"People generally see what they look for and hear what they listen for."
- Harper Lee
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Mira pouted her lips, trailing after her brother. "Please, please, please. Can you please play with me?"
She slanted her eyebrows, making an angry face as her brother walked away from her, shaking his head 'No'.
"I'm going to tell Mommy you're being a jerk again." She smiled and walked after him. "No, I'm gowing to twell her you failed your math test and then hid it in your room so she wouldn't see it."
She followed her brother until he stood outside Mommy's room.
"Hey Mommy isn't home and you can't go in there. Oooo I'm going to tell on you."
Ryan ran a frustrated hand through his hair before turning back to his little sister.
"First of all, Mom already knows I failed my math test. That's why she's making me take those stupid tutor classes. Second, I'm going to tell mom that you're annoying me again."
He smiled at his sister as she crossed her arms and stomped her feet, angrily.
"Third, I'm going to tell Mom that you stole her lipstick, again." Ryan smirked as Mira looked up at him, surprised.
"I did not take it. Mommy gave it to me."
Ryan let out a irritated sigh. He looked at the closed door. The key was in his hand, hidden so his sister couldn't see it.
He'd taken the key from his mother's purse after Disneyland. He needed to find the pills. He was going to find the pills.
"Hey Mira, I'll play dolls with you. Why don't you go get your dolls and we can play in the living room?"
"Rweally?" Mira jumped up and down before running across the hall to her room.
Ryan turned and faced the door again. He knew his mother had locked it to keep everyone out. He quickly unlocked the door, slipping instead and rushing over to the dresser.
He opened the first drawer to find a bunch of socks. He quickly shut the drawer and opened the second drawer just as his sister called for him.
He pushed aside the shawl his mother had used to covered everything in the second drawer.
Ryan opened the blue box to find a bunch of letters. He closed the box and opened the gray box instead.
His eyes widened as he found many pill bottles, some empty and some full. He grabbed a bottle, hiding it in his pocket and closed the drawer as Mira walked into the room.
"Ryan! You said you play with me."
"Yea let's go." Ryan gave his sister a faint nod before following her out his mother's room.
He pulled out the medication bottle, discretely looking at it as he followed his sister.
Gleevec. He was going to find out what was wrong with his mother.
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Amanda slowly opened her eyes, looking around the room. She made a gagging sound, gross. Because she hated the smell of hospitals.
She looked around at her surroundings before letting out a soft cry, pitiful. It was almost as though she'd remembered why she was even in the hospital in the first place.
She pushed aside the white blanket and moved her hands to her stomach. She smiled as she rubbed small circles over her tummy.
Her baby.
Something was wrong with her baby. No. Amanda tried to convince herself of otherwise. Cramping was normal and a little bit of blood was fine.
Her baby was okay.
Her baby.
Her baby.
Just the thought it made her heart flutter. The feeling was warm, it was the kind of love she had always wanted.
She was going to have a baby. Even if the father didn't want it.
The last few days had been a mess for her. From the fact that Andrew refused to answer her calls and the entire ordeal that she couldn't even enter his building to the fact that she had absolutely no idea what was wrong with Anisha. She'd tried to call Anisha, begging for forgiveness but she hadn't picked up the phone either.
She, herself, knew very well that Anisha was running out of time. And all Amanda had wanted was to tell Andrew, to at least fix the problems she was responsible for.
She slowly tried to sit up. The hospital room was empty. No one had come to visit her.
Not her father, not her step-sister. And most definitely, not her mother.
Especially after Amanda had told her about the baby, a married man's baby.
But still, she smiled again, placing her hand on her stomach. She still her baby.
The feeling was overwhelming. And she wanted nothing more than to cry tears of joy. She was going to have a baby. A baby, her baby, was growing inside of her. And she'd give her little child everything she could.
She would.
She looked up as Sebastian walked into the room, giving her a slight nod. "You're awake."
"Hey."
"What are you doing here?" Amanda looked at him, wearily. She hadn't expected him to visit her.
She watched as he sat down on the chair, looking at the monitor and checking her vitals.
"I work here. I'm sure you remember something about me at least."
"Oh." She noticed the light green scrubs as he stood up and silenced the beeping monitor.
She bit her lip, shyly, diverting her eyes.
When they had been dating, she'd always joked that he looked ten times hotter in his work outfit. The light green scrubs were lighter than his dark green eyes but perfectly accented his dark hair and faint 5 o'clock shadow.
"So, you're in the maternity ward."
She watched as he avoided her gaze, adjusting his stethoscope before looking around the room.
