1
Chapter one
“Well, let’s see…How about starting with what you did today?” he suggested, but still staring at me with a worried look. “Perfect idea!” I said with heavy sarcasm. " First, I was woke by my four year old brother jumping on my bed," I pictured Blake’s long, dirty blonde hair bouncing up and down while the springs were squeaking every 3 seconds, and he was shouting Katie, get up, “Then I went to go hop in the shower and when I turned on the water, expecting it to be fairly warm, the cold water rushing down my back, as I released a scream. Just then, I had figured out that my mom had used all the hot water to take her shower this morning. But, hold on, it gets better. After, I got ready and went downstairs, I found my dog, sprawled out on our carpet floor, dead.” I could feel the tears forming again. He looked at me, and I could tell he wanted to cry too. Charlie was the only dog Derek didn’t hate, and I think he was growing to like him. He was a chocolate brown lab. “I’m sorry.” He took one step, and embraced me. He brushed my straightened light brown, shoulder-length hair with his hand while we just stood there. I wish I could have just stood there forever, because I actually felt happy. Not because my dog just died, or I was having a crappy day, but because my best friend in the whole world is comforting me with one of his famous hugs.“Maybe we should go inside,” Derek suggested, “considering the fact that people are actually stopping and staring now.”
2
“Yeah,” I agreed. We walked up to my house on the corner. It was yellow, and it had two stories. I skipped up three steps and took a step back as I was finding the key. I found it on the bottom of my camera case.
“Here, let me get that,” he said, while removing the key from my hand.
“Thanks,” I spoke as if I were dead along with my dog.
“You’re welcome,” he said, while holding the blue door open for me. Just as any, raised up to be, gentlemen would act.
As we walked in, I had noticed that something was different. Where’s the mess? Or the thing that always makes the mess, my brother? Or how about the loving person that always has to put up with clean the disasters, my mom, Kara? The house was empty. What were they up to? Where did they go? All of these questions were asked in my head, none of them were answered.
I searched several rooms before I noticed the yellow sticky note on the counter. It said:
“At the hospital, something has happened to Dad.
Love you,
Mom.”
I still had no idea how my mom could have wrote that neat in this kind of situation. I’m probably not freaking out right now because my brain hasn’t really accepted that information yet. Yeah, I know I read the note, but I’ve already had enough today. I’m in the shock stage. But I guess it will get to me later, just like this morning.
Just then, Derek found me.
“Did you find them?” he asked, suspiciously.
“Kind of.”
“Kind of? What does that mean?
3
“It means, I know where they are, but not exactly,” I tried explaining to him.
“Well…Where are they then?” He starred at me with his blue eyes as if I were crazy.
“At the hospital, something has happened to my dad.” As I said this, his face also turned to shock, but then quickly turned to pain..
“Do you know what happened to him?” he asked, lifelessly.
“No,” I mimicked his emotion. He started coming back to life. Which, I guess is a good thing, but then comes the jittery panic.
“Should we go to the hospital then?” he questioned, anxiously.
“I guess.” I still haven’t gotten over the shock stage. He grabbed the keys, and we were off.
4
Chapter 2
We rode in the silver minivan in silence. I guess he understood that I didn’t feel like talking right now.
We arrived at the hospital 15 minutes later. I ran to the front building and waited til an available opening in the revolving door made it’s way to me. I was getting impatient as people were stealing the possible spots I was going for. Finally, one came and I was in. I sprinted to the main desk, nearly tripping over my Converse shoes on the way. Then I asked the receptionist lady where Mr. Sleck was. She said that he was 5 doors down on the right, and that they were expecting me. I followed her instructions and ended up in a white room with one three-seated tan couch. I saw my dad lying there with a bunch of tubes and IVs attached to him. The only thing I could do, was cry. I didn’t know I had anymore tears left after this morning, but I guess I was wrong. I went over and hugged him while the tears ran down my cheeks.
We were in that position for awhile until I finally asked him,
“Are you alright? What happened?” The questions were the ones I’ve been asking in my head all day. Now, hopefully, they’re finally getting answered.
I untangled my arms from his and leaned back so I could see his face. I noticed something that I hadn’t noticed before, there was a cast on his leg sticking out from beneath the blue hospital blanket. And, there was a cut over his right eye that looked fairly deep.
“The stupid Metropolitan area, that’s what happened,” he said with disgust.
“What was it this time?” I asked as I glanced around and saw my mom, lightly snoring on the couch. How long as she been there? Just above the couch there was a black picture frame hanging. In it, was a picture of a boy playing with a dog. That’s ironic.
5
“Well, I was on my lunch break, just cruising along on the city roads, and this idiotic driver pulled out right in front of me, blowing the big, red stop sign, as if he was oblivious to it,” he sighed, he was already used to that, “and, I tried to avoid the accident by swerving to the right a little, but, since I’m accident-prone, there just happened to be a street light pole in my way. So, smack! I went straight forward into the pole. But, that’s not the end of it. The car behind my was ignorant of what just happened and he tail ended me. So, the front and the back of my car are both completely dented, while I was smashed in the middle.”
“I’m so sorry dad, but you didn’t answer the most important question I asked, are you alright?
