The Aftermath Of You

Chapter Nine

"You're going to have to use crutches," the doctor told Toni, "and keep the weight off your foot for the next six weeks."

Toni's heart sank. "Six weeks?" she cried. "You don't understand ..." It was imperative that she finish her list in the very near future. "I've got to take dancing classes! That's plural - not singular." She looked up at the doctor's face, brandishing the list at him, begging him to understand.

He glanced at her list and his brow clouded over. "I'm sorry, Miss Hancock," he told her sternly, "But you've broken two bones in your foot. There's nothing I can do."

"Surely you have casts for athletes? Maybe a moon boot-"

The doctor turned to his computer and hit a few keys at random staring thoughtfully at the screen.Then he clicked his mouse. "Hmm."

Toni waited for him to speak.

"Your files say you have taken anti-depressants; do you need any more?"

Toni's face crumpled. That was only the one time. "No, I don't need drugs. The reason I'm not getting any happier is because you people keep shoving things down my throat. I'm not some guinea pig you can test all this stuff on!"

"There's always St John's Wort. It's a natural medication," the doctor explained calmly.

"I'll be fine." Toni sniffed. "Besides I'm going to be better soon."

Then with her scrawny shoulders pushed back proudly she turned and hobbled out to the reception where Danny and Jayden were waiting. "I'm stuck with these for the next six weeks," she told Danny sadly. "I'm not going to be able to do anymore dancing classes. I'm never going to get over Jack."

"Oh dear," Danny replied in shock, his fuzzy hair pulled back tightly into a pony tail so that it exploded from the back of his head. His faded green sweatshirt read 'Aloha' with flowers emblazoned across the front. "Are you okay, Toni?"

She was craning her neck this way and that. "What? Apart from the fact I'll never heal my broken heart?"

"You're just looking around like-"

"My family, where are they?"

Danny seemed awkward. "Uhh, well ..."

"Did you hear from them?" Toni asked.

"I rang your mother and I called Granny Smith as well."

"What did they say?" She needed some words of reassurance.

"Your mother actually said 'It's good she's off her lazy ass at long last', and Granny Smith mentioned that you might have to buy an automatic car like Ann Malcolm's daughter has so you can get around." Danny picked up his jacket and some of Jayden's books which were scattered over the seat. When he turned back around he found her still waiting. There was a pause.

"Is that all?" Toni asked finally. "Did they say anything else?"

He scratched his brain. "Your mother said she would have come to see you but she's going to Matthew's twenty first."

"Really? Who's Matthew?"

"Wouldn't have the foggiest, but apparently his brother is getting married next year... your mother was quite excited about it."

"Well, isn't this just like my family? They're forever nagging me and putting their nose where it doesn't belong, but the only days I need a few words they are always absent." Toni glared at Danny vehemently.

"Don't shoot the messenger, Toe ... I mean, Kidney."

"Let's see, my mother bothers me continually about getting off my "lazy ass" and getting a life... and when I do what she suggests and need a little help she ditches me for a twenty first birthday party of someone I don't even know ... You do the maths."

Toni began to hop angrily off down the hall with Danny letting out a long low whistle behind her. On the short drive home Toni forced Danny to stop and buy a large bottle of rum. That would be jam packed full of calories she thought. As the car pulled out of the bottle store the three of them were silent.

"Look, Toni," Jayden said. "There are all of those nasty rocks that killed all those people." He pointed at the graveyard which was bathed in light from the streetlamps.

"Those are headstones, honey. And they don't kill people, they just show us where they are buried."

Jayden was outraged. "Stop the car!"

"Why?" Danny asked.

"We need to help them out!"

"I'll leave this one up to you," Toni said to Danny. Opening her bottle she took three gulps of Pirate Juice (as Jayden liked to call it).

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