The Silent Fighter

Samuel

About a month ago, Susana and I got to come back home. We spent Christmas with our dads and New Years with our mom. She's a lot better than what she was, she's still a little out of it, but she's getting better slowly. Susana is five now and so is Jennika, she's almost six. I'm almost twelve and my brother, that's right Katrina is having a boy, could be born anytime now. They decided they couldn't wait anymore and they just had to know the gender. Today is January 6th, his due date is January 17th. Jennika was born a month early so it's very possible that he could be born soon.

It's about seven in the morning and I'm just not tired at all. I want to go say hi to my mom, but she's with Andrew in her room and I do not want to walk in. Last year, when I was ten, it was about three in the morning and I heard my mom and Andrew...... I'm not going into detail. Anyways that night I yelled for my mom to come in my room because I couldn't fall asleep because of what I heard. She came into my room wearing literally nothing, I couldn't see anything, thank God, but I knew she had nothing on. She asked me what was wrong and I told her that I kept hearing noises. She told me she and Andrew were watching a movie. I asked why she didn't have any clothes on and she said she was about to take a shower. I knew exactly what she was doing, but I didn't tell her. The next day I told my friend what they were doing and she was disgusted, so was I. So, I'm not going in.

My phone starts to ring and I jump as it vibrates. Fumbling around to get it into my hands, I'm finally able to answer it. "Hello?"

"Autumn, it's your dad. You need to come to the hospital, Katrina is in labor." I shoot out of bed and start pacing around the room.

"Okay, I'll tell my mom to bring me. See you there," he hung up. I open my door, quietly because Susana is still sleeping, and I look at my mom's door, it's closed. Well, I don't hear anything so maybe I'll just walk in. I grab the doorknob and slowly walk in. Andrew is already awake on his phone.

"Hi Princess," he smiles. He calls me princess, sometimes I like it and sometimes I don't, it depends, I'm not sure how I feel about it right now. "What do you need?"

"My step mom, Katrina, is about to have her baby and I need someone to drive me there," I ask shyly.

"Well I'll bring you!" he exclaims. He jumps out of bed. "Just give me a few minutes to get changed and we'll go," he smiles and closes the door. A few minutes later my mom comes out. She's still somewhat of a stranger to me, but I still smile.

"So I hear Katrina's in labor? That's cool," she smiles. She doesn't really like Katrina all that much. The funny thing is, she used to be best friends with Katrina when they were in high school, my mom doesn't seem to care for her much anymore.

"Yep, Andrew is taking me, unless you wanted to take me?"

"No, that's okay Honey, I'm tired," she's always tired, but whatever that's okay.

"Okay!" Andrew cheerfully skips in, "let's go!" We head out the door. Most of the way there we're silent. He tries to make small talk, but we don't know each other that well so I don't talk back very much. We arrive at the hospital and look for room number 18. Finally, we find it. We knock to make sure it's the right room, we don't want to walk into the wrong room. We hear a small voice say to come in, it's Katrina.

"Hi-" I start, then Andrew starts.

"Hi, congratulations!" He immediately jogs over to give her a hug, he barely even knows her. So I just stand there smiling awkwardly.

"Thank you," she tells the both of us.

"Well, I'd better get going!" Andrew says. He gives us both hugs and walks out the door at the same time as my dad walks in. They have a staring contest for a few seconds then they both walk forward.