Anne's POV
“Girl, where have you been!” Jane exclaimed, rushing into the room, with Pamela in tow. “We thought you'd been kidnapped! We've scoured the entire earth for you!”
Oh shoot!
I totally forgot about my friends.
Exhausted, I had returned to the hostel, fell on the bed and slept off. Stupid me.
“Oh you have a black eye,” Pam said softly, covering her mouth with her palm.
They came to my side and began fussing over me, looking me over to make sure I was mentally and physically okay.
“Oh no, your arm!” Jane said, taking my arm gently.
“What happened? Pam asked, caressing my cheeks. “We stepped out to get you a change of clothes and food, although Jane,” she scowled at Jane, “decided to go back to school and find out what was happening.”
“The army was involved! School is a dead zone now!” She said, throwing her head back and laughing.
“As I was saying, when we got back to the hospital, we were told you've left. We came back here and didn't find you… We panicked.”
"We thought you'd been kidnapped," Jane said.
“Jane!” Pam rolled her eyes, laughing. “We thought you had collapsed somewhere.”
"No, really. We thought you've been taken," Jane insisted.
“You thought that, I didn't,” Pam said, and they started bickering.
I just sat there watching them, a huge smile on my face. Pam looked fine. She had her glasses on.
“Annie, how are you doing, really? I feel responsible,” Pam said softly.
“Oh Pam, please don't.” I touched her cheeks. “You would have done the same for me. I'm not so sure about Jane."
Jane gasped dramatically, pressing a hand to her chest. Pamela and I burst out laughing.
“I was worried about you too, Pam. You had it rough as well. How did you even get out?”
“Oh let me tell you!” Jane chipped in. “Dr. Ken came to her rescue."
Dr. Ken, Pam’s crush, was the youngest lecturer and the object of every lady’s swoon.
"He was in the office behind the podium when the ruckus started. He saw her, pulled her up onto the podium, and from there they fled together into the sunset.”
Pam’s cheeks turned a deep shade of red. “Shut up, Jane.”
I laughed.
"No, seriously, where have you been?" Pam pressed, "We’ve been worried sick."
Oh no.
I hadn't told them of any of my encounters with Andrew.
“Uh… I ran into a friend. I'm so sorry guys, my phone died, I would've called.”
“In this state, Anny? Could your friend really not have waited? You needed your rest," Pam said softly, placing a hand on my arm.
“Uh… it was important... Plus he was looking out for me the entire time”
He had, even if it annoyed me at the time. He kept going on about my bruises, fussing like it was his responsibility. He even suggested we postpone the conversation until I was better, but I refused.
I didn't want anything to do with him or his brother, so the earlier we got it over with, the better.
“Ooh! Was it the man that brought you back that night?” Jane asked, her eyes lighting up.
This was two weeks ago. They had seen him drop me off at the hostel. Half the hostel had seen him that day. Some girls had practically hung out of their windows. Ever since then, Jane had refused to let it go.
I'd told them he was a doctor at the hospital and that we would be conducting our project there in a couple of weeks, which was true. I just didn't tell them how we actually met.
“No, Jane. It was some other friend,” I said, hoping that would end it.
“Oh really!”
“Jane, drop it. Anny needs to rest,” Pam cut in, and I was grateful for that. “Get some sleep. There's food if you want some. Jane and I will go get your prescription from the pharmacy, okay.”
After that, she dragged Jane along, who grudgingly followed.
“This isn't over, Anne!”
I let out a slow breath and sank back into the bed, my mind going back to my conversation with Andrew.
He had been in tears the entire time. He blamed himself. He even pleaded to make it up to me by footing all my medical bills, which I declined.
“Why'd you stop,” I'd asked him.
“My intent was to scare you a little, Anne,” he said. “I hated the assumption I felt you had about us when, in truth, you had every reason to be wary. But when I saw your face, I knew I had gone too far. I knew I had messed up.”
