Yes, it was a terrible ankle sprain. And me walking after that to track down Ethan only made the sprain ten times worse.
I groaned as I stared at the beautiful chandelier hanging right on top of me in my room. It was evening and I had had my dinner before everybody else. A doctor was called to attend to me. My mom had visited me twice to ask me about how I was and I replied that I was just fine. Thank God she didn’t ask me how I ended up with that ankle sprain yet.
I had already had my dinner. It was sweet of Samara to bring me my favourites for dinner and ice packs every two hours. The pain was terrible but I was able to walk by myself if I didn’t put much weight on my sprained ankle. The doctor had told me to not move around much and my mom had literally ordered me to never get out of bed for this week and if it was urgent, like I need to pee or something then to call Samara to help me.
Currently I was on my bed as Samara nursed my sprained ankle with an ice pack. It dulled the pain for a bit just for it to return as soon as the ice pack was pulled away. My ankle was lightly bruised purple. I hit the tiled wall of the bathroom with my ankle real hard. A small, barely visible bump was formed and I hissed in pain at a point when Samara pressed the ice cube a little too hard on the tender lump. She apologized profusely for that. She was really sweet and helpful. And already a great friend of mine, I could say.
***
Mrs. Jenson was a great lady. She loved her close ones deeply and cared about her family more than she cared about herself. She had decided to spend the entire day with me today, to take care of me and have a good talk with me.
After I had showered, which was a very uncomfortable thing when Samara was there to help me in and out of the tub when I was naked, and had my breakfast, Mrs. Jenson stepped into my room with a soft smile gracing her rosy red lips. I wondered how she managed to look youthful all the time. She looked more like an elder sister to me than an actual mother to someone who was nineteen years old.
I put the book which I had been reading down on my lap as I smiled back at her. “Good morning, mom,” I greeted as I shifted a little in my bed, pulling the duvet up a little so my ankle was not tangled in it.
“Good morning, sweetie. How are you? How’s the ankle?” She asked, propping herself on the edge of my bed as she eyed my bandaged ankle which was wrapped up in a compression band.
“I’m fine and so is my ankle,” I replied, watching her as she nodded, her eyes still on my swollen ankle.
“I hope you get better soon,” she said, shifting closer to me so she was sat right in front of me. “So… how are you finding things so far?” She asked, lifting her hand up as she brushed some hair out of my face.
“Uh… alright. It still feels new and unfamiliar,” I spoke slowly, choosing my words carefully and eyeing her to see if I was speaking something not normal to Juliet.
“Hmm… don’t worry. You’ll get used to it pretty soon,” She smiled at me.
I nodded.
“Why are you not working today?” I blurted out, not realizing that I was coming off as rude. Mrs. Jenson’s brows furrowed together and I almost peed myself. “I-I mean, it’s great that you’re not working today. I was j-just wondering.”
She let out a quiet chuckle as she slid closer to me and sat next to me, resting her back against the headrest of the bed. “I had never seen you like this. Nervous? Really, Juliet? What has happened to you? You were never like this before.”
I relaxed at the thought that I had not offended her. “Is it bad?”
“No, of course not. You’re much better a person now. I love how you’ve changed yourself. You’ve changed for the best, believe me.”
“Oh. I’m glad.”
“Now I really want to know what happened to you all these years. And I deserve to know! I have missed two important years of your life. I didn’t watch you grow in these two years,” mom said quietly, her voice breaking in the end as she tried to hold back her tears. “I really want to know what happened to my baby. You still very much look like the same. Just in some weird way, you look a bit different. I actually had to look at you for a good five minutes at the party to be sure it was really you. And indeed it was,” she looked up at me with her hazel eyes sparkling as she sucked in a deep breath.? Only I? wasn’t.
My words of comfort stuck in my throat as I became utterly clueless as to what I was supposed to say. There was fear. Fear of getting the lie spilled out somehow by some really stupid mistake. Fear that I would suddenly be pushed into the limelight. What would life become?
“You’ve got to tell me everything, Juliet,” Mrs. Jenson’s words distracted me from my train of though as she held my hands, drawing my attention into her eyes where I saw vulnerability and much worse, I saw how broken she was after her daughter left. I could never understand the pain of a mother whose child had ran away. I could never know how she had survived the uncertainty of her daughter’s safety, spent two years in utter horrific suspense, not knowing if her daughter was even alive. Was she even in this world any more?
I felt my head lower in shame. How could I do this to her? I was being so selfish, so inconsiderate and so horribly insensitive to her feelings. I was worse than Olivia. I was worse than Ashley. Ashley, she didn’t even do anything that big and wrong. She was just a normal college girl like me who was just living her life. For the first time, I felt bad for slapping her and for ripping that purple dress of hers to pieces. She didn’t deserve it. I deserved to get the worst. Sure, Olivia kind of forced me to do it but in the end I was the one who went along with her ridiculous plan. She was such a bitch. But more than her, I was such a bitch. I didn’t have the right to hurt someone like that, play with someone’s feelings like that. I was free to refuse. Yet I chose to lie.