Remember Me? (Percy Jackson-- Leo Valdez Fanfic)

Chapter 6: Three years later.... (Part 1)

A/N: Nothing to say but an early warning: the next two parts of Chapter 6 are (long) fillers, but they're still important :3 Hope y'all understand what's happening and like it anyway xD NOW PLEASE. PROCEED :D 

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~Kristen's POV~

I still remember every detail of the day Diana disappeared.

It had been a little over a year since Leo had left, and not long after we had both turned fourteen. I remember the trees. The innocent game I had suggested. The silence that met Josh and I as we waited for Diana to find us, only to hear the screams. 

I remember how her screams continued to ring in my ears as I sat up in a hospital bed, days after I collapsed in the woods. My entire body should have felt like it had been bathed in acid, considering all the poisonous thorn bushes I had pricked myself with. But all I felt was numb. I didn't know if it was from all the pain-killers and anti-toxin injections they had given me, or from the hollowness I felt inside after I came to the realization that my best friend was missing, possibly dead, and I had no idea what happened or what to do to help. 

What surprised me the most, and it looked like it had confused everyone as well, is that I hadn't cried once since I ran after her voice. I felt broken, lost, guilty, depressed, but my eyes never watered. When I stared bankly at the white wall in front of me for hours, my parents got worried and asked the doctor, but all they told them was that I was probably just in shock. It's not that I couldn't talk, I just couldn't find the words to say. I knew they were worried, and I wanted so badly to tell them that it was okay. That I was okay. But I couldn't. Because I wasn't. I was far from it.

It was only on the tenth day of being stuck in the hospital when I suddenly started to feel something again. I had been lying on my side, arms under my head as I stared dully at the glass window. Josh had been sitting on the chair next to me, but I didn't look at him while he updated me on how everyone was doing. 

"Kristen?" he said the second time. Only then I flitted my gaze towards him, blinking when I saw concern written all over his face. "I'm sorry." He said, leaning forward.

I slowly sat up in my bed, and looked down at his hand covering mine. 

"I miss Diana too. We all do. And we know you do most of out of all of us." He said softly, and stood up to sit on an empty space next to me on the bed. "But not once have you screamed, cried or shouted at me since you got here." He joked, but he wasn't laughing. "Come on Kris, you've gotta give me something to work with."

I looked up at him, and but his face fell even further when I didn't give him anything, and sighed. Before I could say anything, he pulled me carefully into a hug. I stiffened, and he felt that, as he started talking again.

"We're doing everything we can, okay? It's going to be okay. We're going to be okay. You've still got us, Kris. We'll be there for each other until Dian comes back to us. I promise." He mumbled into my hair. I relaxed a bit, and laid my head on his shoulder. I wanted to believe him, but I felt more hopeless than I wanted to admit.

"You've still got us." He repeated, and for the first time since I woke up more than a week before, I felt a tear fall down my cheek, and my breathing started speeding up as I began to sniff. Josh hugged me tighter as I kept crying, not knowing what else to do.