Just How Life Is.

Just How Life Is. Chapter 22

Dedicated to all those who suffer

“Hey Troy,” I mumbled sleepily as I felt someone scoot into bed with me, knowing Troy would be the only one to do that. I felt strong arms wrap around my half asleep body. “Bad dream?” I questioned.

He didn’t say anything so I figured that it was a yes.

Let me start over so this makes sense.

It’s been maybe over a month since Troy’s dad almost killed him. Things weren’t going too well for Troy. I remember when Faith, Chloe, Jake, Danny, and I went to go visit him.

The doctors led us to his room and told us not to take too long. I hope he’ll be alright. We walked into his room silently and he was sleeping, again. Every time that I’ve been here it’s seemed like he was always sleeping. Jake and Danny looked pretty awkward; I knew those two were never really good friends with him. Chloe nudged Danny and whispered something to him quietly.

Faith replaced the dying flowers on the table next to his bed with new ones. I asked her why she insisted on bringing them, but she would just smile and shrug. I walked up to Troy and realized something. Smirking, I crouched just below the bed and went to where his head was. Everyone looked at me confused but I just motioned for them to not take any notice.

Quietly, I rose so only my eyes were peering at Troy, then I made a “rawr” noise and his eyes instantly opened. “Ha! I knew you were awake,” I said.

He rolled his eyes and smiled at me, “I thought you guys were doctors or something so I pretended to be asleep.”

“Why?” Chloe asked.

Troy tried to sit up but he looked uncomfortable. In fact, he didn’t look good at all. He was getting skinny and was still looking a sickly pale. He was also wearing a tee shirt so you could still see all the injuries he suffered from his father. “Because they keep poking me with needles and doing weird tests.”

“Have you been pretending to be asleep since you’ve gotten here?” I asked.

“What day is it?” he asked.

“Sunday,” I said, raising an eyebrow at him.

He put a hand to his chin, “I think the last time I was fully awake was maybe Friday,” and then he shrugged.

I sighed, then noticed the tray of food for him, I picked up a sandwich and handed it to him, “Eat.”

He took it, “Yes ma’am,” while rolling his eyes and began eating.

Then a nurse noticed he was awake and began changing the bandages wrapped around his head. When she took all of them off, I’m pretty sure every one of us besides the nurse gasped. Troy’s hair was sticking away from his wound so we could see it. There was a large gash on his head, but it looked like it was healing. Even still, it was hard to look at.

Troy stared at his blankets while the nurse put medicine on it and he winced a few times. “Does it hurt?” she asked him. He just ignored her and she took that as a yes.

I found out that shortly after we left, Troy fell asleep and didn’t wake up for a while again. But eventually, Troy healed. I was afraid though, the doctors said it wasn’t looking too good for him. But, his stab wound healed up along with his head. But he was told to take it easy and couldn’t go to school for a while; which didn’t really matter, school was almost over. But the hospital was wondering about something: who would pay the hospital bills?

Well, after I told the police officer that Troy’s father tried to kill him a whole investigation took place. Troy wasn’t very comfortable telling them what his father did, and they realized it would be no use to keep asking him. But they did search his house, and they found tons of money hidden away. They were confused as to where all this money came from, but they found a note. Turns out Troy’s mother was sending money so his father could take care of him every month. Obviously, that money was not put to good use.

But another dilemma came up; Troy had nowhere to go. He had no relatives, no one knew where his mother could be, and he certainly didn’t want to go to an orphanage. So my parents decided to help out; Jared was in jail so they offered Troy his room. Troy was baffled by this and said he couldn’t accept that. But it was not a worry; after all, all that money the cops found in Troy’s house was given to him and there was a lot. Let’s just say, Troy was set for college.

And yes, Jared is in jail. His trial hasn’t happened yet but he’s being charged with murder. We cleaned out his room of everything that reminded us of him, and then we moved in Troy’s stuff. I could tell he was still uncomfortable and it took him a while to get use to it.

In fact, he didn’t like being by himself at all. He would normally sneak into my room in the middle of night. I remember the first time it happened.

I heard the door creak open and I was instantly awakened. It was too dark to see anything at first so I turned on the lamp on my night stand. I saw Troy’s frowning face peeking in through my door.

“Troy? What are you doing? Come in,” I said, sleepily.

He padded in softly, wearing plaid PJ pants and a tee shirt. Then he stood there awkwardly.

“Is there something wrong?” I asked, sitting up in bed.

He opened his mouth to say something, but stopped. He’s so cute. I motioned for him to sit in bed next to me. He sat down and stared at the floor. Eventually, he spoke.

“I, er, had a, um, “nightmare”.”

I wanted to laugh at his cuteness, but the way his eyes flickered back and forth I think I realized what he was talking about. A nightmare about his father.

“About…?”

He nodded.

I got up and left the room with him confused then came back with his pillow and put it on my bed next to mine.

Don’t worry; we did nothing bad, just slept. The next morning I asked him why it was bothering him so much and he said it had something to do with the day his father tried to kill him; the last incident. Before he got stabbed his father did something, but he wouldn’t tell me what. So most nights he would spend them with me.

I think the fact that Troy’s father was never found also added on to his stress. The police were searching, but it wasn’t going too well.

I rubbed Troy’s hands that were wrapped around my waist, “Want to talk about it?” I asked. He sighed into my hair.

I sat up and looked at him in the darkness, “You’ll have to talk about it sometime,” I said quietly.

“I know,” he mumbled, sitting up too, “But, it’s hard.”

I nodded and pulled him into a hug. I rubbed his back and could feel the bumpy scars of that horror that was written on his back. It’s like getting a tattoo and instantly regretting it, because “Bastard Child” will never leave his back. Every time I thought about it, it made me hate Troy’s father even more.

I realized at that moment I just wanted to cry; I wanted to cry for Troy because he never does. I sniffed a few times and pulled away from him. He looked at me with a tilted head and I could see his blue eyes glint in the darkness. He wiped a stray tear away from my cheek and smiled at me.

“Skye, you don’t need to be sad anymore. I’m safe. I didn’t think it was possible, but it is. That monster is long gone and now I can heal. I also have you,” he said smiling.

I smiled at him and then he kissed me. Our lips moved together in perfect harmony and when we pulled away I saw that early morning sunshine was shining through the curtains and I tried not to laugh remembering that one day and what I said to Troy.

“I can show you the sunshine of this world.”

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A/N- well that’s it. That’s the end. And no, I was not going to kill Troy off; that would be horrible. I want people to see that there can be a happy ending. And I also want people to see that there are bigger problems in the world then “Oh! No one asked me to the dance, I’m so unloved” or “I can’t believe that they would say that stuff about me. Why does everyone hate me?!” please people, its high school/ middle school I guess. Petty problems like that aren’t really problems at all. And don’t make fun of people or spread rumors about them when you don’t actually know them; cause you know, you don’t know what their life is actually like. Take Troy for an example.