It Started With A Wrong Number ✯

17. When I See You Again

Dad doesn't reply, so Lucas continues. "We don't know who abused him like this, but we have a few suspicions, including Rose. Hopefully Skye will be able to tell us when he—"

"Dad?" says a voice I recognize as Damon's on the other side of the door. "Doctor Wolff? The nurse said you're in here."

"Yeah, I'm here," Lucas calls. The door opens then closes. "What're you doing here, Damon?"

"School over and I wanted to surprise you," Damon replies. "Hey Jer. Who's—"

Damon cuts himself off, likely having seen me. He comes rushing over, grabbing my other hand. Something hits my chest, making pain stab my ribs, a grimace appearing on my face at the unexpectedness. Since they now know I'm awake, I open my eyes slowly, blinking at the light.

Dad still looks the same. The same blonde hair that I got from him, the same blue eyes that now hold a very guilty, ashamed look. Damon, I now realize, is basically a carbon copy of his dad. They have the same dark hair and eyes, the same face shape. It's easy to tell they're related.

Looking down, I see it's Damon's head on my chest, over my heart. Feeling my movement, he looks up at my face, lifting his head.

He smiles brightly, "you are alive!"

"Damon," Lucas, Doctor Wolff scolds. "He has three fractured ribs, and was in a coma for two weeks. Be careful."

Damon's smile turns sheepish. "Oopsie." He looks at me, "so this is where you've been."

I shrug lightly, avoiding his eyes and pulling my hands from the grasps of him and Dad.

"How long were you awake?" Lucas asks. Knowing my voice won't be very good, I weakly lift one arm to point to Dad, then to Lucas, then to the door. "Since we were outside the door?" Lucas guesses, making me nod. "So you heard everything?" I nod again. "I'll ask this now because he'll be fretting over it, but are you OK with Jeremiah and I dating? With homosexual people in general?"

"Why wouldn't he be?" Damon asks, confused. "Skye's part of the rainbow too."

I notice Dad's eyes widen, while Lucas' narrow as he looks at Dad.

"All that," he says. "All that worrying about whether he'd end up hating you or not. All for nothing. Nothing, Miah. If you could've just grown a pair you could've done something sooner to protect him."

Dad looks away, ashamed.

"Wait, I'm confuzzled," Damon says.

"Jeremiah is Skye's dad," Lucas explains. "I've been trying to convince him to visit Skye for quite some time now. How do you know him, Damon?"

"Ah, remember how I mentioned Jaxon and Aaron bullying someone at school of being gay?" Damon says sheepishly. "Oh, that reminds me, Dad you might be getting a call from the school about me continuously harassing Aaron and sometimes harassing Jaxon."

I can just picture what Damon's been up to. With Aaron in all of his classes, Damon's had a lot of opportunities to make his life difficult.

"Want to explain why?" Lucas asks, raising an eyebrow.

Damon goes on to explain everything that happened the day I tried to commit suicide. The whole event at school, how he didn't notice I disappeared, and how he's been going after Jaxon and Aaron, especially Aaron, since then.

"That's... Not everything," I mumble, voice raspy.

Everyone's eyes turned to me. Hesitantly, I explain everything between Aaron and I, and everything about the day before, when Jaxon read the texts. How Aaron got my number, how we grew closer, everything.