“Well, as you can see,” he wiggled his free toes, “I broke my leg and I have some minor cuts on my head, and arms. But, other than that, I’m ok.”
“That’s a relief, I thought I was driving here to see my dead father.” We both laughed and I gave him another short hug and a kiss on the cheek.
“I love you, Dad. And I’m glad you’re ok.”
“I love you too, Katie,” Derek walked in. I suspected that he overheard and wanted to give us some privacy, but I didn’t mention anything.
“Hello, Mr. Sleck,” Derek greeted.
“Hi, Derek,” my dad responded.
“How are you feeling?”
“I’m feeling just fine,” said Tom Sleck. He scratched his head, that’s covered in short, brown hairs.
“That’s good.”
Their conversation ended, so I decided to go take a walk around, and maybe take some pictures along the way with my black digital camera.
6
I actually took some decent pictures of paintings on my adventure through the hallways. I’ll upload them and get a closer view of the paintings later. I start walking back to the hospital room, number 27.
I guess my mom woke up because I could hear her having a conversation with my dad. It sort of sounds…serious? Weird. I catch a glimpse of what they were saying before I snuck up on them…
“Are you sure?” my mom questioned.
“Yes, I’m sure. I just can’t believe it hasn’t happened yet. I mean…” my dad was about to finish the sentence but I walked in, interrupting him. As soon as I took a step in, the room was silenced. I could tell that he wasn’t going to finish the sentence he started, with myself in the room.
My mom glanced over at me and smiled.
“Hi, sweetie. I’m guessing you found my sticky note then?”
“Hi, mom. And yes, I did find it. After frantically searching the house for you. Could you at least put it on the door next time you decide to leave?” She had an angry smirk on her face. You know, the one that says, ‘who do you think you’re talking to?’ So, I decided to add the word, ‘please’ after it, hoping to soften her up. I also gave her a warm smile along with it.
She sighed. “Fine. I’ll remember that next time. But hopefully, there won’t be a next time,” she said in a ‘tired of this crap’ voice. But, frankly, I don’t know why she said it like that. Because, this exact thing hasn’t happened before. I mean, we’ve seen it on the news a ton of times, and Dad gets a few scratches on his car from people who don’t respect other peoples’ property. But, she sounded as if she was directing it to Dad. She’s confusing.
7
They told my mom that he would have to stay there for one more day, or, until they get the x-rays back to predict what the estimate time it’s going to take to heal and for him to get back on track. So, my mom and I gathered up our things, and said our byes to Dad. Then, we left, along with Derek. Who says he was checking out the vending machines the whole time. He’s such a liar. Oh, well. Gotta live with him. I’ll ask him later about it though.
8
Chapter 3
I went straight to bed after arriving home giving a ‘goodbye’ hug to Derek. I didn’t want to deal with anymore crap.
When I woke up, I felt awful. I had a seriously major headache and the worst cramps in the history of.. well.. everything EVIL! That was weird though, because, I’m not getting me period until another 2 weeks. Something’s wrong. I went downstairs to go get some Ibuprofen so it would maybe take away some of the pain. Usually, in normal circumstances that kind of medicine doesn’t work on me. But, this wasn’t a normal circumstance because of how much my body ached, so I was hoping that maybe it would work.
My mom came downstairs, being her usual, honest self, and gave me a suspicious look.
She said, “You look like crap.”
“I feel like crap,” I responded. But it weirdly came out as a whisper. Was I losing my voice to? Great, just great.
“Woah! Ummm, honey, are you okay?” My mom asked, with a much worried look.
“I already said I felt like crap!” I basically shouted, well, that’s what I wanted it to come out as, but, it only came out as just above a whisper. I was surprised at my instant wave of anger. She looked gloomed.
“Ohh, um, sorry Mom. I don’t know what came over me.”
She sighed and I swear I heard her say, ‘I do’, but, that was probably just me hallucinating. What kind of sickness do I have? Jeesh. Cramps, headache, voice lose, and …hallucinations? What the frick?
“Why don’t you take a little nap or something? I bet it would make you feel a lot better.” My mom suggested, well, I don’t think I had an option, so, it was basically an order.
“Ok, maybe it will help.” I yawned.
9
I reluctantly went upstairs and plopped down on my black, silky comforter. Tucked my self into them in what my parents would call, a ‘taco wrap’. When I was little, my mom used to tuck me into my covers by pulling both sides over my body and calling it a taco wrap. I turned to my side and headed off to dreamland, where magical fairies played and unicorns pranced. Hah, no. In my dreams, I’m probably flirting with some random guy from the streets in a dark alley. Yup, that’s what I call a good dream. What I call a bad dream is when Barney is chasing after with a machine gun, wanting to touch my private parts so that he could feel like he has a life. I shook. Just thinking about it gives me the hebee-jebees!
But, this dream was different. It was so real, that, I didn’t even know it was a dream until I saw that I was on a cloud with two golden gates in front of me. Great, I’m dead. Way-to-go, Katie. Just what you need for your family. Another person for them to worry about. Well, at least I don’t have to deal with pain anymore. Wow, I’m being pretty selfish. I started walking towards the door, when it automatically opened for me, and a bright light blinded me for a couple of seconds. When I could finally see, without all of those blue and red blotchy things in the way, I opened me eyes.
10
