****
Staring at the ceiling in my bedroom had always helped me fall asleep before, watching the fan spin, listing to my alarm clock tick the minutes away that I had left to sleep, but in this place I found it extremely hard.
Checking myself over once to be sure that I hadn't contracted any of those strange spots, I felt confident that I was indeed not sick.
Brad had the top bunk and I had the bottom. It took an hour or two for my father to finish throwing up, but when he was done he fell asleep in the bed next to me without a word.
My eyes wandered to the glass, looking out it and seeing the doctors moving the busy bees. There was a lab set up in the back, test tubes and microscopes everywhere. Whatever this was, it was bad. That much I knew. I wished that they would tell us something, anything, but I knew that they were busy with other things.
The TV was our only source of entertainment and it was so old that all it caught was one channel and static on all the others. I learned that after fumbling around with it for an hour and a half, moving the bunny-ears in different directions to no avail, taking the batteries out of the remote and rubbing them between my hands in an attempt to revive them.
Suddenly I heard a voice and I sat up, suddenly fully awake, "hello." A doctor said from behind the glass into a microphone. The sound was coming from above us, however and I realized that there were speakers in the room with us. "We are very pleased that you all came willingly, we insure you that this is for your safety as well as the worlds." He cleared his throat, "I'm going to be blunt with you all, this is a virus that we have never seen before. Due to this we have no idea as of yet how it spreads, how long it takes to incubate, or how it came into existence. But, what we do know after testing some of the infected is that this virus works through your DNA, breaking it down. Due to this, we are going to need to take a blood sample of each of you to determine if any of you have it."
The older man stopped, putting the phone down and walking into the room next to the one that we were in. After ten minutes the door from his room to ours was open and he walked in, fully clothed in the same type of suit the other male and female were in before.
Brad sat up on his bed, climbing down beside me, "I don't like this." He said, his eyes scanning my reaction, but I ignored him. I was just too mentally drained to deal with him, to deal with anything other than what was currently at hand.
But when he continued to stare at me, I finally gave in. "You say that a lot." I said, my eyes meeting his. He didn't have his contacts in and for a moment I couldn't help but watch his eyes. So beautiful, I thought. I guessed he didn't have a chance to put them in after he had woken up.
My father was on his bed, sitting up finally as the doctor approached us. "Ok, who wants to go first?" The man questioned, pulling out a needle from his pocket and uncapping it.
My father moved his arm, rolling his left sleeve up and extending it in front of him. The man kneeled down, pushing the plunger down so all the air was out before tapping my fathers arm, trying to find a vein. It took him a moment of examining, my family wasn't very vein-y. We all had light skin, but our veins were deep under the flesh, nearly invisible to the human eye. The doctor stuck the needle in, pulling back the plunger until he had a vial of blood. "There." The man said, standing up and walking over to Brad. "You ready, sir?" He asked, pulling out a new needle and recapping the last one, placing it in his other pocket.
Brad kept his arms over his chest, "I don't want to give you my blood." He grumbled.
"Brad, come on." I said from beside him. How could he be so selfish? This would help the doctors to find a cure!
Brad looked at me, bit his lip and then un-crossed his arms, extending his right arm shakily, "fine." He said, his eyes began to tear up as the needle neared him. He jumped back, looking away as the needle penetrated his skin. It was easy to find his vain, it was big and budging as the doctor stuck it in, pulling the blood out. Brad continued to look away until finally the needle was removed. He took a deep breath, holding his arm close to him. It was then I realized that he was afraid of needles. I chuckled silently, it was funny, big bad Brad scared of a little old needle.
"What's so funny?" Brad asked angrily, looking towards me suddenly.
"Nothing." I smiled, waiting for the doctor to take a needle out and poke it into my arm. He took a few minutes trying to find the vein, but once he had it he took the blood with ease.
"We will be back with the results later." The doctor said as he existed the room. The small white door opened and he stepped out, suddenly he was visible behind the glass, handing the blood samples to a woman in a white lab coat. They talked about something and then parted ways.
"So, you're scared of needles?" I asked, but Brad didn't look at me.
"Maybe." He said finally just before he got up and climbed the bunk bed back to his original spot.
I got up after him, following him, "just 'maybe?'" I smiled sitting on the upper bunk with him.
"Yeah, just maybe." He frowned, laying down and putting a pillow over his face, but not asking me to leave.
I bit my lip, the smile creeping across my lips and infecting my entire face, "Brad?" I asked finally.
"What?" He said, his voice still muffled with the pillow.
"Why do you hate needles?" I seriously wanted to know, I wanted to know why of all things, needles were what frightened him. He had been spot and had his arm broken and he didn't cry not once, he didn't shed a tear. Why here? Why now?
