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my-fanfic-soul · 7 years

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No Need to Regret: Chapter 20

From the Beginning

When I was a kid, Brad was typically the one that would comfort me when I was upset. My parents couldn’t be bothered and Abi just always seemed to be missing that natural instinct to be nurturing. He did his best, but in all honesty, he didn’t have much to base his attempts off of. But, when things went bad he would always tell me, “Things always have to get worse before they get better.” A phrase he had seen on the wall in his elementary guidance counselor’s office wall.

Lately, I’ve been aggressively willing the universe to get around to the “better” portion of this roller coaster. I had found myself obsessively checking social media, particularly twitter and tumblr, to keep up with what people were posting about Niall. While the initial fervor had died down around the whole “Kendra is a manipulative user” there was still frequent discourse over my very existence.

Naturally, reading the negative things about myself and watching the rumors expand about the depth of my internal ugliness, I started feeling even more negative about myself in general. With more and more gossip magazines picking up the story and paparazzi yelling at Niall on the streets, looking for a comment on what my mother had said, I was feeling guilty on top of it all not just about not being with my brothers and sisters, but putting Niall in a bad light. Making someone “problematic” in the fandom who previously had not been.

This only caused issues between me and Niall. “Keni, I’m trying to make you feel better about yourself but it’s damn near impossible if you’re still reading that crap all the time,” he had snapped after listening to me argue against him on a supposedly good trait he claimed I had. Maybe snapped isn’t the right word, but he was definitely getting snippy and losing his patience with me. We had less time to talk than usual, with him getting ready for the first leg of his tour and being in rehearsal and he didn’t like spending so much of it hearing me rehash the worst parts of my day and the internet.

If work was normally a reprieve, because at least I was busy, the tides had definitely turned there, as well. Samantha was always asking a million and one questions about Niall and our relationship. When she wasn’t asking about Niall, she was wanting to know about the relationship between me and my mother and the full back story. She meant well, and I knew she was concerned because the image my mother painted in the magazine was worlds different than the Kendra she knew, but it was exhausting to have to keep evading her and being as vague as possible when I couldn’t escape.

School had finally started, but it was only a bit of a welcome distraction. I felt like I was under a microscope everywhere I went. Even if they weren’t look at me and whispering comments that I could still faintly hear, I felt like everyone was staring at me. It was enough to drive a girl insane and school had only just started… it would only get worse from here.

The best part about the entire thing was that Michaela had gone from the friendly barista I talked to whenever she was free to being an actual friend that lived in the same town as me. She didn’t know my full backstory, and made a point of letting me know she didn’t actually want to know. “With a mom like that, it can’t be pleasant,” she had said when I offered to fill her in on why my mother was a pig.

“I went off on a girl on Twitter earlier,” she casually mentioned as she leaned against the counter in my tiny kitchen. She was currently watching me do my best Jenga impersonation as I attempted to pull out a few mugs for us without pulling everything else out of my crammed kitchen cabinets.

I blew a strand of hair out of my mouth as I finally climbed back off the counter and placed both mugs on the counter. “Oh? Why’s that?”

Michaela snorted as she watched me methodically prepare our tea. She was still a skeptic about my technique making a difference. “She was being a total bitch about you. I couldn’t take it anymore and I freaked out on her. Told her she obviously didn’t know who or what she was talking about if she was saying those things about you.”

“I appreciate the support, but it won’t change anything. It’ll just make you a target.”

“You should tell that to your sister. Abi has been going off ever since the article was released.”

I sighed, remembering reading a post where my sister was blistering a girl for painting my mother in a positive light. “I know, and I’ve tried to stop her. As much as she wasn’t the sweet sister you’d go talk to about boys while you painted each other’s toenails, she is extremely protective of all of us. I almost think she’s enjoying having a reason to rage at all of the assholes that inhabit the internet.”

Michaela shook her head as she grabbed her mug and pulled it closer to her, swirling the tea bag around in the rapidly darkening water. “What’s Niall got to say about all of that?”

It was my turn to shake my head. “He’s still royally pissed about the article, but there’s nothing we can do about it. He really wishes Abi would back off her one-man Twitter rampage, but he knows we can’t control her. He’s got enough on his hands as it is.”

Her look was sympathetic now. We don’t talk about my relationship much. She knows I’m private and she won’t press for details. “When are you going to get to see him again? Ballpark estimate.”

“Spring break.”

She tutted as she went to pull her tea bag out of her mug. “I don’t know how you can manage it, only seeing him every few months.”

