Chapter 4
It wasn’t long before they were driving through the industrial estate. The roads were quiet. Not a car in site. As they drew nearer to the building that her dad worked in, her heart sank. Yellow tape closed the building off. A crowd of people stood outside watching police officers milling in and out of the building. She could make out the local news van and her breath was sucked from her body.
Jenna felt sick. People dressed in white, their faces covered by a white face mask were holding what looked like a dead body.
A white sheet was placed over the top as three men carried the body on a stretcher to a nearby black van.
There was no mistaking what the back van was. A private ambulance. Jenna knew then that her worst fear was true. She had murdered him. It was self-defense. She told herself. That didn’t matter. The guilt she felt intensified, and her skin became hot and clammy.
What if she had left evidence behind? She would be sent away. Locked up in a place where all the bad kids went. She wasn’t a bad kid. She had just made one mistake.
“What do you think as happened?” Donna tapped her shoulder, and she peeled her eyes away from the scene. Jenna shrugged. She didn’t trust herself to speak. She twirled her fingers in her lap as her mind faded back to the attack.
Before she knew it, they pulled into the school parking lot. Jenna got out of the car with shaky legs.
Each step up to Dem’Say High’s double doors made her head feel lighter. She was swimming in a sea of despair and guilt, drowning in her own lies and fear.
As they pushed the doors open. Jenna’s legs gave way. The cold grey tiled floor broke her fall as pain shot through her knees and hands.
“Oh my god!”
“Are you okay?” Donna asked rushing to help her up.
All Jenna could do was nod. She could hardly see. Everything was blurry.
The boisterous noises from the pupils suddenly stopped, then became distant, like she was underwater. Her head began to feel fuzzy.
Flashes of light caused a whirlpool of nausea to spin in her stomach.
She screamed as a sharp pain ripped through her skull, forcing her to her knees. She clutched and tugged at her hair as the pain rocketed through her head. She couldn’t breathe. The pain knocked all life out of her. As her vision turned to grey than black, Jenna welcomed the darkness and calm that came with it.
“A break in?” Mason looked at his partner with a disbelieving glare. “Yes, there was no evidence that it was one of them,” his partner whispered as the police officers worked nearby.
“Why the police? We can’t afford to have them snooping around,”
“Mary was the first in this morning, she reported the body to the police before I arrived,” this was the reason Mason hated having to have interns working for them.
But they had to look like a normal laboratory. They couldn’t afford any suspicion.
“Get rid of Mary. I don’t care how. Just do it,” Mason ordered.
“Who was the man?” Mason asked.
“No identity as of yet,”
Mason’s phone rang. It was his wife. Cutting off the call he placed his cell back into his pocket, but she seemed relentless. The phone began to ring again.
“Mason?” Selena sounded panicked.
“Yes Selena,” He didn’t have time for her over dramatics. He had serious matters to handle.
“Jenna …. She has been rushed to hospital. She has had a series of fits at school,” If his wife said anything else. He didn’t hear it. His baby girl was sick. Mason left the situation to John and rushed to the hospital.
Jenna opened her eyes to be blinded. She squeezed them closed. They felt like they had grit in them, so she rubbed at them, which caused her eyes to sting. She opened them slowly. The light still hurt her eyes, but it was bearable. Jenna found herself in a white room. Beep, beep. She looked in the direction of the noise. She was hooked up to a machine that looked to be monitoring her heartbeat. She was in a hospital bed. But why? She strained to remember what had taken place. Her mind was blank. Her head began to bang, the pain was worse than any headache she had ever had before. The more she forced herself to remember, the worse her head became.
The door opened, which let out a slight groan. To Jenna, the noise sounded ten times louder and she gritted her teeth together and clasped her hands over her ears.
She didn’t know who had entered the room as she closed her eyes.
The pain was causing her to see flashes of light. Even with her eyes closed. The pain and lights continued.
“Hi, Jenna, I am Susan, and I am your nurse for this afternoon,” She only just made out the woman’s voice. It was drowned out by a loud buzzing sound. Jenna didn’t answer. She kept her eyes firmly closed and gritted her teeth against the agony she was in.
“I need to check your vitals” the woman said, then began to work on Jenna. All the time Jenna never said a word.
“Do you hurt?” the nurse asked, placing her hand on her head. The feel of her hand was soothing. The coolness helped to dull the pain. Jenna nodded.
“Where sweetheart?”
“My head,” Jenna croaked.
The nurse then fumbled with something. The rustling and tapping of her shoes, made Jenna’s head feel like it was about to explode. Did she have to make so much noise?
“The pain killers will set in soon, if there is anything you need, then just buzz,” Jenna couldn’t reply as she felt the drugs taking effect. Her mind was drifting.
When she woke up, it was dark. The room was silent. Where are my parents?
She bolted up in bed and looked around the room. It was empty. Jenna dove from the bed and fell to the floor with a loud thump.
Her body erupted in pain in places she didn’t even know existed.
Slowly she got to her feet and took carful steps to the door before pulling it open. Her legs were weak. Like her muscles had not been used in a long time.
The halls were deserted. She turned left and followed the hallway which said purple zone. A woman came out of a room, holding a clip board. She grinned at Jenna.
“Good evening, Jenna, I see you’re up and about,” Jenna took in her appearance. She was a middle-aged woman. Her black hair showed a few strands of grey. Her face had slight wrinkles around her eyes and mouth that showed her laugh lines. The woman’s eyes looked friendly.
“Come on, I will walk you back to your room. Are you hungry,” Jenna shook her head? She didn’t know how long she had been there, but she wasn’t hungry.