The promise. [Short Chapters]

Chapter Twenty.

Bright lights can either be an indication of something good or something terribly bad.

For example, if you're lost in the middle of nowhere, but you see bright lights in the distance, that's probably a good thing because that means you're that much closer to civilisation once more. But if you wake up from a particularly deep sleep and you don't want to open your eyes because you can already tell that in front of them lies a blinding white light, that's usually a pretty bad thing, and that was my exact situation.

The worst part of it was that I had no idea where I was. The last thing I really could remember was fighting with Josh and Max and then crying in the rain. I recalled breaking up with Matt as well, but not as clearly. I had no idea what I'd done that landed me in an uncomfortable laying position with a throbbing headache and bright lights before my eyes, and I wasn't sure if I was ready to face it yet, so I busied myself with trying to focus on the two whispering voices that I could vaguely understand.

"It's all my fault," the first voice whispered. "If I hadn't have been such a dick."

"It's all of our faults," the second voice reasoned. "We all could have avoided this if we tried."

I decided that listening in on this conversation was a rather dull way to spend my time, so I risked intensifying my headache by letting my eyes lazily drift open until they focused on two dark-haired figures: one sitting right next to where I lay and the other laying across the room on an armchair. When my eyes finally adjusted to the light, I recognised these figures as Josh and Matt, respectively.

Josh was the first to notice that I'd awoken. "Welcome back," he whispered so he wouldn't agitate my headache even further. He edged closer to me and placed his cold hand on top of mine. "How do you feel?"

I was too exhausted to even bring a hand up to cradle my forehead, so I simply murmured, "Like hammered shit. What the hell's going on?"

He and Matt exchanged worried glances momentarily. "What can you remember?"

I would've cocked an eyebrow at them in confusion if it wouldn't have hurt so bad. Instead, I just squinted and went along with answering. "You wrote a song about me and made me cry."

Matt let out a barely audible chuckle at my reply. "Well, it's not amnesia." Josh shot him a mildly funny glare, but I was more irritated that they hadn't answered my question than amused at it.

"I said, what the hell is going on?" I repeated, rather annoyed. It wasn't until then that I finally examined my surroundings. The bright lights finally made sense when I realised that I was laying in a hospital bed, surrounded by bleach-white walls and a few assorted machines, all of which were turned off. There was a small hole in the back of my left hand where an IV needle was once stuck, and my clothes had been replaced with a hospital gown littered with traces of dried blood. "Wh-what happened to me?"

Josh frowned and scooted even closer to the bed, now brushing his cool hand against my cheek. "You got hit by a car last night. Doctors said you're lucky you just came out of it with a concussion and a gash on the side of your head."

At that, I finally brought my hands up to my head, cringing both from the pain and from the feel of layers upon layers of gauze bandages wrapped around my head. "I need to take a walk."

Both boys in the room immediately shook their heads, but Matt was the one to speak up. "You really think that's a good idea with your obvious debilitating headache?" His tone was vaguely bitter.

I sighed and tried to look tough as I eased myself out of the bed. "I'm a big girl. Get a couple painkillers in me and I'm peachy. I just need to clear my head."