“It’s not easy but what choice do I have? He travels the world for a living and I’m still in college. I can’t exactly become a groupie and follow him everywhere. I think we’d start to get on each other’s nerves if I tried that.”

---

Even without my siblings to take care of, school and work were both kicking my ass. I was taking as many hours of classes as I could and working as many hours as I could, despite the awkwardness of dealing with people on campus. The first few days I tried to hide as much as possible to avoid the stares, but eventually I decided that it just wasn’t practical. It didn’t matter if I was crammed into a corner on the floor in a building I didn’t even have a class in, people would stare. At least I could be comfortable while people treated me like a zoo exhibit.

I was sitting in the student union building struggling through some readings when my phone rang. I glanced at it, expecting for it to be Niall or Michaela, but my stomach dropped when I saw Bethany’s name on the screen. It felt like I stalled, shocked to see her name and worried it might be my mother’s latest trick to get me to listen to her yelling. Most recently she had decided that I owed Mike an apology. From an outsider’s view, I probably dropped my book as soon as I saw her name as I scrambled to find my phone.

“Hello?” I said, my voice sounding miles away.

For a moment, my shoulders relaxed as I heard my sister’s voice reply, “Kendra!” But then my mind connected with the stress and strain in her voice and the tension came back.

“Beth, what’s wrong?”

There was no missing it now, there was panic in Bethany’s words. “It’s Olivia. She’s sick again and she just won’t quit coughing. I’ve been home with her for a week and she just keeps getting worse. I don’t know what to do. I tried going next door, but they’re out of town…”

I was already shoving things in my backpack. “Where’s mom?” I asked her as I heaved the straps over my shoulders.

My stomach turned to ice as she replied, “I don’t know. I haven’t seen her in two weeks.” I could hear the coughing in the background get louder, like she was moving closer to Livy. “Keni, I think her lips are turning blue. I’ve been trying to use her medicine from the last time she was sick, but I ran out.”

Now wasn’t the time to play twenty questions and it definitely wasn’t the time, or place, to start screaming about our useless mother. “Bethany, I need you to listen to me. I’m going to hang up because I need you to call 911. I’ll take care of calling dad and I’m on my way down there now. It’s going to take me a couple of hours, but I promise I’m on my way.”

I don’t remember getting off the phone. I don’t remember what she said. I don’t remember calling my dad, only the beep as it was sent to voicemail. I was on the edge of campus when I remembered that I don’t have a car. A brief moment of panic settled over me as I scrambled for some solid way to get to my sisters. I didn’t have the money for a cab all the way to my hometown. That was a once a year luxury. I had a close friend now, but it was too far away for me to ask to borrow Michaela’s car.

Staying here wasn’t an option. Abi was at a wedding out of state, so she couldn’t go to the hospital. Brad loses money he can’t afford to lose when he misses work. Even if they were available, I need to be there. My terror was overwhelming and only getting worse the longer I stood here. Mom hadn’t been home in weeks. Bethany hadn’t told me, for whatever reason. Livy is sick enough to need an ambulance. I’m hours away from them.

The only option was clear, but I hated resorting to it. I took a deep breath and swallowed my pride, though. My sisters were in a bad spot and it wasn’t time to let my ego get the better of me. A weird feeling filled my veins as I opened my contacts, something between being numb and being sick to my stomach, except all over my body. It was probably dumb, but part of me felt like this phone call was more than me just asking for a favor. A thick accent answered after the third ring. “Ken, I’m busy, can I call you later…”

“Niall,” I rushed, praying he wouldn’t hang up. “I need you to hire a car for me from here to my hometown.”

It came out wrong. Like I was demanding that he had to do this. The silence from his end only lasted a beat though, and he picked up on the things I wasn’t saying. “Kendra, what’s wrong?” Quickly, I explained that my mom had left the kids alone and that Bethany was having to take Olivia to the hospital and I needed to get home, I just didn’t have the money to get there. I heard him telling his assistant to schedule the car to pick me up as soon as possible from my apartment, so I started walking. “Any idea where your mother is?”

“I have no clue,” I seethed, checking traffic as I crossed the street. “If I think about her right now, I’m likely to break something, though. I know this is going to be expensive, though, Niall. I promise I’ll pay you back as soon as I can.”

“No, you won’t,” he says smoothly. “I don’t care about the cost. Just let me know when you need to head back up to uni.”

I hadn’t really put much thought to my classes. I’d need to email my professors, let them know that a family emergency came up… “I don’t even know when I’ll need to head back. I’m probably going to take a few days’ worth of clothes. There’s no way I’m going to leave if Livy’s in the hospital overnight.”

