We've Met Before

7 - Hospital Rooms

TW: MENTIONS OF SA
CADE

"Dude, are you okay? You keep zoning the fuck out." Luke shouts over the blasting stereo music.
Would it kill them to turn it the fuck down?
    "Yeah, I'm fine. Keep fucking driving."
    He scoffs, but says nothing else.
    The Laughlin's house finally zooms into vision. It's rather big, a little ostentatious for my liking. Luke parks in between the other multitude of cars.
    He gets out the car, and so do I. He swerves by my side and pats my shoulder enthusiastically.
    "Here's to getting blacked out!"
——
We walk through the doors and all I'm able to smell is sweat and alcohol. I see people feeding off each other, whether it be for sex, or for something as simple as a conversation.
"Cade! I didn't know you were coming!" I hear a shout from somewhere in the room, but I can't locate it because of all the sound in the room.
I finally feel a tap on my shoulder.
I turn around to find Ashley Oakley draped around my arm. I groan and shake her off.
"Hello." I say curtly, avoiding the bad taste in my mouth.
Luke slides his arm over — a now lonely—Ashley, and she grimaces as she shoves him off her.
"Not you." She mutters, narrowing her eyes at Luke.
Luke puts his hands up in the air with confusion and turns to face me. "Dude, how do you do it?! You literally just stood there."
I smile at him, "You just don't have it like I do."
He rolls his eyes, "Cocky bitch."
"Yeah, whatever. Where's Dean?"
"He said he'd be here. He spent like thirty minutes wallowing on what to wear. I swear he has a secret girlfriend or something." Luke says, dragging me towards the punch stands.
He pours both of us the liquid inside red solo cups. I take a whiff of the punch and wince. "Holy shit, this smells fucking rancid."
He smells it as a response, smiling. "Smells fine to me!"
He chugs it down, smiling to himself like an idiot. I take my cup and pour it back inside the punch bowl.
He pouts, "What happened to getting drunk?"
I whip my hand across his head, "You're a fucking idiot. I have to drive you back home."
He shrugs his shoulders. "Oh, very true Mr. Steele. Sucks."
——
Luke is in deep conversation with a couple of guys at the party as I tag along quietly beside him. They've tried including me in their conversation by asking me dumb questions like 'What do you think Cade?' I just smile and say some shit like, 'It's cool.'
I used to think people were able to take hints, that eventually they'd guess that I didn't give a shit about what they had to say. But it seemed that the more I ignored people, the more they wanted to reach me, to inch closer to me.
I started as the quarterback my freshman year, and we won the state championship. All I could hear from that point on was everyone's bullshit excuse for conversation. Each sentence more shallow than the other.
"Cade!" I turn around at the familiar voice and suddenly feel at ease. Dean walks towards me, dabbing me up.
"Where have you been?" I ask.
"Hanging around, had important matters to tend to," He responds, a guilty smile dangling from his mouth.
Then it dawns on me, "Holy shit. Luke is right. Who's the girl?"
He sweeps his head down to try and hide his smile.
Holy shit he has it bad.
I'm about to say something when the guy who was walking with Kaia strolls beside me. He's about to open his stupid fucking mouth when I interrupt, "What the fuck did I tell you about getting lost?"
"Gabby wants to talk to you," He says simply, looking around nervously.
"What are you? Her dog? Tell Gabby the same thing I told you. I don't have anything to talk with her," I spit. I take a few steps towards him, enough so that I tower over him, "Get close to me, or Kaia, and I'll make sure that's the last thing you fucking do. Get. Lost."
I feel Dean's hand on my shoulder as he pulls me back. "Cade, let go of it. Now."
One of the two only people I'll let talk to me like that.
I turn around and start walking towards the stairs, trying to find my way to a bathroom.
I feel the anger cement itself into my head. I thought I had gotten rid of Gabby. I thought I had made it safely across her shit.
I find an empty bathroom and I shut the door, locking it. I feel my lungs collapse beneath themselves. An inexplicable panic coursing through my skin, and through my veins, and through my thoughts.
I start hyperventilating.
Count.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
I want to scream.
I want to cry.
I want to get rid of all of this.
I did something bad.
I hurt her because of it.
I close my eyes and picture the one thing that would be able to make me feel lighter in this moment.
I see my dad.
He's sitting next to me on the couch.
We're talking about football.
He's laughing, and he's smiling.
He's wearing my football jersey because he says his greatest possession is his son.
My vision changes.
I see the beach.
Her blonde hair is waving through the wind.
Her laugh is singing in my ear.
I feel her lips graze my temple.
Her hands grip onto my t-shirt.
I open my eyes and grip onto the sink.
I see someone in the mirror.
I don't know who's looking back at me.
I hear a knock on the door and I frantically stand at the pounding.
"Is there someone in there?" Her voice is dazed, muffled out by the incoherency of her own mind.
I open the door immediately, recognizing exactly who it is.
Kaia struggles to stand on the other side of the open door, her eyes closing out. I grab ahold of her shoulders and she's sheening with sweat, and her body is as cold as ice. Her teeth chattered as she struggles to speak.
The panic I felt five minutes ago is nothing compared to the sheer terror I'm feeling right now.
Kaia doesn't drink.
I immediately drape an arm under her knee, another one around her waist, and I begin carrying her towards an empty room. I shut the door and rummage through her pockets for her cellphone. I finally find it, and I unlock her phone, using the password I memorized over the summer.
Ihateonions
I rummage through her contacts until finding the only number I'd fully trust.
I hold the phone at my ear, begging that the call goes through.
"Kaia? Where are you—"
"Dahlia, it's me Cade."
