see's Sam standing next to her.
"You did great today!" he smiled at her "Welcome back!"
"Thanks" she smiled back at him as she notices that she had yet to find out what was in the other 2 lockers Sam had locked up for her.
"So am I ever going to find out what else is in these two lockers that I can cross of my to do list?" she asked him playfully.
"Are you ever going to tell me what your #1 is?" he replied back challenging her.
They sit on the locker room bench together as she takes his hand and looks at him.
"My #1 is to get married and have something as amazing as what my parents had." She gazed into his eyes.
"That's what I figured" he grinned. " So let's open the lockers".
To Jules' surprise locker#3 contained several cans of paint thinner, santarini blue paint, and more dry wall mix.
"I know that was on your to do list for renovations and not exactly your life plan" Sam chuckled.
"Thanks, smart ass" Jules replied elbowing him.
When she opened locker number one it contained a sign that had in big letters which read:
"TURN AROUND AND SAY YES"
As she turned around, there before her was Sam on his knees with the most beautiful ring she had ever seen.
TBC - BY THE FINAL CHAPTER OF THIS STORY
THANKS TO IHEARTFLASHPOINT FOR EDITING. I FORGIVE YOU NOW FOR KILLING JULES AND HAVING SAM HURT HIMSELF. REALLY I FORGIVE YOU. (HEE HEE HEE)
PLEASE REVIEW EVERYONE!!!! THANKS FOR READING AS ALWAYS!!!