“I know you won’t.” There’s something in his voice I can’t identify and I don’t get the chance before he says, “I hope you know that I’m buying you a car now.”

I don’t even know how to argue about it anymore.

---

It was hours later before I was walking to the information desk in the ER in my hometown. I spent the ride bouncing my foot and checking my phone constantly. Brad was upset, but he couldn’t leave work. Abi was too far away to do anything. The minutes seemed to tick by as I wondered how other people my age could have so few responsibilities. What it would be like to not have the weight of the world on my shoulders. “Olivia Freeman?” I ask the middle-aged woman behind the desk, who looks at me with shrewd eyes. “She’s seven, came in on an ambulance a few hours ago.”

Before the woman can open her mouth, I hear, “Kendra!” I barely have a chance to turn around before Bethy is colliding into me. I can tell she’s spooked and my arms wrap around her immediately. All of the emotions of the last few months try to force their way to the surface and I have to fight them back down. It didn’t matter, all that mattered was my younger sisters. “Olivia’s back getting x-rays right now. They wouldn’t let me go with her.”

“How is she? How are you?” I demand, holding her at arm’s length so I can get a better look at her. She looks exhausted and terrified and I have to swallow my anger again. “You look like you haven’t slept in ages.”

Beth shrugged, avoiding the questions about herself. “I don’t know,” she said, her face screwed up in annoyance. “I’ve been out of the room a lot. Social workers and the police have been asking me a bunch of questions about mom and why we were alone. I know they had a hard time getting her to stop coughing and she’s on oxygen. I think I heard a doctor say something about pneumonia.”

Beth led me back towards the patient rooms. A nurse intercepted us just before Beth stepped through the curtain and asked, “Are you Olivia Freeman’s older sister?” I nodded. “You’re listed as her emergency contact and we still haven’t been able to get in contact with either of your parents.”

There’s a big surprise. “My dad doesn’t answer his personal line during work,” I lied. He probably saw that I had called and decided to ignore all of his calls until he didn’t have an excuse any longer. “He’ll be fine with me making decisions until we can get him to answer his phone. How is she?”

The nurse is just finishing filling me in on what’s wrong with her and scaring me with the talk of how low her oxygen saturation was when she came in, when the curtain is pulled back and they push a wheelchair through with Olivia hunched over in it.

“Liv!” I choke out, realizing just how scared I’ve been, too. She looks… awful. Pale and so small in a much too large wheelchair. It’s a small town, they don’t have a children’s ER or children sized wheelchairs. The worst was the tubes in her nose, attached to the oxygen tank and just how weak she looks. Miserable wasn’t a strong enough word to describe the way she looked.

She reached her arms out to me as she said my name and the nurses didn’t argue as I picked her up to transfer her back to her hospital bed. I sit down next to her, brushing her hair out of her face and trying not focus on the IV in her arm and the monitor they were reattaching to her finger. She was uncomfortable after having to be moved around for the x-ray, so I gave a nurse permission to give her more medication.

“My chest hurts,” she whined, her voice as small as she looked on the large bed.

“I’m sure it does,” I soothed, tucking in the blankets around her. “That’s why the nurse is giving you medicine. It’ll kick in soon, I promise. Try to get some rest.”

“I don’t like this thing in my nose.”

“I wouldn’t either, but you have to keep it in for now. Close your eyes and pretend you’re somewhere fun.” Once she had relaxed next to me, I turned my head to Bethy, who looked miserable as she watched Livy. “This isn’t your fault, Beth. You shouldn’t have ever had to make this call.”

Her mood wasn’t improved. “I should have tried to get help sooner.”

It broke my heart seeing so much of myself in her. I had tried so hard to make sure she didn’t have the life I had growing up, but she had been put in a situation even I had never had to deal with. “This is all mom’s fault. It’s not on you at all. The only thing you could have done differently is ask Noah to tell the school so they could call on your behalf.”

She picked at the corner of the hard-plastic chair she was curled up on. “I couldn’t do that. I haven’t seen him since before mom left.”

“What?!”

“Mom kicked him out a few days after Mike left. She went crazy. She was screaming at us constantly. Noah got sick of it and told her that he was glad that Mike left. That our lives would be better without him. Mom threw his stuff out on the yard. He put all he could in his backpack and gym bag and went to stay with one of his friends.”

My anger was boiling under my skin again. It didn’t improve as Beth spoke. “I would have told my school except the first day she stayed home I thought it wasn’t that big of a deal. Just a dumb cold or something. By two days ago I knew it was bad, but I couldn’t leave her alone and I didn’t want to scare Ethan. He hasn’t been taking things well at all. He’s mad about Mike leaving, you know he always hoped that he’d warm up to him. He’s mad about mom leaving. He’s mad about dad not checking in on us. I haven’t been able to get him to do anything since Noah left.”

