Country Girl | ✓

4

Pulling up front of our house, I noticed the ambulance speeding past on the main road. "Mummy?" Olivia whispered sleepily from her seat. Behind the ambulance was another car. The blue one I had seen parked beside the barn last week. Opening my phone, it almost fell from my hand twice. Calling Garrett's number it almost went to voicemail. "What's happened?" I whispered my voice tight already driving backwards.
"It's dad... He had a fall, I don't know how bad. We are just following in the car to follow Denny and the ambulance" he admitted.
"I'm following" I replied and didn't let him answer. Spinning the car around harshly, I sped down the road.

"Penelope? Is everything okay?" Janice asked as I sped up to tail the boys.
"I'm fine the kids are fine but I need you to pick them up. I'll let ya know where soon"
"Okay. What's happened?"
"Kane... It's..."
"I'll be there." Hanging up, my vision went a little blurry as every possible scenario played through my head.

...

Pulling in to the hospital parking lot, I parked next to the boys. Wiping the tears away, I grabbed my phone and pulled the keys out the ignition. Frankie went around and got Olivia out her seat. Grabbing the tablet from the middle of the back seat, I got out. Going around, I picked Julius' car seat out of the adaptor, I grabbed the nappy bag. Putting the tablet and my phone in the main pocket, I closed it back up and swung the strap over my shoulder. Closing the door, I locked the car and followed the boys into the hospital. Going to the waiting room, Denny soon came into the room from the emergency area.

Sending off the location ping to Janice, I watched as Olivia fell asleep in Frankie's arms. Julius was passed out in his seat in front of me. "They've taken him straight up to x-ray" Denny announced and sat down beside me. Rickey was watching me from the seat across from me. My phone vibrated as Janice confirmed her leaving. Rickey then got up and stormed away. The brothers watching him go. Getting up, I followed him. Always the one who solves the problems.

Finding him leaning against the wheelchair access railing outside, I went up to him. "Hey" I whispered as I stood next to him. "Are you okay?"
"They don't talk about you to me. I don't have anyway of understanding why you are here" nodding, I leaned against the railing too.
"I had just turned 15 when my mum committed suicide... I had been picked up and was sent to live with my closest relative. My mums cousin, Xavier. He used to own the farm..."
"He was dad's old friend"
"Yeap. Xavier got sick, he couldn't look after me the way I needed so he talked to Kane and I went and moved in with him and your brothers... Poor Kane had no idea what to do with a girl..." I smirked at the awkwardness when I first told him I needed pads. "I had been living with them for two years before I met Noah... He saw the anger I still held against my mother. We got close, he was the start of a dark road. Drinking and drugs became a consistent... I eventually noticed the signs of what it was doing to my body. Kane started to notice as well... I stopped partying hard, started getting back into my schooling. We still would hang out and once in a while I'd party with him, not as hard but hard enough that I felt awful the next day... I had less than a year before graduating when I realised I could be pregnant... I had gotten Noah's mum Janice to get me a test... I sat on the swing and read it... I knew what I needed to do, so I broke things off with Noah and told him... He didn't take it good. He would come to the house and sit outside all night. He'd leave threatening notes in my locker, a few times he'd put them in the mail... Kane was so angry. He'd spew profanities every night back at Noah. I'd have to calm him down before he did something he'd regret... At the time he didn't know why Noah was doing it... It wasn't till I was 5 months pregnant and starting to really show that he found my stash of clothes... God he was so disappointed in me... Slowly Noah backed off when I couldn't hide it anymore... Kane was there holding my hand when she came into the world... Noah was on a week long drug binge... I named her Olivia Gracie. Olivia for the horse Kane had taught me to ride on and Gracie for my mum. Once I graduated two months later, I had packed up and left. I didn't mean to cut ties with them, I just needed to focus on my daughter and repairing myself... Two years ago I ran into Noah, he had long been clean and we repaired our relationship... It wasn't until I found out about Julius did he start his downward spiral again. At the time his father also died. I noticed the change in him before he did. He soon started the drinking and drugs again. That's when I gave birth to Julius. A week later I was gone again... I was jumping from couch to couch before biting the bullet and I moved back here. Xavier had long been dead and the house had been sitting there"