Chapter 6: Better

"The people who are meant to be in your life are the ones who know how to stay and patiently wait for you to heal. Fabian could do that, i know he could."

"So? Was he like... dead? Or..." Kacey trailed off as she looked at Jaimie-mae expectantly.

"What, no! He was fine. Just a little beat up." Jaimie-mae was already begininng to feel upset over her friends words.

"Was he cute?" Kacey asked as she wiggled her eyebrows.

"He was hit by a car," Jaimie-mae deadpanned.

"Right. But was he cute?"

"Why does it matter. The only thing that matters is that he didn't d-d..." Her voice cracked and her eyes blurred.

The memories began to slowly seep back into her brain. She had taken time and effort to seal the cracks in her brain so the memories wouldn't leak back in, but the seal was broken again. All because of one night.

She hated that her mind did that. Made things seem so real. Like she was really there again.

Jaimie-mae pulled back her four friends into the tight storage closet as the teacher, Ms. Dase, went to lock the door. All five of them peeked out of the closet into the darkened classroom. Their breathing was heavy and panicked as their teacher neared the door.

"Stay quiet for me girls, okay," she whispered.

Just as Ms. Dase got to the door, it flew open.

"No!" Jaimie-mae squeezed her eyes shut and tried to block out the vivid memories. Only, they didn't feel like memories. They felt real. Right there for her to relive all the time.

"She's dead," Jaimie-mae whispered as she cried to herself.

"Jaimie. Jaimie. I'm so sorry. I-i... what should i do for you?" Kacey panicked.

Kacey got no answer to her question. The only logical thing she could think of was ask the teachers to help Jaimie-mae out so she could get fresh air. No doubt over-curious students would push for information she couldn't give. She didn't even know the reason behind Jaimie-mae's attacks.

She'd asked once before and promised herself she'd never do it again. It was scary to see Jaimie-mae so... terrified. She hated to see her in tears.

Kacey quickly ran out and brought back the councilor and the suprisingly fit gym teacher.

"Oh the poor sweet heart," Mrs Benson said as she looked down at the curled up girl on the floor. "Mr. Divow, may you please bring her into my office. And be gentle please. Don't want her panicking anymore than she is now."

The gym teacher wordlessly nodded and bent down to pick Jaimie-mae off the floor. As soon as he had her hovering off the ground she screamed, now bringing all of the attention on her.

"Go back to your notes please," Mrs Benson said sternly.

All the students heads slowly returned to thier notebooks, but now they were muttering things amongst themselves.

"What's happening to her?" Kacey asked worridely.

"You can come see her during your free period. We should get her out of here now," Mrs Benson said, completely dismissing Kacey's question.

Kacey nodded. She hoped Jaimie-mae would be okay.

***

"You were doing so good. Do you know what made you react like this today?" Mrs Benson asked as she leaned forward in her chair.

"Umm. It was a lot of stuff just building on top of one another."

"Like what? Don't go into all the details. Small steps."

"Okay. Well, I visited the hospital. All that talk of people dying. It just gave me... flashbacks."

"Oh. I see."

"Yeah," Jaimie-mae muttered nervously.

"You're safe here sweetie."

"Yeah. Its just my mind tends to make things not so safe."

Mrs Benson smiled at her sympathetically. Jaimie-mae realized she got that look a lot lately. Everyone felt bad for her. She didn't like that people had to watch what they said around her. It was like they were walking on a thin layer of ice over a lake and if they stepped in the wrong spot, or even stepped too harshly, they'd crack the ice and fall in and everything would freeze over again.

She knew it wasn't her fault for making people tread lightly, but sometimes she felt like it was. It wasn't anyones fault except the person who made her live that traumatizing event almost two years ago.

"Would you like to go home early? I can give you a pass. I think if you at least tried to get some sleep, your mind wouldn't wander so much."

"Ugh. Yes please."

Mrs Benson quickly wrote something down on a slip of paper and passed it to Jaimie-mae. "Feel better, okay. So your friends aren't so worried."

Jaimie-mae took the pass and got up out of her chair. "Thanks. I will."

***

"Hi mom." Jaimie-mae rolled over onto her stomach and put her feet up, keeping the phone up to her ear.

"Hi daughter," Jaimie-mae's mom, Jazmyn, mocked.

Jaimie-mae giggled.

"Wait Jaimie. Shouldn't you be in school right now?" Jazmyn was in mother mode now.

"Yeah," she said sheepishly.

"Well, why aren't you there?"

"I had a flashback. So the councilor gave me a pass to go home."

"Oh sweety. I'm so sorry I'm not home to help you. Have you been taking something to calm your brain down?"

"No. I need my brain running for school."

"But i don't want you having those attacks at school."

"Yeah, but i don't want to fail my second semester. I'll be fine."

"Alright. Just promise me you'll try to get some sleep."

"Okay i promise."

"So. Did anything new happen while i was gone?" Jazmyn asked cheerfully.

Jaimie-mae began to wonder if she should tell her mom about the crazy week she had. She hated to make her mom worry when she was out of town because there wasn't much her mom could do from a completely different place. She knew her mom would stress knowing she wasn't there to help her, but she figured telling her when she got back would just make things a lot more complicated.

"Last week i went out with Kacey. We had lunch together at this cute little café."

"Good. That's good. I'm glad you're hanging out with friends again." Jaimie-mae could practically hear her mom smiling through the phone.

"Yeah. It was fun. And then a few days later, i was coming home from work and i saw a boy get hit by a car."

"Wow, that's so- What! You saw a..."

"Yes mom. I saw a boy get hit by a car. And i saved his life. And cracked one of his ribs by mistake."

"Jaimie-mae. This isn't funny."

Jaimie-mae felt slightly upset that her mother thought she was joking about something like this. She would never joke about a thing like that. She was quite blunt about it though.

"You aren't joking are you?"

"No I'm not."

"And you saved his life?"

"I did."

"Oh, baby face I'm so proud of you," her mother said excitedly. "What's his name?"

"His name's Fabian. I went to visit him last week Tuesday at the hospital. He was really nice to me."

"You went to the hospital?" Jazmyn asked, surprised.

"Yeah, i did. I had to know if he was alright."

"Is that why you've been getting the flashbacks?"

"No. I-i don't know. It's no big deal."

Jazmyn knew not to push her daughter, so she shut her mouth about her flashbacks. "How many times have you visited him?"

"Only once," she said quietly. She wanted to see him again. But she also wanted to avoid the hospital.

"How old is this boy?"

"Nineteen."

"Yeah?" Jaimie-mae could hear her moms smirk through the phone. "I think you should try visiting him again. I know you don't like hospitals. But it could help if you saw him healed up. You'd have a memory of him all healed up instead of..."

"Yeah. You're probably right. I should probably visit him tomorrow."

"Yeah go ahead sweetie. Have fun okay. I need to go now. I'll see you soon. Love you."

"Love you too mom. Bye."

Jaimie-mae hung up and rolled onto her back.

'I'm going to see Fabian tomorrow. He'll be better,' she told herself. And that's the image she tried to imagine in her head. Him being better.