Chapter
73
“What?! Oh, God,
what happened?!” Jenna cried, jumping up from her seat.
“We’re not sure… Brian and I went over to his house. Brian was worried about him because of… well,
everything that’s been going on this week… and so he wanted to go see how he
was doing and invite him out to lunch with us, and when we got there, there was
no answer at his door, so Brian went in, and… w- we…” Ashalyn dissolved into tears, unable to
finish her sentence.
“You what?” Jenna demanded, shakily. “Ashalyn, what happened!?”
“We found him… lying on the bathroom floor, covered in
blood. H- he slit his wrists!”
Jenna’s face went white, and she felt faint and
queasy. “Oh, oh God, no!” she howled,
swaying on her feet. Ashalyn reached
out to steady her.
“Are you okay?” she asked worriedly.
Jenna closed her eyes a moment and fought the dizziness
that threatened her. It’s my fault,
she thought. It’s all my fault. “I’m okay,” she finally responded. “I- I need to see him though. He’s gonna be okay, right?”
“I don’t know, Jen.
There was so much blood,” Ashalyn wept.
Seeing Jenna go pale again, she quickly said, “Come on, come down to the
ER with me, okay? I’m sure everything
will be okay. Things like this always
look worse than they really are.”
Jenna nodded, not really believing her, and walked as fast
as she could without passing out towards the elevator, leaning heavily on
Ashalyn.
***
“Who here is with Nickolas Carter?”
Jenna looked up at the sound of Nick’s name and leaped out
of her seat. “We are,” she said quickly
to the middle aged woman in a white coat who had appeared in the doorway.
“Are you family?” she asked.
“Almost,” Jenna replied.
“I’m his girlfriend. Please, is
he going to be okay?”
The doctor pursed her lips.
“I’m very sorry, but by the time paramedics arrived on the scene,
Nickolas had lost a massive amount of blood.
Too much, I’m afraid. We used our
best efforts to revive him, but we couldn’t get him back. He died.”
For Jenna, the whole room seemed to spin out of
control. She felt cold, then sweltering,
all the while dizzy and nauseous. And
then, everything went black.
***
“Jenna? Jenna, wake
up!”
Jenna opened her eyes slowly. The first thing that came into focus was
Elyssa’s face.
“What are you doing here?” she asked groggily.
“What do you mean?
I’ve been here all week,” Elyssa replied, looking confused. “Are you okay? I think you were having a nightmare.”
“Huh?” Jenna jerked
upright and looked around. She was in
Elyssa’s hospital room again. Or, maybe
she had never left. “A nightmare?” she
asked.
“Yeah. You were
twisting around and moaning. It must
have been pretty bad,” Elyssa said sympathetically.
“Yeah,” Jenna said breathlessly, still in shock. A nightmare?
That meant… “Nick!” she
cried. “Where’s Nick?”
“Oh, I don’t know.
He was in here earlier, talking to me, but he left, and I must have
fallen asleep,” Elyssa said with a shrug.
“Oh. Did he, uh…
tell you anything about me and-“
She nodded, smiling slightly. “Yeah, he told me,” she said.
“Oh, Lyss, I’m-“ Jenna started to apologize, but Elyssa
silenced her.
“Wait, Jenna, there’s something I have to talk to you
about,” Elyssa said. “I know I’m
probably not going to live much-“
“Don’t say that!” Jenna burst out.
“Shh. Just hear me
out,” Elyssa said calmly. “Look, I know
you don’t want to hear it, but I think it’s the truth. I know how serious my condition is, and I
just have a feeling.” She shrugged. “It’s weird, but somehow, I know. Well, anyway, AJ’s gonna be a wreck when I’m
gone. He’s going to need someone to be
there for him. Someone to love him.”
Jenna cocked her head, wondering where this was going. “What do you mean?” she asked.
“Jen, I’m not mad at you for what happened between you and
AJ. I think it’s great actually. I don’t want AJ to be alone for the rest of
his life, and if you’re the one he fell in love with, that’s great. I wouldn’t want it to be anyone else.” She smiled crookedly.
Jenna’s mouth dropped open. “Elyssa-“ she started, fighting the urge to
laugh, “AJ and I aren’t in love.”
“Jen, you don’t have to deny it. I don’t know what AJ feels at this point, but
it’s okay if you love him. I know you’ve
always loved him, and I guess you feel like I stole him away from you back when
we first started going out. I love him,
I really do, but now it’s your turn.”
Jenna shook her head furiously. “No, you don’t get it, Lyss. I don’t love AJ! Okay, maybe I used to have feelings for him,
back when we all met for the first time.
And maybe I was jealous when you two first started going out. But not anymore! I love Nick now, much more than I could ever
love AJ!”
Elyssa stared at her.
“What? You mean-“ She started to giggle, and Jenna joined
in. The two of them began to laugh so
hard tears streamed down their faces.
“Oh, no, Lyss, that wasn’t it at all,” Jenna laughed. “See, I went looking for AJ that day, cause
we were worried about him, and I found him in the chapel down the hall. He… he was crying, and I went to comfort
him, and I don’t really know what happened, but before I knew it, we were in
each other’s arms, and we were kissing.
Neither of us meant for it to happen, but it just did. And Nick walked in on it and got mad. But we didn’t mean anything by it. No offense, but it wasn’t at all like I used
to imagine back when I did like him.”
Elyssa laughed harder.
When she had calmed down, she explained, “I’m sorry about thinking that,
Jen. It’s just that that’s just what
Nick thinks went on. He said that he
knew you used to like AJ too, and he thinks that you’ve liked AJ this whole
time and were cheating on him.”
Jenna rolled her eyes and started to laugh again, but
suddenly stopped. “Oh my God, Nick!” she
cried.
“Huh?” Elyssa was
staring at her like she was crazy.
“I had this dream, and… well I can’t explain it now, but I
have to find Nick. I have to tell him
how much I love him before he does something to himself,” Jenna cried, jumping
up.
Elyssa shook her head in disbelief as Jenna ran out of the
room without even saying goodbye.
***
