"Hello," a male voice answered that Dusty knew immediately wasn't Kyera's.
"Where is Kyera?" she demanded.
"Dusty, it's Kyera's dad, Terry. Kyera took an overdose and is in the hospital," Terry Aroura said, though his voice quivered with emotion.
"I'll be right there," Dusty managed to reply. She felt the world begin to crumble around her. She was in floods of tears by the time she hung up on the call.
"Dusty, is everything all right?" Kayla hurried over to her weeping daughter.
"It's Kyera." Dusty sobbed. "She's in the hospital!"
****
Dusty managed to calm down during the drive over to the local hospital. Ashley's father kindly drove both her and her mother there, a pained look of sadness etched across his face the entire time. "I'm sure she'll be all right," Kayla said.
"Why would she do this to herself ?" Dusty said, quivering. "Why would she want to die?"
"I don't know, honey." Kayla shook her head. "She must be a very troubled young woman."
As they pulled in to the hospital parking lot, Dusty noticed the flashing blue lights of the ambulance near the access to the emergency department and tried to block out flashbacks to the terrible night when her father had been shot. She hated seeing those flashing lights; they always meant that there was someone in trouble.
She often imagined a young girl like herself witnessing something awful, desperately waiting for help to arrive. Kyera had been moved into a side room. Her father was waiting for Dusty outside as she all but ran down the corridor, still wearing her cap and gown and attracting a few bemused looks as she passed people by.
"What happened?" she asked, her tone incessant. Terry Aroura looked tired, more tired than she'd ever seen him look before. New lines had appeared in his already haggard face, and dark circles hung beneath his blue eyes that had probably once sparkled as her daughter did. Terry looked like a man who had weathered turbulent times.
"We found her this morning in her dorm room," Terry explained. Dusty could see his eyes were red and raw, unable to cry any more tears.
"This morning?" Dusty was aware that it was now almost half past two in the afternoon.
"We didn't want to worry you," Terry explained, sensing her unhappiness at not knowing of the situation sooner. "It was your graduation day. We couldn't let it be ruined," Terry continued, glancing into the room where Kyera lay on a bed while her mother watched anxiously over her.
Dusty wanted to scream that her day was completely ruined, that her graduation from Princeton would forever be tainted by Kyera's suicide attempt, but her mother, who was in a more rational state of mind, spoke up before she had the chance.
"We appreciate you thinking of Dusty's well-being at such a difficult time," Kayla said, placing a hand on her daughter's shoulder.
"Graduation is a key milestone growing up." Terry choked. Dusty's anger softened when she realized that Terry had now been denied the opportunity to see not one, but two of his children graduate.
"Why would she do this?" Dusty whispered, trying to understand her girlfriends motivations. "I thought that she was looking forward to graduating."
"So did we." Terry sighed. "She invited us up and seemed so excited. We should have expected this would happen again."
"Again?" Dusty queried.
"She's tried to commit suicide four times since..." Terry looked away sadly, not needing to tell Dusty the moment he was referring to. "This would be the fifth attempt," he said, looking intently at his daughter . "If she keeps it up, she risks being institutionalized."
"But Kyera isn't crazy," Dusty interjected.
"We can't risk her hurting herself ."
"Can I go and see her?" Dusty looked through the glass door, in at Kyera, who seemed unaware of her presence. Terry made eye contact with his wife and gestured to Dusty.
His wife looked at Dusty, then at Kyera before nodding. "Just for a bit, she's really drained," Terry said. "I'll wait right here," Kayla whispered to Dusty as she entered through the glass door, passing by Kyera's mother, who was kindly vacating the room to give them some privacy.
Kyera was looking out of the window on the far side of the room, watching distant trees dance in a phantom breeze. When she heard the door click, she looked up at Dusty, but her expression remained blank.
"Kyera." Dusty ran to her side and picked up her hand. She flinched. Her hand was full of needles hooking her up to the monitoring devices. "Sorry." Dusty released her hand and backed away, not daring to touch her and cause further damage.
"My lips are okay," Kyera quipped, not having lost any of her bravado.
"I'm not kissing you."
"Why not?" Kyera turned her head to face Dusty, and the empty look fell away to a cheeky grin. She was paler than usual, her eyes deep and heavy in her head and no longer sparkling, but she retained her charm. Her hair seemed darker than normal against the white bedding, trussed up around her head like a macabre halo.
