Chapter Two: The One With the Blond Hospital Boy

"You're actually out of your mind." Rachel yelled from behind me, after I took maybe ten steps into the hospital. I didn't realize she followed me here, so it took me by surprise, and I was angry about it, but deep down I was kinda glad too. I developed the frustration part because of how many people turned to look at me when she had to shout so shatteringly loud, but besides that, I wasn't angry at all. I was thankful for the distraction.

I remember this place in all the worst ways. It was this very waiting room that I saw my father cry for the first time in my entire life; real heartfelt tears that wanted to have hope that we'd go home from that day as a family of four, and not a family of three, but that knew somewhere in him the chances weren't likely. It was standing by this front desk that Mew's bed rushed right by me with frantic paramedics shouting words I didn't understand, and that I struggled to regain enough energy to follow her. It was in one of the rooms of this place that she flatlined, and was never to be awaken again.

The entire place was painted in white, a shade I always connected to a blank canvas, and the epitome of beginnings or origins, but ever since that day it became the exact opposite. It meant bad luck, and it meant that endings were just around the corner. It dawned on me now that it's a possibility that the reason I hesitated to find the truth about her disappearance wasn't what everyone told me, but more the fears that I had inside of me. I was scared of all the places that there could be answers.

"If you came here to stop me, you might as well turn around and go home, Rachel." I shouted back at her without bothering to face her, even enough that she could see my side profile. She could see my back and that was the most I would offer, that is, until I continued to take steps deeper into such a creepy place, alone. "People aren't the autumn season. We aren't here to enjoy the 'leaves changing color' being beautiful and what not. We're people. We don't enjoy death. Right?"

Of course, Rachel being Rachel wasn't going to let that happened without at least putting up a fight. She was going to express her defiance like she always did, which was good in only some scenarios. Sometimes it meant she stood up for what she believed in, but for a moment like this one, she was someone who got in the way of what I needed to do. She threw herself at me as an obstacle, when I didn't need anymore as it was. "Seriously Crishia! What good to you see in this? The case closed a long time ago. All it's going to do is pick at some old wounds."

"Those old wounds never healed. They're still gushing blood and no matter how much pressure you put on them they just won't stop. If you were actually a friend of her, why aren't you suffering the same? Why am I the only one suffering here?" My foot stomped to the floor and I became aware that the outburst was not only bringing back the stares, but the whispers of others that were actual screams, labeling me as a crazy entrance to the building that needed to be kicked out stat. I hated that feeling again - the feeling of that attention, but I brushed it off for what the moment was. I'd let anyone win at anything. Just not this.

"Shh!" Rachel hissed, her arm around my shoulder after catching up with me, and her other hand at her lips to emphasize her request. "Listen, Shang, okay? I understand what you're going through. I might not have loved Mew as much as you do, but I did love her a lot. She was my best friend, alright? My life revolved around that girl, but I'm worried about how this is going to affect all these people now. The people who are alive. So much time has passed since then. Don't you get that? You need to pause and think about what you're doing, Shang."

I flung her arm away from me, and out of her shock she took a couple steps back. Because of how much I hated her touch, it was a huge relief from the fire it seemed to burn right through my skin and deep into my muscle. I could barely move my arm comprehending that she's been that close to me and it increased the sting knowing she was still only a couple feet away.

"That's where you're wrong." I replied through gritted teeth, my knuckles hurting with how tense they were getting. "Apparently, you don't understand. I still love her and I always will, and here you are using the past tense like love dies when a person dies. That's not how it works. Just because she's dead you care more about other people than her? Do you know how inconsiderate you're sounding? That's disrespect to those who have passed. They lived and walked this planet as long as they were able to and that's not any different than anyone else. She's still the same as us. The same as this 'these people now' you speak of."

"But-." She tried to speak her mind, but I was already walking away, off on the mission I came here for. With how she is, I expected that she'd go right on talking and assume that I'd listen regardless of how she witnessed she tested my patience, but she didn't jump on making the chance to continue. It took her a while, and when she finally got there, she had yanked on my wrist to hold me back from reaching those who sat behind the barrier, who had access to thousands of people's medical records. "Shang, she cut her life short. Accept it because that's the only explanation for it and try moving on now. You've been holding on by relying on this imaginary security net and it's going to ruin you. I'm trying to look out for you because I can't look out for Mew anymore. You're going to hurt yourself this way. Trust me."