The curtain pulled back a few inches and a female voice asked, “Is it alright if I come in?” I said yes and a doctor stepped in and introduced herself. “Are you the big sister?”

“Yeah, I’m Kendra.”

“Olivia’s been a real champ through all of this, but I know she’s glad that you’re here. We have the results from her x-rays and lab work.” She opened an envelope and held up an x-ray. “This is Olivia’s chest. If her lungs were healthy it would be mostly black except for her bones. This white bit here shows us that she has fluid build-up, which is not good. This combined with her lab work is really telling for pneumonia.”

I stared at the scan, wrapping my head around the fact that it was my little sister’s x-ray that I was looking at. “Is it definitely pneumonia, or is there anything else that it could be?”

“We plan to go forward like it is in fact pneumonia at this time.”

The words made me feel like I was about a thousand years old. “So, what do we do? What’s the plan?”

“We’re going to send a specialist down here to talk to you and take a look, since she’s so young. I can tell you that it is very likely that she’s going to be in the hospital for at least a night based on her oxygen saturation when she came in and the look of her scans. There’s a very good chance that due to her age and the severity, she’ll be transferred to a children’s hospital an hour away.”

“Would the children’s hospital be better for her?”

The doctor nodded. “They will be better equipped to deal with a child, and she’ll most likely be more comfortable, as comfortable as she could be in a hospital.” I nodded, wishing that I could curl up and take a nap, too. “Do you have any questions for me?”

I shook my head and she excused herself from the room. It wasn’t a minute later that a nurse was sticking his head in and letting me know that they had finally been able to get ahold of dad and that they were sending a police officer to pick up Noah from school after practice and Ethan from the house.

Time started to blur from that point. Liv fell asleep and I sent Beth to the cafeteria to get something to eat. Niall called and I gave him an update. Dad finally showed up and was questioned by the police officer and a social worker. Then I was questioned by the police officer and the social worker. They were nice enough, just asking about what I knew about the past three weeks and the history of the home, but I just wanted back with Olivia.

I spent most of my time on Olivia’s bed next to her. Even with her medicine, she was calmer when I beside her. Dad never even came up to her. Beth had just finished explaining that she had been digging through mom’s closet looking for more medicine that she may have been hiding when she found the cell phones when Noah and Ethan came through the curtain. Ethan looked as grumpy as Bethany had described him but he hugged me willingly and even through his tough boy act, I could feel him relax.

Noah didn’t even try to hide it, though. “I am so glad to see you,” he sighed as he wedged himself onto the small space left on the bed, Ethan sitting down on the only other chair in the cubicle next to Bethany. “I had no idea she was going through this at all.”

“I know you didn’t, but why didn’t you call me when she kicked you out?”

“I didn’t have my cell phone and I don’t have your number memorized.”

It was hard not to take my anger out on Noah. He was almost 18, a selfish part of me wanted to know if I had spoiled him by not making him be more responsible sooner. I knew it was unfair and that I had done what was best, but in this moment, I wasn’t the most reasonable. “Doesn’t your friend have a computer? You could have found me on Facebook.” His ears turned red, a sure sign that he was embarrassed. “What about the school? I’m listed as an emergency contact for all four of you.”

I could barely hear his mumbled, “I didn’t think about it…”

Deflating immediately, I said, “It’s not your fault, Noah, I’m sorry. Where have you been staying?”

Time accelerated again as an emergency court order was issued giving dad temporary primary custody of the kids. I was signed as a person officially allowed to make decisions on Liv’s account through the hospital. The specialist told us that he wasn’t comfortable keeping her here, so he was going to transfer her to the children’s hospital in dad’s town. I sent the kids up to the cafeteria again, there were just too many people in too small of a space and things were about to get even crazier with us being transferred.

Dad finally came in the room after signing the transfer papers. He barely glanced at Olivia and my mind traveled to the knowledge that in a normal dad, that might be because he didn’t want to see his little girl like this, but he isn’t a normal dad. He cleared his throat and said, “Someone has to ride in the ambulance with Olivia. Will you do it?”

“Of course,” I answered, honestly surprised he even bothered asking instead of just assuming.

“How long are you staying?”

That should have been obvious. “As long as Olivia’s in the hospital.”

“Can you stay with her, then? I have to work.”