“When you saw my face? Your friend literally hit me. Twice.”
His eyes widened. “I didn't know… I... I,” he trailed off, pressing his lips together. He inhaled deeply, breathing out slowly before he continued.
"I wasn't supposed to start anything in the first place, so it's on me. All of it.”
“And your friend, where is he?”
“He fled.”
Then he continued talking about how terrible a person he is.
There was something in the way he spoke about himself that unsettled me. There was so much negativity he attached to himself. It was troubling. This made me probe further.
"Why'd you do it then?"
He went mute.
“I hear you taking accountability,” I said. “That’s fine. But the root cause is still sitting there. Don’t you think addressing it would stop a repeat?”
"Anne..."
"Andrew, why did my being weary of you trigger you so much?"
He stared down at his palms for a couple of seconds, then looked back up, straight into my eyes, and boy, did I shudder.
"I feel inferior, Anne. I'm never enough for him. All my life, I've been told of what a failure I am, at everything..."
"Enough for who?"
"The one man I was supposed to take shelter in his arms. Someone that was suppose to nurture the dreams of his child."
"Your father."
He nodded.
"It's still not his fault that I did what I did to you, and I'm so sorry..."
I saw pain and guilt. The kind that has been suppressed for a long time.
He talked about his father. How nothing he did was ever enough. How failing a class was referenced whenever his father needed to make a point.
How one evening, at fifteen, he had come home with a song he had spent weeks writing, something he had poured himself into completely, and his father had looked at it and said that it was a waste of paper.
He spoke about it like someone repeating something he had heard too many times.
He apologized again and again.
“Where was your brother in all of this?” I found myself asking. “It seems to me he'd rather deal with things with money than actually address them.”
“Vincent?” He asked with a chuckle, as if I asked a ridiculous question. “It would have been a whole lot worse without him. My brother absorbed most of my father’s wrath growing up. He worked extra hard just to divert attention and give me room to breathe. He had it rough too, but you wouldn’t know that looking at him.”
He sighed and ran hand through his short hair.
“When I realised he’d found out what I’d done, I was ready to disappear. Because that man has sacrificed a lot for me, and I had just gone and jeopardised all of it.”
He told me how his brother, who rarely lost his temper, had been furious that day. How he had yelled at him in a way he never had before. If not for his injuries, Vincent would have had him in a cell that night. Since then, they had barely spoken.
Going to the hospital was one of his several attempts to fix his relationship with his brother.
With this revelation, it dawned on me that maybe I had misunderstood Vincent's intentions that day.
The arrival of Jane and Pamela snapped me out of my thoughts. They returned with more food and the medicine, and without wasting a moment, Jane began grilling me about the doctor.
“Jane! You literally have a boyfriend,” Pam exclaimed.
“A serious relationship, may I add. Seven years with your high school sweethearts,” I said.
Jane went quiet.
“Jacob has been acting strange lately,” she admitted.
“Oh, sweetie,” I smoothed.
This time, it was our turn to fuss over her.
She told us everything. How distance he'd gotten. How she had tried to fix it and nothing worked.
“This is me choosing myself," she said with a small smile. "I'm the price!" she added dramatically and we all bawled out laughing.
From then on, we talked until well past midnight. Who was dating who in our department. The boys who would not leave Jane alone. Pam's ongoing obsession with our eligible bachelor lecturer.
By two in the morning, they were fast asleep.
I wasn't.
I tried and couldn't get myself to sleep so I stayed awake regurgitating the past few weeks and its toll on my body.
“Thinking about the doctor,” Jane said sleepily when she woke up to pee and noticed I was still awake.
I smiled, turning onto my side.
Jane was right, I was thinking about him. Specifically, I was replaying the way I’d treated him, a memory that had made me cringe for the last twenty minutes. But mostly, I couldn't stop obsessing over the way my body had completely betrayed me in that hospital room.
I pulled the pillow over my face and let out a frustrated scream.