Chapter 0014

“Erica shut up or we’ll leave you. We have things to discuss without your constant complaints.” Leviene gave a scathing glare to the annoyance in question. It bounces right off her shield of obliviousness.

“I have important things to discuss too.” Erica argued.

“Do it later.” Sylphie cut in. “We were both anxious to hear the result of the party’s search.”

“I don’t have to listen to you cripple.” She did not go there. Please someone tell Leviene Erica did not go there. For the love of all that’s holy, did the idiot have no sense.

Panic set in Leviene as she ping pong between Erica and Sylphie. Erica and Sylphie have no blood relations, while Leviene was related to both, Sylphie on her father’s side and Erica on her mother’s side. Sylphie has been tolerant of Erica’s antics out of respect for Leviene and the Calbot family.

There is a limit. Hopefully, Sylphie didn’t hit it yet.

“Then leave.” Sylphie retorted, “You don’t have to listen to us, we as hell sure don’t have to listen to you.”

“Fine, legless. Laurie, let’s go! I don’t want to stay another minute with motorize muscle here.”

“F*ck that Erica. What made you think I’m going with you? Have you got brains inside that empty husk? Yeah so we’re f*cking gamers here, but guess what? You’re in a gaming world idiot. Us gamers are the one who’s going to know what’s going on and probably the one who's going to find the way out AND we don’t have to share the information with a whining b*tch like you. Go away and don’t come back until you learn some f*cking manners.” Leviene ranted.

There is a limit.

Sylphie didn’t hit it yet.

Leviene did.

Laurie hate it when she receive the news of the accident. Everyone rushed to the hospital, grabbing any strangers in scrubs, asking for information only to told they can’t have the information because they were never given the authority by the patient. It wasn’t the hospital’s fault. They had to protect the privacy of the patient as well as themselves.

It was so frustrating.

So the family waited.

And they waited.

When they receive news, they rushed to the OR floor, where they waited again. The doctors came out to deliver the bad news. Everyone cried, but they still waited because another member of their family was still fighting for her life.

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Jessica’s surgery took 16 hours.

Those 16 hours were the darkest hours of Laurie’s life. She lost her father, her uncle, her aunt, and now she might lose her cousin as well.

It made her question her determination to become a nurse. Why study medicine when you can’t save the ones you love? Wouldn’t it be better to become a cop and stop the crime when it happen or better yet, a vigilante who kill all the bad guys before they can commit a crime? Why does she work study night and day to become a person who can only pick up the pieces after a tragedy?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Because the survivors need someone they can count on to be there for them. Their family isn’t enough. They need someone trained to guide them, encourage them, just be there for them through the healing process.

Laurie tried to become that person for Jessica.

She knew the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. The Calbots were prepared to get through their misery together. They weren’t prepared for a disabled Jessica, but they were determined to pull through the tragedy as a family.

The pain was too intense for the paraplegic. Everyday, Jessica scream herself hoarse as unendurable pain race throughout her body. Everytime Laurie visited Jessica, her eyes begged her cousin to knock her out, drug her up, do something for the pain.

They did. They gave her a combination of methadone and hydrocodone. When that wasn’t enough, they pushed the doctors to prescribe oxycontin. Jessica’s tolerance level increase, so they had to give her a higher dosage for the same effect. When it didn’t work, Jessica turned to the black market.

First it was marijuana and morphine to relax her, then heroin and methamphetamine. They couldn’t cut her off the marijuana and morphine. Jessica needed the drugs to control her pain. Until she didn’t need it anymore. She moved on to heroin and methamphetamine and possibly cocaine, though John only found meth on her.

It became a push and pull of needs in a mire of sadness and depression, spiraling down and further downward towards a hell on Earth.

The Calbots were helpless against Jessica’s scheming. They were her family, not her mother. They couldn’t tell her what to do and what not to do.

May Lin Darnatell, Laurie’s mother, quit. She couldn’t take it anymore. She lost her husband. The mother of three wasn’t given time to grieve before she had to deal with her conniving drug addict niece. It was too much for her. Everything was coming at her, pushing her down, drowning her in tragedy after tragedy, never leaving her enough room to breath.

It was irresponsible of her, but she left Jessica to under the care of her children and took off for a year. May Lin came back a better mom, but a subdued, burnout woman.

One year of rehab and 24 hour suicide watch later, Jessica got better.

She got better, but she wasn’t fine. She wasn’t Jessica Deveraux.

The three Calbot siblings did everything they could to interest Jessica. Then the game years started. Good times. Good times. Good times.

It was mentioned before but it bear mentioning again. The gamings years must be praise three times at least.

“But Laurie, I thought you were on my side.” Erica teary implorement did nothing to Laurie. Admittedly, she always tolerated her better than the rest of the family, but she went too far.

“Erica, get a f*cking grip. I was never on your side. I just tolerated you better than everyone else. Now shut up or leave.”

After giving Erica the ultimatum, the duo turned their attention back to the party.