The Wallflower and the Prankster

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Broken but not Gone

Joshua

It’s true. The world is a scary, cruel place. That’s probably why I can’t face it properly. I hide behind my jokes and pranks, as if they were my main line of defense in a one-one man army. However, when one of those defenses chip away into nothingness, a question would surfaces again and again in my head.

A question I will never be prepared for because it will knock me down again and again—break me, then remake me.  And changing is the one thing I cannot do. No matter how much people want it.

It wasn’t until after the third round of basketball that news got to me. Sara had tried to commit suicide.  The news shook me to the core, and an empty feeling brushed through me. 

The basketball had dropped down to my ankle, and bounced a couple of times. “What the hell do you mean suicide?” I repeated the question for probably a dozen times to Eve as I paid the taxi driver in front of the hospital.

“I told you already, Josh. She attempted but—but she’s fine now. She is resting.” Like hell that would be comforting. How the hell was I supposed to act when my best friend was in the hospital because she attempted suicide?

“She was fine the day before.”

Eve exhaled into the phone. “And she was fine for all of her seventeen years—even a month ago. “

A month—a month ago, I had just started dating Alazne Martina. The tension in my stomach uncoiled a bit at the thought of Alana. I can’t even stand to think of Alana without wanting to race back to her. My whole body wanted to go and support Sara, but my mind screamed for Alana.

I left her on a bad term. I should’ve been trying to make her feel better, even when she was rumored to like Ricki, the last thing I wanted to do was leave her. It made me want her more, or atleast show, and prove to the world that we were together.  Instead, I did neither of those things, I just left her.

I did it for a good cause, I reminded myself. Sara needs me.

I clutched my phone in my hand tightly, and raced for the room. Eve worked at this hospital so I had a fair idea of where things were, not to mention my past history of coming here with broken arms and such.

I cursed under my breath, seeing the elevator filled with wheelchairs and headed for the staircase. There, my words echoed through the halls. Nothing, absolutely nothing useful came to mind. 

When I got there, Sara was leaning on the headboard of her private room. A tube was attached to her wrist, and the heart rate monitor beeped steadily.

“Sara,” I breathed, allowing myself to breath properly again. I knelt down by the door, covering my head.

“Don’t do that, Josh.”  Her voice was strained, as if she was holding back a sob. “Don’t you dare do that!”

I lifted my head, happy at her reaction. “I should be the one telling you that,” I teased, finding enough energy to stand up and walk towards her.

She was pale, and her hair stuck to her cheeks as if she just took a shower, but I doubt that was the actual case.

She shook her head, and averted her gaze from me.  My brows furrowed, and I straightened myself up. “What’s wrong?”

I inched closer to her, connecting her dots on her cheeks in a soothing pattern with my index finger. That usually made her smile—giggles.

“Joshua,” she let out a shaky breath. I flinched at my name. She hardly says my full name, and when she does, it’s serious. “Can you do me a favor?”