As Good As It Gets

Chapter 13

LAYLA POV
When he first said trip to New York, I thought what the hell was I going to get into? Then I thought about it. I meant I really thought about it. And turns out, it sounded like a really good idea. New York- the big apple. We were going to New York. Parker said we would figure out the plans today and we would start packing today. I was fine with doing both. Parker booked the tickets and I called his mom and told her to come over. She came within 5 minutes. I sat my family down at the table with Parker's mother.
"Well hello Barbara. It's been a while." My dad says greeting her by kissing her cheek.
"Yes it has been Ryan. How lovely it is to see you." Barbara smiled widely.
"And I you." My father said sitting down next to her. Ariel came running in and sat on the opposite side of Barbara.
"Hi I'm Ariel." She waved.
"Hi sweetie. I'm Barbara. Parker and Troy's mama." Barbara said smiling.
Ariel's face went pale. "H-Hi."
"Don't worry Troy tells me he's very fond of you and he has told me that you add very pretty. And might I say he is definitely right. You're so cute." She said.
"Thank you." Ariel muttered as her cheeks went red.
"What's the news Flounder?" My dad rubbed his forehead.
"Well Parker and I have decided that it would be a good idea to get out of town for a while. Maybe a month or two. We are still working out the little details which him and I will take care of and all you have to do is worry about yourself. We are taking a trip....to New York!" I excitedly said.
My dad's face paled, Ariel got excited and Barbara followed suit to Ariel and was very excited.
"Layla I don't think-"
"Dad.....you can't decide this. You are just going to come along for the trip. Okay? I'm going to be 18. I'm not 5 anymore. Parker is 18. He's an adult. We are okay. Dad I know that you will worry about me for the rest of your life and even beyond that but really....I'm good. I've been doing this on my own for a long time. I'm okay." I said.
My dad had tears in his eyes. He walked upstairs.
"Dad!!" I screamed.
"Layla......have fun in New York." My dad muttered as he shut his door to his bedroom. I put my head in my hands.
"I'm guessing you two are in?" I asked them.
"Of course! New York!!" Ariel screeched.
"Count me in." Barbara smiled.
"Okay. So you two go pack. I'm going to see if I can convince Dad to go with us." I half smiled back.
I walked up the stairs and into my room. I want to give me a little bit of time to himself. When I walked in my room, Parker was there on the computer on my bed.
I sat next to him and leaned my head against his shoulder.
"Layla what happened?" He asked me turning his head to look at me.
"Your mom and my sister are packing now." I weakly smiled back.
"Your dad?" He asked.
I shook my head with tears in my eyes. I whimpered.
"Layla....." I whispered pulling me into his arms. I cried silently into his chest.
"I just......really wanted him to agree with me. He's my dad. He's been playing the mom role and the dad role for ever since I can remember. It's not just hard on him though. It's extremely difficult on me. I was being the parent in this situation and I tried my best. Just thought that my dad out of all people would stand by me always. No matter what it was." I cried.
"He does understand you. He does believe me. Maybe he doesn't want to go because with all of you out of the house, who would be there to watch over your mother?" Parker told me rubbing my arm soothingly.
"What do you mean?" I asked him. 'Watching over my mother?'
"I wasn't-"
"It's okay Parker. Tell her. Tell her everything. I'll be downstairs in my office.....when your finished." My dad said standing in the doorway watching us talk.
"Tell me everything? Have I been that out of it? That my boyfriend knows more about my family then me?" I cried silently.
I heard my father's slow footsteps go down the creeping stairs. And then I felt in. It was a pain so sharp, it was like a knife to the heart. I cried out.
"Layla what's the matter?" Parker asked.
"My.......heart...." I gasped. I choked as I fell off the bed and onto the floor.
Breathe Layla Breathe i told myself.
My body almost collapsed until I took in a gasp of air from my inhaler which laid on the floor. I took a gasp of air or two and I regained my breath.
"Are you okay?" Parker asked.
"I'm-"
"Layla?" Was the last I heard from Parker's voice for a couple of months.
