Chapter Eight Part One
"You did great babe."
Louis smiled at me, giving me a peck on the cheek. "Thank you. I think this is going to be an amazing first video."
I nodded in agreement. From the way the director just let the boys' be themselves, it was going to be one awesome video. I took the striped towel from Louis' hands, and reached up to dry his damp hair free of ocean water.
"I can feel the salt in my hair." Louis complained, his face scrunching up in disgust.
I tsked, patting down his damp hair. "Don't be such a girl. I'm the girlfriend here."
"Obviously I mean you have the-"
"Louis," A high voice said behind us, interrupting Louis' sentence. He turned around, my arms frozen in mid-air.
The girl behind him smiled sweetly at him, before glancing back at me. "I didn't know you had a personal stylist." She said, motioning her hands back towards me.
I looked at the girl with confusion, whose dark brown hair was neatly tied up into a high pony-tail, revealing her well structured face. She flashed me a fake apologetic smile, before returning her gaze towards Louis who looked equally confused.
"She's not my personal stylist." Louis said, slinging an arm over my shoulders, "This is Victoria, my girlfriend."
The girl, whose name I had yet to learn, looked me over before crossing her arms below her chest. "Oh. It's nice to meet you."
I nodded, giving her a sarcastic smile. "Likewise."
She advanced foreword towards Louis, resting her arm on his forearm boldly. I guess Louis' other arm around me meant nothing to her. Didn't she hear him say I was his girlfriend? Louis looked down at her perfectly manicured fingers curling around his arm.
"The director said for me to come and get you. He needs to ask you about re-doing a scene." Her gaze trailed over me, and her upper lip curled in distaste, "Should I tell him you can't because you're with your girlfriend?"
Louis looked over and me and pecked the side of my head, giving me a wide smile. "Victoria can handle herself, right Vic?" I nodded. "I'll be back shortly love."
Before I knew it, his arm disappeared from around my shoulders and he was walking down the beach towards the director - with the girl walking too close for comfort next to him. It didn't help all she was wearing was a bikini top and some athletic shorts.
I sighed, moving up the beach towards a variety of rocks all lined up near the grass area. I took a seat on one of the larger boulders, crossing my right leg over my left leg. Dropping my purse to the sand beneath me, I watched as Louis chatted with the director, and the brunette from earlier shielding her eyes from the sun while nodding at something the director was saying.
No more than five minutes had passed and sitting on the hard, cold boulder started to get uncomfortable. I shifted when I felt a vibrating sensation run through my upper right thigh. I stuck my hand in my shorts' pocket, reaching for my phone before I grasped the device and clicked the answer button right away.
"Hello?"
"Hey Vic. It's Jon."
I smiled, smoothing down a piece of stray hair that was floating in front of my face. "Oh hey. What's up?"
Jon sighed. "Don't sound too cheerful Vic, I actually have some bad news."
When I didn't respond, Jon continued on, his voice getting thicker as he spoke. "Your mom - well they ran some tests on her earlier this week, and we just got the results a few minutes ago. She, well, Vic I don't know how to say this."
"Just come out with it, Jon." I said, my patience was wearing thin and I needed to know what the results were. Because, even though my mom was in the bi-polar sense when it came to loving me and hating me, I still loved her.
"She's got a brain tumor Vic - she's had one for about two years now. They don't know how long she has. It could be a week to years that she lives. I think you should come home, Victoria."
I nearly dropped the phone into the sand below me after Jon finished his sentence. I inhaled deeply, my stomach twisted as I pinched the bridge of my nose. "I know. I'll be there as soon as I can." I said.
Before we hung up, Jon gave me the name and location of the hospital my mum was at and I quickly scribbled it down on a empty gum-wrapper. I thanked him, before hanging up and closing my eyes for a brief second before coming back into reality.
I placed my phone on the boulder next to me before resting my elbows on my knees taking in a deep breath. When I looked back up, I watched Louis and the brunette walk into the black tent, cheerful smiles plastered on all their faces. I couldn't ruin their day with this news, I just couldn't. This day was about them - it wasn't about me and my sick mother back in Doncaster.
I pushed myself off the boulder, giving one quick glance over my shoulder at the beach behind me. None of the boys' were around, and neither was Ava. I couldn't go back to the hotel to get my stuff without a key, and if I asked them for one right now they'd question me.
I picked up my purse from the sand, dusting off the remains that clung to the bottom of it. I thanked God that I had thought about bringing my purse with me, seeing as it had all my money and credit cards for this whole entire trip - leaving me enough to buy a cab to the airport and a plane ticket. I clutched the purse to my chest as if my whole life depended on it at that moment. And the funny thing is, it did.
~*~
Three hours later, I was sitting on a eight hour flight back home to Doncaster. I sighed, leaning back in the airplane chairs and closed my eyes. This all felt surreal. Three hours ago, I was watching my boyfriend and his band mates have the time of their life shooting their first ever music video.
And now, here I was on a flight back home to see my mother for the first time in about two months. I didn't think this was the thing that would send from the United States back home to the United Kingdom.
Sometime during the flight, I must have fell asleep because I was awoken to an announcer overhead informing us that we had ten minutes before our arrival in Doncaster. I reached in my pocket to retrieve my phone, but came up empty-handed.
My eyes went wide, remembering that I had set it down on the boulder next to me back at the beach. I groaned, throwing my head back in frustration. Now it was going to look like I was kidnapped. I had no form of communication with anyone until I actually got off the plane and headed towards the hospital. I reached into my purse and retrieved the empty gum wrapper that I had scribbled down the address on.