She nodded, fear clouding her. "Wait, what are you doing here?" Sebastian wasn't her doctor. And they certainly weren't friends anymore. Why he was in her hospital room was unknown to her. "I mean, you're an oncologist. You deal with cancer patients. Why are you here?"
Sebastian puckered his lips together. He turned and eyed Amanda. Her face pale, sickly pale.
"You're right. I work on the fifth floor." Sebastian nodded, almost in irritation. "But I got a phone call last night from your father. And he was asking me how my pregnant fiance was doing."
He shrugged as her face sombered, clouded by sorrow and dullness.
"I take it that he doesn't know that you broke our engagement more than six years ago. Nor the fact that you've been sleeping with a married man?" He sighed as she let out a cry. His work phone vibrated and he knew someone was paging him.
"Your dad wanted me to check-up on you and so here I am." Sebastian turned to leave but instead froze as a stray tear slid down her face. "Amanda, did you tell Andrew?"
"No."
Sebastian took a small step towards her, brushing away the tear.
"You aren't going to tell him. He doesn't need to know. It's my baby." Amanda reached for Sebastian's hand, pleading with him to keep her secret. "Is Anisha fine?"
Sebastian pulled his hand out of her grasp. "She's fine."
He turned to walk out of the room, without saying anything else.
"Wait Sebastian, my baby? I had bleeding and cramping. It's normal. My baby is fine." She begged him to answer. She shook her head, screaming, begging him to tell her that her baby was fine. "Sebastian, my baby."
There was nothing wrong with her baby, she was sure of it.
She just needed Sebastian to confirm for it.
"Sebastian, my baby?"
Everything came tumbling down, a dull gray as he gave her a pitiful look.
Running his hand through his dark hair, adjusting his stethoscope, mumbling before he walked out of the room.
"I'm sorry."
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Anisha let out a harsh sniffle before she continued. Her voice still shaky, trembling at every word. She paused a little before continuing, almost as though she was waiting for Franco too, like Andrew, to blame her.
"Cassie had a check-up with her doctor and, and after she came down to the ER, crying. She was paranoid and she kept telling me that she was a bad mother. I...I didn't know what to do."
"She said she couldn't sleep and that...that she...she'd been having anxiety attacks lately. I didn't know." Anisha placed her hand over her mouth, muffling her sob. "Xanax was for panic and anxiety and I prescribed it. I didn't know. It was supposed to help..."
"I swear I told her not to use it and not to drink alcohol. She wasn't supposed to drink alcohol with it. I swear. It isn't my fault. It isn't." She closed her eyes, shutting them so he couldn't see her guilty eyes. Her shoulders shook as the cries left her lips. She was begging to be forgiven. "I...it's not my fault."
Anisha let her cries be heard as he scooted next to her, wrapping his arm around her. He kissed her forehead lightly before gently rubbing her back, soothing away her pain.
"Anisha, it isn't your fault." His voice was soft. Also a little bit of careful. "It was never your fault, Anisha. None of this was ever your fault."
"Yes it is." Anisha said it, her voice uneven and scratchy. "I'm the one who said it was okay for her to take the pills. Even Andrew thinks it's my fault. He said I could've done more, could've done something to save her."
"I should've done more. I knew she was depressed. Instead of telling you or Andrew I just gave her pills. But...but she told me not to say anything. She said Andrew had a presentation and I shouldn't distract him. She said she was fine. But I didn't know. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry." She hiccupped, her voice shaking.
"It's not your fault, Anisha. It's not your fault, it's not my fault, it's not Andrew's fault. The only person to blame is Cassie." Franco sucked on his lower lip, a little too bitterly.
"Cassie knew what would happen if she took Xanax with vodka. She knew how much she was prescribed to take and when. She knew the effects and risks of taking more than her prescribed amount. She knew she wasn't supposed to be drinking. All that Anisha is not your fault."
"You did what you were supposed to. Xanax was supposed to help her. It was supposed to help her with the panic attacks she was always having. That was your job and that's what you did." He gave her shoulder a soft squeeze, reassuringly. "You did the right thing. You tried helping her."
Anisha looked up at him only to find honest sincerity.
It was as if he meant every single word he'd said.
"You know I blamed myself too. Right after her funeral especially, I kept blaming myself." He rubbed his chin, scratching the scattered dark stubble. "I mean, I knew better than anyone that she was depressed. She thought that I blamed her for the baby not being healthy. I should've been there for her. I should've fought harder for her. And instead, I maintained my distance."
