Forgetting Billions | ✓

17 | Forgetting Hospitals

"HOW LONG has she been down?" a man whispered while a woman sniffled loudly as if to call attention to her grief.

"Three days."

Another man sighed and Jasmine felt her bed creak as he sat down beside her. Almost as a habit, the man ran his fingers through her hair.

"What did this to her?" the man sitting beside her asked. The woman across the room shrugged and no one said anything after that.

After a few seconds of tense silence, the man across the room spoke again. "Did they say when she'd wake up?"

The man on her bed shook his head. "I hope you wake up soon, Jas," he whispered, brushing his lips against her forehead. The bed creaked as he stood and turned to the two others in the room. "I'll stay with her tonight."

"First of all, you're the only one who has stayed with her. I'm her best friend, Shayan. I deserve to be with her." Selena urged, sniffling again.

"That's not going to happen. The only people allowed to be with Jasmine are her parents, Bianca, or me," Shayan replied, his trademark scowl cutting across his face.

Evan's footsteps neared Jasmine's bed, his voice low and dangerous. "You arrived in Mayfair Hills a few months ago, Shayan. I wouldn't push your luck."

"I don't want to push her luck. It's a miracle she survived and I don't want you two jeopardizing it." He lowered himself on the bed, Jasmine's head resting in the crook of his neck.

"Leave it, Evan. If he wants to demonize us, then so be it. We can't change his mind," Selena scoffed. "Let's go."

Jasmine's two best friends left the room and she willed herself to open her eyes if only to ask them to come back, but she didn't have the energy.

Shayan sighed and turned back to her. "You've scared me too much, Jas. I can handle that, though, if you open your eyes again. That's all I need– to wake up and scare me again."

Jasmine wanted to smile, to pull his face closer to his and kiss him with all her might. She wanted him to squeeze her hand and distract her with the tales of his life, but his plea was the last she heard before her brain turned off again, sending her into another dreamless slumber.

⇣⇣⇣

JASMINE LOOKED around the room and its dreary white walls, resisting the urge to rub her eyes. Shayan was curled up in the corner chair, sleeping for what seemed to be the first time in days. Beside him were her parents, playing cards in silence while they waited for their daughter to wake up. Her gaze went back to Shayan and the bags under his eyes, his curly hair mussed into a heap on his head. He seemed to have forgotten to live as he waited for her to wake up and her heart melted at mere the sight of him.

Jasmine cleared her throat, ignoring how it sounded like the croak of a bullfrog battling the flu. Her mother dropped her cards at the sound and jumped to her feet.

"Jasmine!" Aishwarya exclaimed, her hand hovering above her daughter's head before smoothing back her hair. "You're awake," she whispered as if she couldn't quite believe it.

Her father came into Jasmine's vision and his face was puffy, a telltale sign that he had been crying. He kissed her cheek. "I'm so happy you're awake, Jazzy Pants."

Years had passed since he called her by her dreaded childhood nickname. She smiled when she say heard her Uncle Rahul's voice etched in each syllable of the endearment, thankful to have his memory when she needed it the most.

Despite her renewed energy, she still couldn't say much more and her mother noticed, telling her father to call the doctor to the room in Hindi. The language sounded more foreign to her than it already did, but then again, even the English spoken between the men and woman in her room earlier seemed indecipherable.