Planning Your Future

Fearless (Part 2)

September 25, 1991

Veronica's POV

JD and Erika show up as soon as they're done with classes. I'm gripping a letter when they walk in. "What's wrong?" JD sees how upset I look. I hand him the letter. "The news station wants to have one of their reporters come by tomorrow to interview me." I bite my lip. "You don't have to do it if you don't want to." JD says. "I have to. I'm sure rumors are already spreading throughout campus. If I don't tell everyone what happened, they'll probably say I planned to kill him or something." I sigh. "I get it. Just do what you think is best." JD sits on the edge of the hospital bed. "What do you think, Erika?" I ask her. "I have to agree. All those stuck up richie-riches will believe anything but the fact that Aaron was insane." She crosses her arms. Erika's right. Aaron was a well known guy. I was known only for killing him. The only way to save myself from being considered a murderer, which I fought so hard to stop with Heather's murder, was to get interviewed to set the story straight.

There's a knock at the door and a nurse comes in with my dad. "Veronica! Thank god you're okay!" He hugs me. "When my assistant told me she saw you on the news in connection to a shooting, I couldn't believe it. But I knew I had to drive up." He hasn't let go of me yet. Finally he does and sees JD. "Hello Jason." He lightly smiles. JD smiles back, "Hi sir. Nice to see you again." There's some awkward tension that you'd have to be blind to miss. Even the nurse feels it. "I'll leave you to it." She leaves, me feeling bad she had to witness that but also wishing she'd take me with her.

"Ronnie, who was he? The boy who shot you?" There it is. There's the question that was bound to come up. "Um... well JD and I broke up for a little bit and in that time, I was with Aar-" Even saying his name is painful. "With the guy who shot me. But JD and I made up and got back together. That really upset him so this year he snapped and he pulled a gun on me. We wrestled over it, he shot me, then the gun fired while aimed at him." The story gets hard every time I tell it. Unfortunately I can't be this brief with the reporter tomorrow. "I'm so sorry." He holds me again. "It's okay. My surgery went well so I'm fine."

JD gets up. "Erika, how about we go? That way they can talk alone." Erika agrees and goes outside with him. I feel bad that my dad made him feel the need to go out of the room. "What's wrong with you and JD?" I ask. My dad says nothing. "It's because he let this happen, isn't it?" I feel like that's what this is. "This shouldn't have happened. He shouldn't have let it." He looks down, almost ashamed to be angry about this. "I told him to let me handle it. Aar- he thought I was too helpless to do anything so I told JD not to intervene. That's on me, not him." I tell him. He looks up, "What about Erika? She's your roommate after all." I know what he's doing, and I can't say I blame him. "I told Erika to stay out of it as  well. I wanted to do this myself and it just escalated farther than anyone thought it would." I put my hand over his. "I know you want to blame someone for this, but it should be on him. He did this. Not JD or Erika. Aaron did this." I take off the sweater I'd been wearing, revealing the red mark on my arm. "He also did that. And JD and Erika didn't even know until yesterday."

My dad gets up. "I called your mother." Way to change the topic, Dad. "I secretly knew she wouldn't come but I had hope that she'd come if her daughter was in serious trouble." He seems genuinely upset she didn't show up. "I didn't expect her to come, but at least you tried." My mother never showed up when I needed her even while living with us. Why would she show up now? I shouldn't even call her my mother. I should just call her Karen. She shouldn't be called something she's not.

"Now would you go apologize to JD so he won't feel guilty anymore?" I ask. "Of course." He kisses my forehead. I watch from the small window on the door as he and JD look to be making up. Finally they come back in. "Well I'm sorry but I do have to head back. I could only get off of work for today." My dad tells me. "Okay. Love you." I give him a sad smile. It was good to see him but I do wish he could've stayed. He hugs me, "Love you too."