Anger billowed up in me again. I couldn’t swallow it, not with him. Not with someone who actually deserved to feel my rage. “Right, I forgot. Everything in the world comes before your kids. It’s not like your youngest child is hospitalized or anything. Heck, you don’t even seem that concerned with the fact there hasn’t been an adult in the house in weeks. Wouldn’t want to interrupt your precious meetings!”

He shook his head dismissively. “You don’t understand.”

I laughed humorlessly. “Of course, I don’t! It’s not like I’m the one who basically raised her while you and mom pretended like you didn’t have kids at all. It’s not like I don’t have a job or college or anything important like that. It’s not like I’m the only one willing to actually sacrifice anything for you children. I don’t want to understand how you’ve managed to justify this.”

His face was turning red. He knew people could hear through the curtains. “That’s enough, Kendra.”

“Actually, I don’t think it is.” Twenty years of frustration was too much to keep contained. I didn’t care who could hear. “You’ve never wanted to parent. I don’t think you even know what being a parent actually is. It’s not just paying child support on time, dad. It’s definitely not pawning them off on your older kids and vaguely hoping nothing bad happens. You haven’t seen your kids since Christmas, not even during their mandated weekends, and you don’t care. You were fine with not hearing from your ex or talking to your kids, meanwhile a fourteen year old was left to take care of the youngest two. Then one of them got sick and didn’t receive medical care. In your head that might seem normal, but I promise you that it’s not. She could have died and your teenage daughter would have had to live with that for the rest of her life. Do you even care?”

Someone cleared their throat and I looked up to see the nurse who had originally talked to me standing there, side eyeing my dad. “The ambulance is here to transport Olivia.”

“Will you stay with her?” he asked me again.

“Of course, I will. It’s not like you’re going to.” He stalked out of the room and I could have sworn the nurse gave me an understanding nod. I turned to Olivia who had woken up as the EMT’s started getting her ready to move over to their gurney. “You’re going to go for another ambulance ride, ok?”

She looked at the gurney uneasily. According to Beth her first experience hadn’t been the best. The EMT that gave her an IV hadn’t exactly been gentle. “Do I have to?” she asked quietly, her hand wrapping around mine.

I nodded and squeezed her hand back. “They won’t need to give you another needle though, I promise. And I’ll be riding with you to the new hospital.” She only let go of my hand long enough to be moved over, and then she grabbed my hand again. I talked to her brightly as we made our way to the ambulance, explaining why they were moving her and that the new hospital was geared towards kids, so she’d be more comfortable there. Dad and the others followed us out to the ambulance and I hugged the other kids while they got everything secured inside.

“Be good for dad,” I told them. “He doesn’t know what he’s doing.” Liv fell asleep pretty soon after the ambulance started moving. I spent most of the ride making small talk with the EMT sitting in the back watching her vitals and texting updates to Abi and Brad. At the new hospital, it was several hours before we were moved into our room. Once Liv was settled and asleep again, I stepped out into the hallway to call Niall.

“How is she?” he asked before he even greeted me. It was the first thing that brought me comfort since I got to the hospital earlier that day, what felt like a million years ago. Niall cared for my family and nothing meant more to me. This is how every other adult in their lives should be reacting.

“She’s stable,” I tell him as I move away from the nurse’s station. “We’re in a permanent room. They want her here for at least three days. She’s sleeping now.”

“Good. Sleep is good for sick people. How are you?”

I played with the edge of my hoodie, glad I thought to bring it with me. “I’m drained, in every way possible. I even ripped into dad at the other hospital because he doesn’t want to be uncomfortable in any of this.”

Niall snorted. “Good, he needed it. He’s a shitty parent.”

I grinned, my first all day. “Yeah, he is.” The grin fell from my face as I said, “I think he’s not going to get much of a choice in it, though. The court has done an emergency order to keep the kids away from mom and everyone from social services to the police are involved. They told dad they’re looking at possible child abandonment and neglect charges. They may have to move in with him.”

“I’m not sure that’s much better.”

I sighed, leaning my head against a wall, the cool tile feeling good against my skin. “In the grand scheme of things, no it’s not. But we don’t have much of a choice. At least he won’t cut me off from them, though.”

Niall is quiet for a minute before he says, “I just hope he doesn't start taking advantage of you. You have work and school to focus on.”

“He doesn't care about those. He's made that perfectly clear. And it's not like I can turn him down. They need someone that cares about them and that's me.”

“I just don't want you giving up everything that is just yours to parent your siblings.”

“There's probably going to be a lot sacrifice for the next few months, Niall. It's the nature of living and change. Things have to get worse before they can get better.”

Master List

Chapter 21

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