Genius

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

Laws and the order in which you follow them

    A nurse scolded me. Then a doctor. And then Susan and Hal. And then a lawyer. And then the police. It was a little different each time, with the common theme of "you did a stupid thing and now we have to try to fix it but fixing it may not work, especially if you keep doing stupid things, so here are your options".

"But I have to go to the maternity ward, Penelope is there!" I argue, Susan and Hal have been dead set on not letting me out of their sight until an official statement can be drafted and a trail carried out, considering what seems to happen when they are unaware of my whereabouts.

"Susan, we should let her go. It's not like she can leave the hospital, and even if she did: she wouldn't get far." Hal says, gently nudging Susan, who has crossed her arms and assumed her 'this is non negotiable' stance.

"No." I find myself mirroring her stance (from the waist up at least).

"Yes." I give her a look that I hope shows that I am not above sneaking out.

"You have thirty minutes." She admits, after a rather long stare down staring a worried Hal looking between us two

"Labor takes longer than that." I mutter, looking at the floor while Hal goes to get a wheelchair. The five minutes it takes for Hal to come back seem like hours as Susan glares at me coldly. And in complete silence. When he does come in I'm ready to hop in the chair but the nurse, of course, wants to make sure everything is fine first: they've already detached me from the iv drip so I'm not sure what, exactly, she's checking. And then she insists on pushing me down the hallway and accompanying me in the elevator before leaving me in front of Penelope's room in the maternity ward.

I take out the phone I had to beg Hal to bring for me from home and send the group chat a text: Here.

"Look who decided to show up." Rolland is the only one who smiles as he greets me. Alan tries to smile and fails while Gwen just glares.

"What were you thinking?" She hisses and I stare at the ground, I'm sure everyone's been thinking it: my lawyer who in the process of drafting an official statement, those officers who asked what happened, Hal who hasn't mentioned anything about the situation, and Susan who spends most of her time silent, they just haven't asked.

"I was thinking a lot of things, honestly. I was thinking about how my parents were setting me up, about how the police were out to get me, about how worried Alan must have been, about how angry you and Susan were going to be, about how scared Isa would have been. But mostly it was about me, and how frustrated I was. And how much I wanted to get back at Alice for what she did." I smile wistfully, "Selfish, right?"

"Why didn't you just call the police if you knew where they were keeping her! How could you do something so stupid and dangerous? You both could have died!"

"Hold up: what do you think happened, exactly?"

"Hold up? Since when did she say that?" Rolland whispers to Alan, Alan just shrugs,

"She's gotten sassier from what I can tell. I kind of like it."

"You two, shut up, I'm trying to have a serious conversation with this one." Gwen glares at them, averting her death-ray eyes from me for long enough to catch my breath.

"No wait, I want to hear what Alan has to say about me being 'sassier'."

"I take it back, you aren't sassier." He looks away, probably trying to spare himself from embarrassment, I can tell because his cheeks are dusted with pink.