"I'm doing what she would've wanted. I don't care what the consequences are. Let go of me." I commanded her, trying to walk on forward, but she grabbed on tighter. I knew from the feeling that it was going to leave a mark, and that she didn't care as long as she made her point. For some reason though, as the pain settled in around my bones, it cheered me on to run from her grasp. As I scanned the people around us, and how the lobby was getting more full of them, I planned my escape with one last barked-out warning, the words extra spaced out than they'd normally be. "Let. Go. Of. Me. Now."

Like a miracle, she lost her grip, and I took advantage of the busy place, forcing everyone to serve as barricades that she wouldn't be able to get through so simply. She called my name after me as I did, and it's her voice that was louder than her footsteps, which began trailing behind further and further, as I planned. Oddly, the more she would tell me that she didn't want me to go through with this, the more I felt I had to get it done - an act of rebellion that I only digested when the demand came out of her.

I need to see Camille Leslie Lobrigas' medical records, is what I would have to say to the woman behind the desk. The lady who professionally typed away at her computer, and probably dealt with people like me on the daily so much that she forgot to feel any compassion for any one of them. It goes to prove as I believe. A hospital is a very terrifying place. It's a building that holds the sorrows and worst days of people's lives, and all that sadness is concealed at its heart, never to leave even if the walls were to fall down and smack the floor.

I need to see Camille Leslie Lobrigas' medical records, is what I would have to say to the woman behind the desk. I'd have to calm down my heaving breath, and my sore legs that only got as extreme as they were because I was running with so much anxiousness built up that Rachel would find me and I wouldn't be able to lose her twice. In what could be limited time, I had to spill what was in my head in a form of communication that could be understood - maybe no time for repeats.

"I need to see Camille Leslie Lobrigas' medical records." is what I finally managed to say to the woman behind the desk to signify a win for me, but my voice wasn't the only one. Already there before I arrived, was a strange boy who looked for the same thing I was looking for. He wasn't nearly as panicky as me, and he was honestly anything but. There was a sad quiver in his voice like he knew Mew's whole story, but nothing that showed he rushed here like I did - his blond hair - a color uncommon in the room - was perfectly combed back, it showed off his forehead as well as the blue eyes below his brows, and his outfit was clean and sleek, not overly fancy, but more dressy than I was. He presented himself well. Too well to think to associate with a casual family like us.

"Who are you?" I asked, but he did too. It took us the exact amount of seconds to get over the confusion expressed from our silent lips and perk up with the question we had in our heads. I cleared my throat, my index finger up in the air to let him know I'd go first, so this wouldn't last forever. "I'm Camille's older sister, Crishia. Shang for short. Now who are you?"

"Camille didn't have a sister. She was an only child." He responded, his hand at his chin and his brows furrowed. It made my heart beat an extra few times too fast to hear a sentence like that exist, that I couldn't get myself to argue with it. Left speechless, I had no choice to allow him to continue. "I'm - well, I guess, I was Camille's boyfriend. Gianni. Gianni Jules."

My body combined as if it were one muscle, and it came together like a rock that wouldn't budge or relax. I thought about how Mew and I told everything to each other, and how we sucked at keeping secrets, so much that we were physically incapable of hiding anything when it came to the two of us, but how at the same time, she never mentioned anything about this blond hair, blue eyed boy being part of her life. How could I have missed that? Can this stranger be telling me the truth? What if he's not who he says he is? It's not like he can be, can he? A creepy stalker maybe?

I don't trust him.

"Oh really? She doesn't have a sister?" I cocked my head to the side. It didn't register as fully as I thought it did until the words spilled from my mouth, leaving a bad after taste behind. I would've never thought in a million years I'd say anything like that, but in under a minute I had to face that there was a side to Mew that I didn't know. She's a different fragment in everybody's minds, and nobody thinks of her in the way I've thought of her all this time. Especially with the one fact that was bursting out of me after it was written over and over in capital letters in my skull, it just as well be engraved.

"And last I knew Camille didn't have a boyfriend. Ever."