An hour after he leaves, there's another knock. Jill is on the other side of the door. "Hi! I am so glad you're alright!" She comes in, frantically rushing to my side. She grabs my hands, "I was so scared when I heard what happened." I look down at her hands and gasp. "Oh my god!" JD follows my glance and sees what my reaction was about. "Mom! Why didn't you tell me?" She sees that we're looking at her engagement ring. "Oh! I was in such a state of panic I almost forgot. Hank and I-" JD interrupts her, "Hank? You're marrying Hank McNamara? I didn't know you two had been dating." I laugh a little bit. The thought of JD and Heather as step siblings is kind of funny. "It started in February. But we kept it quiet because we didn't want to freak either of you out. But then a few weeks ago, he proposed. I planned to tell you at Thanksgiving but this came up and I figured you might as well just find out this way." She explains. "Well I'm happy for you." I shoot JD a glance, telling him to tell her the same. "I am too." He forces out.

I see Erika looking slightly uncomfortable behind us. "Oh Jill. This is my roommate, Erika." Jill looks at her with a smile. "Nice to meet you." They shake hands.

We all sit and talk until they have to go. I'm sad to see them go but at least they came. JD kisses my cheek before he leaves. The doctor, Dr Pomatter, comes in about an hour later. "Hello, Miss Sawyer. How are you feeling today?" He asks. "I'm alright. My stitches kind of hurt." I admit. "That's very common after getting stitches. They should stop when your wound heals more." He tells me. I nod to show that I understand. "Well I'll let you get some rest. I'll check in with you tomorrow." He smiles at me before he leaves.

I sleep horribly that night. I can't find a comfortable sleeping position. I probably only got about three hours of sleep. I wake up at around 9:30 am. A nurse brings me my breakfast and I'm still eating when JD knocks on the door. "Hey." I grin. "What time is the reporter coming?" He asks. "Around eleven." I'm not ready, but they're already coming so I have to do it.

When that treaded time finally arrives, I make sure I look as presentable as possible. The lady, who's name was Katherine, and her camera crew come in. The camera guy gets set up and motions to her to start. She begins to speak to me. "So Veronica, where did you meet Aaron Bridges?" She asks. "We had a class together and he had asked me out a few times and I eventually caved in. But he was controlling and selfish so I ended up breaking up with him and getting back with my boyfriend." I look over to JD, who's sitting in the corner. "Now how did he take that?" How didn't he? "Well he was angry and would do and say very petty things to me. Like throw paper at me and make rude comments about my boyfriend. And then this year he started to get rough," I rub my arm, which was still red. "Rough in what way?" I know she has to push me to be specific, but it felt like a dumb question. "He'd grab my arms tightly and throw me around. And he gave me this," I take off my sweater to show the red mark on my arm. "And he gave you those?" She stares at the mark. "Yes." I confirm. "Now tell me what happened the day of." She crosses her legs and leans forward in an uncomfortable anticipation. I repeat my story for the millionth time, except I tell it this time in great detail. When I finish, she has a blank expression. Once she realizes that I'm done, she smiles, "Thank you for being so brave and telling your story." Then she looks at the camera, "That was my exclusive with the fearless Veronica Sawyer. Back to you in the studio, Joe."

JD gives me a thumbs up with a comforting smile. They cut off the cameras so I am able to relax. Katherine shakes my hand, "That was a pleasure, Miss Sawyer." I grin a convincingly fake smile in response. As soon as they leave, I take a deep breath. "You did great." JD cuddles up beside me. "Thanks. I try." I shrug, just happy to be done. "I'm glad you were about to tell your story. You really are fearless." He laughs. "I'm not fearless. I was terrified. I've been terrified for weeks. I tried to be brave but I wasn't. I just let him have his way with me." I stare at my lap. "Well he can't do that anymore." He holds me close. "I love you." I don't know if he says it as a regular "I love you" or as a reassurance to make sure that I still know that he does. Either way I say it back, "I love you too." I lay my head on his shoulder.