"Kyera, I'm mad at you," Dusty said, though it was hard to be mad at someone in a hospital bed. She seemed so vulnerable, with all the machines whirring around her, wearing only a hospital gown and covered by a thin bed sheet. It made Dusty uncomfortable to see her like that.
"Mad at me?"
"Yes, for trying to hurt yourself. Why would you do this? You scared the crap out of me and your parents." Kyera looked down at the bed sheet sadly and refused to meet Dusty's gaze. "You tried to kill yourself," Dusty stated simply, though her voice was soft and comforting. "Why would you do that? Why would you want to leave me?" She could feel the warmth of tears running down her cheeks as she contemplated how she'd have felt if Kyera had been successful in taking her own life, if her parents had not walked in and found her when they did.
"I'm so sore," Kyera groaned her voice hoarse. "Pumping your stomach is a real killer."
"This is no time for jokes."
"Isn't it?" "Kyera, what the hell is going on with you? I thought you wanted to graduate." Dusty raised her voice slightly but was careful not to be too loud, not wanting to alarm Kyera's already frazzled parents.
"I do, I did..." Kyera shrugged and then shook her head.
"I love you, and I'm worried about you," Dusty said, taking her hand once more but gently this time. She pulled a chair close so that she could sit beside her. Kyera finally looked up to meet her gaze; she looked exhausted.
"I just couldn't shut the feelings out," Kyera said. "The feelings that it shouldn't be me, that I should have died that day."
"But it was an accident; you can't go on torturing yourself like this forever."
"I can't make it stop. The pain is always there." Kyera sealed her eyes shut as though currently being engulfed by a wave of pain.
"But it will get better," Dusty said, knowing from experience that her own pain over her father's death had dulled over the years. While is still retained the potency to blindside her on occasion; if she saw a man who looked like him or smelt the familiar scent of his cologne, she'd feel like she'd been winded.
But those experiences were becoming less and less regular, and time had performed its wondrous miracle and begun to heal her heart, just as everyone had said it would when she'd felt the world darken and close in on her in the wake of the murder.
"It doesn't," Kyera said.
"Your dad said that this has happened before." Dusty frowned with concern.
"My dad says a lot of things," Kyera retorted.
"You need help, Kyera. You can't keep trying to kill yourself."
"And if I don't get help, then what, you'll leave?" Kyera's expression soured as her tone became hostile.
"No, of course I won't leave you."
"But you're already leaving me. You're heading off to New York, not caring what happens to me."
"Of course I care," Dusty protested.
"No, you don't."
"Kyera, I need to live my life. I know you don't like thinking about the future, but I do. I have big plans for myself, and I'd like them to include you if you can stop closing yourself off from me." Dusty gave Kyera hand a reassuring squeeze, but she wriggled loose from her grip and pulled away.
"Go enjoy New York," Kyera said.
"Not without you."
"I'm going to be stuck in here for a while. My dad thinks I can't hear what's said outside that door, but it's my mind that's fucked not my hearing."
"He's just worried about you and trying to do what's best."
"Mmm." Kyera wasn't convinced.
"Don't you want to move forward with your life?" Dusty asked. "Don't you want to go on to great things instead of dwelling in the past?"
"No," Kyera answered. "No, I don't want to move forward because moving forward means forgetting her. Each birthday that passes is just another year that separates us. One day she will be nothing more than a memory, and she deserves more than that."
"But she wouldn't want you suffering like this." Dusty leant forward and stroked Kyera's cheek; she was cold to the touch.
"I deserve to suffer," Kyera said from behind clenched teeth.
"No, you don't," Dusty answered. "You deserve to be happy."
"That's what you think."
"Kyera, it's what I know. You are so smart and charismatic; you shouldn't be wasting your life to honor Kyeri. You should be living it to the complete maximum; you should be pushing yourself each and every day, not sitting in a hospital room when you should be celebrating graduating." Kyera was silent. "Promise me that you won't do this again, because I can't love someone who doesn't love me back."
"I do love you," Kyera corrected her.
"You can't love me, or you wouldn't risk leaving me," Dusty told her. "I have big dreams for our future, Kyera, but they can't come true unless you start believing in yourself—and in us." Again Kyera was silent, contemplating what she was saying. "Can you get better, for us?" Dusty asked.
"Yes," Kyera confirmed, her voice strong and purposeful. "For us I can."