"I thought it was my fault. I blamed myself and I also blamed her but mostly myself. I could've done something more. Just a little something different." His eyes were focused on the table as he shook his head. "But you know, Anisha. We couldn't have. It's not my fault. I did everything I possible could have. I tried convincing her that it wasn't the end of the world. I loved her and I wasn't going to leave her. I tried showing her that. And you did too. It's not your fault. You cared and that's why you tried helping her. We did, we tried and we did, everything we possibly could have."
"Cassie did what she wanted to do. At the end of the day, it was her choice. She did what she wanted to do."
Anisha looked at little Mia as she continued sucking on her pacifier. And then she looked away, looked out the window. She inhaled the scent of coffee as Franco reached for his cup and took a sip.
Furrowing her eyebrows in confusion, she turned to look back at Franco, realization dawning in. "Wait, you said something was wrong with the baby?"
He coughed, choking on the sip of coffee and sitting up straight. There was an awkward pause before he stuttered out the words.
"The baby was stillborn." He focused his gaze on the white mug in front of him. "I'm guessing she didn't tell you or Andrew or her parents."
"We found out at the doctor's appointment five weeks before she overdosed. She just wasn't the same after that. I told her that we'd be fine, we'd figure it out." He let out a pathetic laugh, resentfully. "I told her I loved her. And that was enough of a reason that we'd be fine."
"But I guess it wasn't enough for her." Franco pushed the cup of coffee away and looked at his two daughters instead, smiling faintly.
"For a while, I was so lost. I just...I lost the woman I loved more than anything. So yes Anisha, I know how it feels to feel so lost and broken like you did. I know how it feels to constantly suffer all the time, to have every little thing hurt more than it should. I know how it feels to be afraid that things might never get better, that things aren't going to be better."
"But that's the thing. They do get better. That's just life Anisha."
He widened his smile, reaching over for Mia as she wailed her arms around. "Because things did get better."
"After Cassie's death, I just needed to get away from everything. I wanted to get away from everything. And it was hard. The hardest thing to do was admit that she was gone. And then, with time, everything got better."
"It takes time to heal a broken heart, Anisha."
Anisha looked as he adoringly placed his daughter on his lap. "How'd you meet her?"
"My wife? We met at a party." Franco gave her a warm smile. "She's amazing Anisha. You have to come over sometime. That way I can meet your kids too."
Anisha gave him a slight nod, smiling sincerely for the first time that evening.
Franco was okay. He was perfectly fine.
Unlike her, he'd fixed his broken heart. And life, it had gotten better from him.
"I'm really happy for you, I really am." Anisha bit her lip, her eyes a little glossy as she looked out the window again.
"I guess it's true huh? That stupid saying or whatever." She turned and looked back at Franco, shaking her head. "Something like things can either break you or make you stronger."
She cleared her throat, trying to suppress a cough.
"I let things make me weaker. That's what I did. I've been making the wrong decisions my entire life."
Anisha paused for a bit, debating whether or not she should ask. "Do you miss her?"
"Who? Cassie."
Anisha looked down as he shrugged.
"I loved her, I really did. And I mean, I don't hate her or blame her. It's too late for anything, it was too late for anything by the time she...I get what you were saying, about it being too hard and all that. I've tried to understand but I really don't know. I do know that I loved her. I loved her." Franco smiled, proof that he'd healed. He had healed his broken heart and moved on with life. "I miss her sometimes, you know. And I always will, Anisha. That's the thing, just because she's gone doesn't mean I don't still love or remember her."
"You always remember people, especially the ones who break your heart."
Anisha coughed again, reaching for a napkin and covering her mouth.
Andrew wouldn't miss her.
He wouldn't.
She was sure of that.
He hadn't wanted anything to do with her while she was suffering, begging for him to love her. He'd turned the other way, he'd broken her heart and looked away.
Anisha crumbled the napkin, holding in her fist, hiding the blood that she'd coughed. She froze as Franco pulled the napkin from her hands.
"What the hell? Why are you coughing blood?" She watched as his eyes widened and he turned to stare back at her.
She shook her head, the truth settling in and the clock ticking.
Anisha pushed her chair back, standing up just a little too fast. She stood up and a rush of dizziness surrounded her.
She parted her lips to say something and instead coughed, jerking forward and stumbling a little. Everything around her was starting to spin, faster and faster. She tried reaching out to grab onto the edge of the table. But instead, everything was spinning. Her vision blurred.
It was too late.
She let out a painful cry before she fell to the floor, unconscious.
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welp, I start school Monday :) Yay for another semester of ochem and bio -_-