I felt grateful that I at least remembered the gum wrapper, before grabbing my purse off the ground and nestling it in my lap. The whole ten minutes my leg bounced up and down as a sure sign of anxiety. As much as I wanted to see my mom, I was afraid of all the memories coming back. When I last left her she wasn't the nicest person to me, and I sure as hell didn't feel loved by her.
I sucked in a deep breath, my mind swirling as I felt the plane descend from the air and on to the runway. It was only a matter of minutes that separated me and my mom from seeing each other again - and I couldn't make it off the plane fast enough.
~*~
"Room 307, I just informed them you're here."
I thanked the lady behind the receptionist desk and practically ran towards the elevator and down the hallways to room three-oh-seven. But, when I got near the room I slowed my pace to more of a walk, my heart beating intensely inside my chest.
I let out a deep breath before stepping inside the doorway, only to come face-to-face with a wall of flesh. I closed my eyes on impact, before retreating back a few steps, clutching my nose in pain.
"Bloody hell," I cursed looking up Jon who was smirking down at me, "Watch where you're going!"
Jon smirked, but the playfulness didn't quite reach his eyes. "I was just coming to get you. Oh, the irony." He stepped aside, sweeping his arm in a sideways motion for me to step inside, "After you m'lady."
I sighed, regaining the confidence I was trying to muster up before Jon's chest came crashing into my nose. I took a step forward towards the door, nodding. "Thanks."
When I stepped through the threshold, I expected to see my mother laying there with a ton of wires and needles attached to her, but what I saw was a woman with a blue swaddled blanket in her arms, a mess of blonde hair and a tired, worn out face. She looked much older than she really was, which made my heart drop into my stomach.
"Victoria," Chet said, getting up from the chair next to my mother's bed, "I'm so glad you could make it." He held his arms out, awaiting a hug from me.
I nodded, stepping forward into his arms and giving him a small hug. When I stepped back from his embrace to face my mother, she was smiling gently at me, before gazing down at the bundle wrapped up in her arms.
"Victoria," She said, her voice was no longer emotionless or angry. It had a much lighter and softer tone towards it, "I want you to meet Henry."
I maneuvered around the hospital bed, and then peered over at the human being wrapped up in the thin blue blanket. His eyes were closed, but his face was relaxed and his hand was curled up in a ball, lightly pressed against his cheek. I silently cooed over the fact that this little baby boy was related to me, even if he didn't look a single thing like me.
His skin complexion was slightly tanner than my pale white skin thanks to Chet, and his eyebrows were much darker than mine, insinuating that he had dark hair like his father Chet. My eyes flickered up to my mother's face, her eyes intently focused on me.
"He's a real looker." Was all I could blurt out at the moment. I didn't feel comfortable talking to my mother after not seeing or hearing from her in two months.
She nodded in agreement. "Would you like to hold him?"
I slowly nodded, taking the chair Chet was sitting in moments ago. I watched as Chet motioned to my mum that he and Jon were going to step outside - probably to let us talk alone. I inhaled before she handed me Henry, and exhaled when I had grasped him firmly in my arms.
"Victoria, I know there's a lot to talk about - but I just want you to know I am truly sorry." She paused, her light green eyes reminded me of my own as she stared at me, "For everything."
I looked down at Henry's peaceful figure before glancing back up at my mum. "Don't be sorry."
She shook her head at me, pursing her lips into a straight line. "I just wanted to let you know, that all the ways I acted towards you was because of this damn tumor." She gave a bitter laugh, shaking her head. "I should have known. I was never like that to you - and it couldn't have been the pregnancy. The doctor informed me that it is one of the main symptoms along with the vision problems I never expressed to anyone."
"Mum-"
She shook her head, her eyes clouding over with tears. "I should have told someone, anyone. I let it go to far, and now I'll be abandoning you like your father did." She gazed up at me, her face showing nothing but sorrow. "I'll never forgive myself Victoria."
I swallowed hard, my mother's words cutting deep. Before everything, she was probably the mother most of my friends yearned for. Gradually, she had gotten more brutal this year. Last year wasn't so bad, except for the unexplained vomiting that occur ed once in a while. But being my mum, she brushed it off as nothing but food poisoning. And me being stupid, I believed her.
I guess, in the back of my mind I didn't want to think something was wrong with her. Because honestly, no one wants to think that.
I cleared my throat of the thickness that was invading the space, making it feel closed off and tight. "Don't be sorry." I croaked out, my vision starting to blur with tears, "And don't beat yourself up. Because mum, I forgive you. For everything."
I could swear, in that moment I felt something. Maybe it was a twinge of hope that my mother was going to make it. Or maybe it was because she looked into my eyes and her's reflected guilt for eventually leaving me like my father did. But, I couldn't let her spend the rest of the life she had left dwelling on the past because now, she had to live in the present.
~*~
I choked up a bit writing this last part. As much as her mother was mean to her, I can't help but feel a sorrow for Victoria. I hate doing this to characters.
The information I got on symptoms of brain tumors is from mayoclinic.com. So if you think any of this information is false, please go take it up with them - not me.
I know it has been forever, and honestly I can make up so many excuses but I only have two. One, I had no idea what to write and no motivation to write any ideas I came up with except for this one. Two, high school has been kind of hectic with all the homework and projects and ugh. But hey, on the bright side I met this really hot senior named Jason. Nom nom nom.
Hopefully I'll start writing part two tonight and have it done sometime next week. Just a heads up, part two will be a monthish later and then the book will take on from there.
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Song: I Don't Wanna Lose You - Jamestown Story (I love them. I get this song is basically about love, but the first few lines just break my heart and remind me of this scene. Check out these guys, they're amazing.)