Jane And Austin

Chapter 2 - Dinner

I woke up to my mom caressing my hair. It was evening and she was wearing a pretty red gown, eye liner making her gorgeous eyes look even better, perfectly toned, her waist-long hair could make anyone jealous. She was fairly tall and I knew that was where I got my height from. You would hardly find her dressed up like that, she spent most of her time caring about me, paying attention to even my most minute needs, but when she did, you would put your eyes nowhere else except her.

"Jane, would you like to accompany me and your dad to a business party? It's important for us to go," she sounded sorry.

"I don't want to go, mom.. It's okay," I told her.

"Jane," mom continued after a second, "why do you spend your life like an old woman already done with life, spending it in a room? You go through all of this pain and struggle just to spend it in a room."

I knew she wanted me to live my life. We were having this conversation for the millionth time. I felt sorry for my parents. They had to pay the bills of a girl who wasn't even living her life. I wondered whether they thought it was worth taking all the pains for me.

"I have explained all of it already, mom, I am sorry I am unable to do it.. to live the way how you want me to," I was apologetic. Apologetic and annoyed.

I had been diagnosed with paraplegia (or paralysis) some years ago. Paraplegia to me was like the cage to a bird, handcuff to my dreams, chain to my soul. I loved travelling, I had my bucket list, I had my dreams which I wanted to fulfill. Well, that was all before I was paralysed. Now, I was too scared to live, to love, to go out and to do other things I loved. I guess, life is like that sometimes, it makes you climb the stairs for a moment and then pulls you down at the other. I felt so cut down from the rest of the world when it happened, teens of my age celebrated going to proms and I celebrated wearing my clothes by myself. Paraplegia destroyed the legs of dreams.

"I am tired of explaining it to you. I want you to meet new people and I won't give up," mom said as she left the room, "I will try to be back as soon as possible. Take care, honey."

It was hard to take care of myself, but I had done it before. Now that I was free, I couldn't stop myself from thinking about the incident with the guy, even though a day had passed since then. This was the reason I spent most of my day sleeping as well. Thoughts, sometimes, are like the song which occurs to your mind on a loop. I wondered how creepy it was that a completely unknown girl waved at him out of nowhere and suddenly disappeared too. Maybe, it didn't matter to him at all and I was following my tradition of overthinking.

I wished he did not think that I was interested in him because I was not. What if Susan thought I was waving at him instead of her? What if she thought I liked that guy? Ugh, it was hurting my head.

I got up from my bed. I could move the upper part of my body normally, while I had to lift my legs from my hands. Moving was not really that much of a trouble for me considering I only had to move around in my house and my mom occasionally took me for a walk in our garden. I moved towards the window, lifting my upper body first and then my legs from my hands. I didn't really want anyone to see me or more precisely, I did not want to face that guy so I sat there hiding myself from the curtains. I was still embarrassed.

The weather in England has always been unpredictable. At one moment you would think that there is no chance of rain, only for rain to pour down some moments later, while amidst the most cloudy day, sunshine would appear as if it was an exam which was thought to be too far. It was cloudy. I loved to stargaze and also, I loved the rain. The ground was filled with people and Susan was there, expectedly. I wanted her to visit me today so that I could divert the thoughts in my head and also make sure that she didn't think I had a crush. I wished she didn't notice him waving at me. I searched for my phone to text her, it was kept a meter or two away from my bed.

Out of my laziness, I stayed there for a while. As I kept glancing at the different parts of the ground, I noticed that dude again. He went past one, then two, then three and slotted the ball into the net. Football wasn't one of my interests and I never really gave it a chance until and unless I had nothing else to do and that happened very rarely since I spent my day reading, writing, spending time with my family and Susan, twitter and sleeping for the rest. To my surprise, he looked up after scoring the goal as if he was staring at my window for some seconds. Thank god I decided to sit in a way that no one could notice me.

My phone beeped, it was a text. I thought it was, most probably, from my dad asking whether I was fine. I sat there for some more time to figure out if it was just a coincidence or the guy was actually looking for me. I was startled when he looked up again, this time he was definitely looking up at my window. But, why would he?
I wanted Susan so desperately.

Covering the window from the curtains, I moved to the end of the bed where the wheelchair was placed adjacently. It was of, more or less, the same height as my bed. I kept my hand on the seat for support, lifted my body, sat down and slowly adjusted my legs to make myself comfortable. The wheelchair was automatic. I just had to use the joystick to move, I could control the speed and if needed, I could move manually.

I moved towards the cupboard to pick my phone up. It wasn't my dad's text, but it was Susan's.

"I won't be able to come today." My heart sank as I read the text. Should I text her?

My brain now had one more thing to overthink about. Why Susan could spend time on the ground, but not with me?
Maybe she wanted to visit me but her mom called or maybe she wasn't fond of the idea of visiting me everyday, anymore.

I spent some of my time embracing Oscar in my arms. He always provided me the comfort and warmth I sought, he was also one of the reasons I never felt the need to be in a relationship after paralysis hit me. Also, he reminded me about one of the most beautiful but heart wrenching path of my life.

I killed some time on my phone. One of my subjects in school was Spanish so I spent some of my time learning it. Soon after I was done with the work, my parents came back. They brought some food from my favourite restaurant in Lansville - Buenas. It was a ritual in our home to have a family dinner daily and even though my parents didn't eat, they still accompanied me so that we could have some family time.
Oscar would be there with us as well, eating with us. He always came to me before going for the walk with mom, his eyes always said to me that he wanted to go with me, but I hardly ever did.

We were sitting in the hall. It always provided me a feeling of grandeur. There were textured brown wallpaper surrounding us on all sides. The hall was divided into two parts, one part was meant for watching TV and the other was reserved for the dining table. Our family picture was placed on one of the walls while a guitar was placed on the other.

"How did it go?" I asked them.

"We missed you. Except that I think we had a great time. Your mother looks so pretty in that red gown," dad smiled, looking towards mom and held her hand.

"Ahem, Ahem," I teased them, "So you mean, she doesn't look good at other times? I think she is beautiful always."

"Your dad only finds me beautiful when I am dressed up. So sad to be heard by any wife," it felt like she actually meant it for a second and then she started laughing and I accompanied her.

Dad loved playing guitar. He wasn't really a good singer, but he played pretty well. He played 'About the way you look tonight.' It was his favourite song and mom was pretty flattered when he played.

We talked about a lot of things. Dad told me stories about his childhood, which I hadn't already heard. He was a man with well decided features, slight hint of red hair and tall, but he gained a lot of weight lately.

"I think we should sleep now," dad suggested.

"You look eager to have fun with your 'pretty woman', ahan?" I teased them again.

Mom was already blushing by now. "Jane....," she finally said.

"Goodnight mom and dad," I said as I started going.

"Hey, wait," dad said, "My friend will be accompanying us for the dinner tomorrow. He is coming with his family so you will have to be there too."

"Already thinking about the excuse," I said and started driving towards my room. "Kidding, dad. I will be there." I smiled.

******
Don't forget to vote and tell me your feedbacks :)