Ancil“Hey,” Kate said, maintaining her forced and faked smile.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“I came to see if Samantha was okay. Her mother called me and told me what happened. I’ve been ignoring her for so long I just never imagined that she would-“
“She’s fine,” I said. “The doctor said that she’d be waking up soon.”
“Ohh thank God.” Kate breathed a sigh of relief.
“She just…” I paused and contemplated on how to answer it. I obviously had no intention of telling Kate that I slept with Samantha in the freezing cold. “Alcohol, you know.”
“She was quite the drinker, wasn’t she?”
“You know Sam,” I said.
“Well, I should get going now,” Kate said wiping a tear from her eye. “It was nice seeing you again.”
“What, you’re going already? You should come see Samantha. I’m sure she’ll be happy to see you when she wakes up.”
“No, she won’t. Things would be much easier if I just left. I just wanted to know if she was okay.” Kate then got up. “Nothing more nothing less.” She then started off towards the hospital exit.
“Kate, so nice of you to make it!” Elizabeth shouted before Kate could leave and before I could have conceptualized anything to say to stop her.
Kate stopped, turned around with the same forced and fake smile, and said, “Hey Mrs. Hurlan. I just wanted to make sure that Sam was alright.”
“She’s awake but her memory is a little hazy. She can’t remember any of us. I came to grab some water. By the way, where’s your father? He should be here by now.”
“What do you mean he should be here by now?” Kate asked as her forced and fake smile collapsed.
“I called him and told him about Sam. He said that he was on his way.”
“My father is coming…..here? Now?”
“Yes, is there a problem?” Elizabeth said.
Kate gave me a cold stare as if I had done something wrong and that it was somehow my fault that her father was on his way to the hospital.
“No problem, Mrs. Hurlan but I have to go. Tell Sam I was here, okay,” Kate said, turning to walk away.
“Don’t you want to come see her?” Elizabeth asked.
“I’ll see her tomorrow. I really have to go. Bye.” Kate turned and started a brisk walk to the exit which then turned into a run down the long winding corridors.
“Kate, wait!” I shouted as I followed after her.
“Stop following me!!” Kate shouted.
“I need to talk to you!” My shortening breath didn’t allow me to shout very loudly. Kate ran really fast. As we got closer to the exit, the number of people increased and the loud noises permeating from the large mass of humanity overwhelmed all my attempts to shout at Kate. She burst through the exit of the hospital and out into the darkness of the night. I had no idea that it was night and the darkness kind of shocked me. Kate kept running and all the people around stared at her like she was some kind of crazy person.
I followed her all the way to her car and I saw her frantically fiddling with her keys trying to open her car door. Her hands were shaking and she was glistening with sweat.
“Kate, I need to talk to you,” I said while attempting to catch my breath.
“We’ll talk some other time. I really need to get out of here.”
After a couple of seconds of fiddling with her keys, she eventually got the car open but as quickly as she had swung it open, it was shut closed again as the big hands of Kate’s father, Vince slammed it back close.