Brad paused, the pillow still over his face. "It's just a phobia I have." He said, then removed the pillow. "Why do you care?"
I stopped, looking down at him, "because we are stuck in this room together and I wanted to make small talk." I said, but that wasn't the reason. There was something inside of me, some small part that liked him. At one time I had thought that I wanted to be his sister, that I wanted to make him love me in that way, but now there was something else. Something that I hated, something that was going to show through no matter how many times I buried it beneath the surface.
Brad sighed, sitting up and looked me in the eyes, our knees almost touching, "I'm not scared of needles. I'm scared of hospitals and needles and hospitals go hand in hand. It's something I remember from my childhood. Something that scared me, but I can't put my finger on what it was. It's so vague." He seemed so sincere as he thought back in his mind, "and that's the whole truth."
I paused, "that was beautiful." I said finally. "I love it when you tell the truth."
He bit his lip, suddenly looking sheepish, "I've never lied to you."
It was an hour later that we both fell asleep. I had lied awake before, but with Brad's arm around me, I felt safe and grounded. Even in this hell hole, I didn't mind.
****
When we awoke the next morning Brad was still holding me, but the man from the day before was calling us from the sound system that surrounded the room, "The results are in." He said.
"God, he sounds like he is calling the lottery jackpot." Brad yawned sitting up. I just laid there, feeling too tired to open my eyes fully.
"Yeah, who won the virus jackpot." I cracked my neck.
Brad chuckled at that. My eyes opened just enough to see his luscious lips speak the words. I bit my own lip, how could I possibly like my own brother in that way? There must be something wrong with me, I thought. He was my brother, he was blood related and I was thinking about how sweet and luscious his lips looked, how beautiful his eyes were. And worst of all, whenever I thought back to that night, I thought about how handsome he was, every time I thought about that night I thought about how amazing it was to be with him. I felt sick to my stomach thinking about this, but I couldn't change how I felt.
"I have some questions for you all. Please answer them honestly." He scoffed into his arm. Clearing his throat he continued, "have you been to any place foreign in the past few weeks?"
The doctor motioned for one of us to approach the phone that hung on the wall and talk into it, telling him the answers. No one got up for a few seconds, so I decided that was my cue and I climbed down from the bed, picking up the phone. Holding it to my ear I started to speak, looking back at my father and brother, but my dad seemed to be in the washroom yet again so I answered the question myself, "No," I said, "we didn't leave the country, but we did go on a road trip."
The doctor jotted something down from across from me, "and where did you go on this road trip?"
I paused, "GoldTown. But up into the mountain more so."
I watched as the man jotted more stuff down and then asked his next question, which was, "why did you go there?" I answered, telling him that it was to pick the old farm house up and move it to a new location for my fathers job. He looked at me puzzled, then asked if we owned the MackayHeritageVillage, which I answered 'yes' too.
"And it says here that you made a police report when you got back from that trip?" The doctor asked, looking through his papers and pointing to one of them.
"Yes." I said, then told him the story, leaving out the part about the criminals because I had to recited the lie so much to myself that I no longer could remember the truth fully. Also, I knew that my mother wouldn't want me to tell him.
"Ok." The doctor said nodding his head. "So, is Brad your adoptive brother?"
I looked at him puzzled, "no, all my family is blood."
"Oh." The doctor said, looking at the paper in front of him again. "There is a few things that don't add up in your story however." Oh shoot, I thought. Did he know something about the criminals? My heart jumped into my throat.
"What?" I asked sheepishly.
"You said that you and your two brothers, Brad and Max, and your boyfriend Sam went on this road trip with your parents?"
"Yes?" I wondered where the problem came in to play.
"But when we did the DNA test it showed that you, your brother Max and Sam were related to your mother and father. Brad isn't related, so wouldn't that make him your boyfriend and not Sam?"
My eyes opened wide, "that must be wrong." I said, taking a step backwards, Brad, whom was looking rather sleepy and un interested a matter of seconds ago, suddenly shot up from his seat and ran over to my side, taking the phone from me.
"You're saying that my DNA is different than the rest of the family?" Brad looked puzzled, but then stepped backwards with a smile on his face. He was pleased about this? Did he hate being my brother that much?
"Your telling me that Sam is my brother?" I took the phone from Brad, taking a deep breath, suddenly feeling light headed. How was that possible? How could my brother not be related, but my boyfriend is? How many times had I slept with Sam? My heart started to pound in my chest as my legs clasped under me. I had been mortified when I slept with Brad, now it was an even worse feeling. It had to be wrong. It just had to be. The world around me seemed to be darker than it had been before, the white lights not as harsh. The area around me becoming blurry as I sat there. This isn't possible. It can't be possible.
****