"What the fuck. What the fuck are you doing with Kaia's phone dickhead—"
I don't have time for this. "Dahlia, I need you to come upstairs. Now. It's urgent, please. Don't do it for me, do it for Kaia. Make sure nobody follows you."
I hear a couple seconds of silence, and a bit of rummaging.
Come on.
Tick, tick. Tick.
I suddenly hear a banging outside, near a foreign door.
"Kaia! Kaia!" Dahlia's voice rings through the hall.
I open the door to the room I'm in and Dahlia immediately bursts in.
Kaia lays on the bed, her body falling in and out of consciousness. Dahlia gasps and rushes towards Kaia.
"Go get a cup of water," Dahlia screams, her hands shaking as she sits Kaia up on a couple of pillows. I try to move but I can't think clearly, not right now. Dahlia's shaking, "NOW!"
I snap out of it, and I run down the stairs and towards the kitchen. I fill a cup of water and immediately run back up, ignoring all the calls of my name.
I hand it to Dahlia and she gently smooths out Kaia's blonde hair out her face, placing the cup at her lips.
"Kai, drink some water. Stay awake for me okay?" Dahlia turns to me, "We need to get her to a hospital, we don't know what's happened in the last fifteen minutes."
"Okay." Is all that's able to come out of my mouth. I take out my keys from the pocket of my cargo pants and I gesture Dahlia to shift over. I pick Kaia up, and carry her downstairs. I receive weird stares, and weird looks.
Dahlia walks over to some kid in a blue t-shirt and starts talking to him. He holds her against him, carrying her weight as she seems to finally let herself float in his arms. They link arms and we leave. I place Kaia in the back seat, letting Dahlia and mystery boy sit beside her.
I know the trip to the hospital by memory.
——
I let Dahlia talk to the nurses, her voice is assertive as I remember it, except this time it sounds like it's falling apart at the seams. Mystery boy sits beside me, his hands stuffed into his pockets.
"Who are you?" I ask, more defensively than I'd like.
"Jake. I'm Lia's boyfriend." He says curtly.
I give him a glance up and down. He's tall, brunette, blue-eyed. He seems a lot quieter than Dahlia.
"How'd you meet?"
He says nothing, simply glaring at me.
"Or not," I say, finding the little speck of amusement I have.
"My girl doesn't like you," he finally says, looking off towards her.
I scoff, placing my elbows on my knees. "You think I don't know that?"
"You do, but I'm just letting you know, because that means I don't like you either dickhead." His voice is nonchalant, as if it's a no-brainer to follow Dahlia's thoughts and ideas mindlessly.
"Fair enough."
Dahlia finally starts walking towards us. I stand up and feel my palms sweat.
"Where is she? How is she? Do they know what happened?"
Dahlia looks down at the floor, "They said they'll have her in examination for a couple of hours. All we can do is wait Cade."
I sit back down, my fists clenched as tightly as possible.
Who did this to her.
I want to kill someone.
I want to be able to make someone pay for what happened to Kaia tonight. I can't imagine what's been floating through that head of hers in the last hour. She's always stuck so deep inside her head, always so quiet, always so pensive.
My best wish is that she remembers what happened, the couple of minutes leading up to all of this.
I pray she has a name, a face, a description. So help me god, that as soon as I have an answer, I'll make sure to put it to good use.
——
    All three of us sit quietly in the hospital chairs.
    I've always hated hospitals. They're cold, lifeless, bleak. I know my dad is somewhere between these halls. We thought he'd get better if he stayed at home for a bit, resting, but it seemed to get worse every time.
A coughing fit became him suffocating.
It's been three hours.
I thought about calling Mrs. Turner, but it's Friday, and I know what she tends to do Friday nights.
Dahlia suggested calling Kaia's friends, but I told her not to.
Dahlia moved away and Kaia was left alone for most of her sophomore year. She made friends that Dahlia won't recognize, friends that Dahlia hasn't had the disdain of speaking to.
I don't know all of them very well, but I've seen Kaia walk around with them in the halls. I know that they're all friends with Gabby, and that's enough for me to neglect the idea of any of them being trustworthy all together.
A nurse finally walks in, standing in front of all of us.
"Are any of you in relation to the patient?" She asks, holding a clipboard against her blue scrubs.
    I look at Dahlia, begging her silently.
    She sighs, "Yes, I'm her sister."
    "Very well, can we speak for a moment alone."
    I don't take my eyes off the two of them. It feels like the world might crash down any second. I've sat in this chair for nearly four hours and still don't think I've processed what's going to happen.
    Will Kaia be okay? Surely.
    Kaia is strong, and Kaia has Dahlia, and I. Mystery boy even seems pretty keen, even if it's only by his relation to Dahlia.
     Seconds pass agonizingly slow, trickling down the walls, and smothering the floors like wet paint. I smell hospital rooms, and hospital food. I smell rooms I'm not able to recognize, and foggy nights.
    Dahlia finishes talking to the nurse, and heads towards us.
    "There's no evidence of any sort, inside." She pauses, finding not difficult to form the sentence.
    I shut my eyes. I dig my head into my hands and inhale a deep breath. I'd smile if this was it for her.
    What happened tonight isn't just a matter of whether or not she was assaulted, because that question is already answered.
    I don't need a clipboard to tell me whether or not it's assault.
    "Do you guys need a ride home?" Please say you don't, I can't leave her.
    "No, Jake is going to call his driver for us," She looks at Jake with all the care in the world. She's ten times worse than Dean. "Will you be okay?"
    I nod, "It's not about me right now."
    Her lips form a thin line and she nods.
    She interlocks her fingers with Jake, and they amble through the hospital exit.
    The hospital walls shine brighter than other times.
    It's a bit nauseating.