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LAYLA'S FATHER'S POV
I was sitting in my office waiting for Layla to walk in, tears streaming down her face, screaming at me about why I never told her about her mother. Why I kept her hidden for quite a while. One night when I came back from work, Parker was sitting in the kitchen and I just collapsed. It was random and uncalled for but Parker was there and I guess I just needed another guy to be there for me. It had been a lot on me to not just be the father but also the mother role. Being both is not only challenging enough but having TWO GIRLS was a pain in my ass. Not that Id wish it different, but two girls could kill a man. With all the boys, and the heartbreaks, and gossip, and the talks and the periods......a guy can't handle that much. I had three girls but one of them......has moved away and isn't coming back. I rarely talk to her because her mother took her away from me during the divorce and I wish that I could have at least reconnected but after what I did to Blaire, I don't think she would let me so much as near Pricilla. That was what we named our first daughter. I didn't get to be at her wedding and walk her down the aisle, I didn't get to be there when her first child was born, even the second one I wasn't there, I had missed out on her life just as Blaire had missed out on Ariel and Layla's lives. As I got up from my chair, I wondered what was taking Layla so long. I walked upstairs slowly because I could only take so much with my back and my arthritis. I slowly opened the door to Layla's room. You could hear the creaking from a mile away. There was a body on the floor with an inhaler next to it. Parker was next to the girl and when I opened the door fully, Layla wasn't there. Layla was the girl on the floor.
"What happened?" I quickly asked crouching down to get a better look at her.
"She took a drag from her inhaler because she was having an asthma attack and after saying a word, she just passed out. I don't know what happened it must've been something in the inhaler." Parker briefly described.
"Help me get her up." I told him lifting her up. We carried her out the door, down the stairs, and into the car. I hop in the drivers seat and turn the key. The car starts, Parker hops in the passenger side of the car and we drive to the hospital with Barbara watching Ariel in the house.
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PARKER'S POV
Mr.Ryan and I carried Layla into the ER. I had déjà vu. We had been here before for Layla. It feels like just yesterday. Layla was limp and just slightly breathing. Like she was just hanging on.
"WE NEED A DOCTOR!" I screamed. One came rushing at us.
"Fill out medical information with the nurse. Here put her on the stretcher." The doctor said as she rolled a stretcher near us. We did as the doctor told us and they quickly rolled Layla away. My dream came back to me. The one where Layla was screaming my name for me to come and help her. I felt like I was restricted. Like someone was holding my arms just like the police were in my dream. I touched the sides of my arms and felt nothing. It wasn't real, I kept telling myself. Everytime I told myself that, I kept believing more that somehow it would happen. Somehow they would wheel her back out just so that it would happen. But they never did. They never even came to get us for information. It was weird. Because in every medical case that they have in the hospital that I have seen on Grey's Anatomy, (yes I watch that show because Layla makes me watch it with her) never has the doctor or nurse ever not come out to get information about the patient and what had happened at the hospital. It's almost as if they didn't want the information on Layla. Like they weren't going to take it. Were they trying to kill her? I went up slowly to the front desk, all these thoughts kitting up my brain. Unfocused, I asked the lady at the front desk if we had to give information on Layla to them.
The lady says she recalled someone coming and asking for someone for that girl. The woman made a few phone calls and she told me to wait in the waiting room a few minutes. I've been waiting a whole 2 hours tramp. I wanted to scream. When I went back to sit down next to Layla's dad, he wasn't there. He must've left. I sat down in the seat I was before. I pulled out my phone and texted Layla's dad.
Me: Where did you go?
A minute later I got a text message from her father.
Him: Went to the cafeteria. Want anything?
Me: I could go for a cookie and milk or something like that. If not, bag of chips.
My stomach was grumbling so loud, I thought the lady next to me thought I was farting. I was laughing every time it happened cause she would scrunch up her face so that she didn't smell it. But there was nothing to smell.
A few minutes later, the lady came out and asked for information on Layla.
"Do you by any chance know what is wrong with her based on the information I told you miss?" I asked as I gave her all the information I could think of.
"We think that maybe, we still have to run some tests so it is not so positive yet, but maybe, she could have been poisoned." She said sighing.
"Do you think she will be okay?" Frantically, I twitched in my seat. Not enough for anybody to notice but enough for me to.
"She's responding a bit so we are trying to get her to hold on but there is no saying in what could happen in there. Thank you for the information." She waved her papers around.
"No problem miss." I dismissed her presence and just starred. Poison. How could she be poisoned? And then I thought about it. Could it be Clara Jones coming back to get her revenge on me, on my sister, on my family? I know the next victim is Layla but could she really have done that, that quickly? A half an hour or so later, Layla's dad came back with soup, salad, and two bags of chips. I ate the soup and the salad like there was no tomorrow. The bags of chips we shared together. I told him the news and he did the same thing I wanted to do, listen to the silence in hoping that in one second, someone was going to rush out of those doors and tell us that Layla Reynolds was a fighter and that she was going to make it. After 24 hours, we lost all our hope because someone came out and told us the exact opposite.