Jenna (IN EDITING)

Chapter Thirteen

The hospital looked dead today, it usually was much busier on at this time of day. Adults getting off work and visiting their sick parents or grandparents. The hospital just looked creepy now, as if it stood as a graveyard in the middle of a busy city. But it wasn't a graveyard. No one I knew died there, they all died somewhere else. Two in the back seat of a car, the other in the bathtub of a apartment. The only place I really thought was scary was the fact I was unable to come to terms one day this would be a graveyard, to my father.

"You don't have to go in," I turned to Alex, who stopped the car in a free-parking parking spot.

"No, I'm coming in with you," Alex assured me. I smiled at him, he actually seemed to care about me. That was a feeling that would take me ages to get use to.

I opened the car door and walked out into the parking lot, my color was forming back so no one knew I was a sick kid. I causally entered and saw Debra right away. She actually stood up and made her way over to me, that was usual.

"Hello Jenna, I swear you get prettier and prettier each time I see you!" She said, pinning a bunch of my hair behind my ear with her timid fingers. "I hope my daughter grows up to be as pretty as you," She grinned. Wait, I cannot recall her being a mother or even being in a relationship and I knew Debra for ages, since she started her internship here during university when I was in the hospital after the accident myself. She didn't even have a relationship.

"Wait, are you expecting?" I asked her. "I don't mean you're fat, I mean that I didn't know you had children. Or a relationship."

"I'm expecting in April, I can't wait!" Debra announced and hugged me. "Now, wait, is this your boyfriend?" Her eye's view went towards Alex.

"No, just my best friend," I looked at him as he stood by my side, sadly almost half a foot taller than me. "We are not a couple."

"Oh, well I'm sorry for thinking that way, it does seem like you are from my point of view," Debra looked Alex up and down, giving him a formal inspection. "Well, I must get back to work. Go check on your father, and tell Bernice I said hello," She hugged me and went back behind her desk.

I turned to Alex and laughed. We didn't really look like a couple, did we? I mean we don't even get anywhere close to each other in the way a couple did. Not like he did with Katrina. The fact he kissed me yesterday still lingered in my memories. I never thought he was that bad. I rolled my eyes at Debra's comment and strolled off with Alex in tow to my father's hospital room.

My dad laid there with the same position as he did when I visited not that long ago. He wasn't the same man he was when he was raised me a decade ago. My father was dying, slowly. He didn't show emotion to the stories I told him, or to the tears I shed while begging his body to wake up. He was gone, long ago. But it's still good to talk to a living body versus a tombstone with his name engraved in morbid blocked letters. At least a part of him was still living, looking on the bright side! But he's still never be the same. None of us will be the same.

"He use to be the only one who loved me in the house," I explained to Alex. "Use to treat me like I was a princess in a castle. Now look at him, might as well be dead!"

"You don't look like him," I turned to see Alex as he spoke, he was staring at my father's face. "Maybe the facial features as in shape, but your nose and mouth don't look like him at all. Do you inherit that along with your musical talents from someone else?"

"No, the musical talent, yes. But none of my facial features, nothing from Tanya thank god," I sat in the new fluffy-padded chair next to my father's bed.

"You inherit things from both parents, common knowledge in reproduction. You may not look like Tanya but she's still a part of you," Alex caressed the side of my face. "Somewhere in you is Tanya but it's your choice if you want to show it off."

"Never, I hate her," I said with a obvious blank expression upon my face.

"Hate's a strong word, Jenna!" Alex acted like he was wise beyond years. Yet he was only seventeen to turn eighteen in January. Yet I still was to turn seventeen in November.

"Yeah I know," I smirked. "I hate her!"

"Well," He stopped touching my face and dropped his hand into his jeans' pocket. "Why?"

"She hurt me as I grew up," I attempted to keep my tears from flowing. "Both verbally and physically. I promised I'd hate her and not turn into her when I grew up."

"Who'd you promise that to?" Alex raised a eyebrow.

"Myself," I opened myself up. "My greatest enemy, yet my best friend."

"You can hate her, she sounds horrid anyways, but you have to promise me at least one thing!" He tilted my chin up with his other hand. His touch started to fire through me. I was amazed at how much one person can warm you up.

"Anything!" I told him.

"You'll never hate me," Alex meant this, too. His eyes filled with worry of a upcoming situation of which I may display hate towards him. Which, I was unable to see why he would think anyone would hate his baby-like face and pearl-white smile.

"Never," I promised him.