The Road.

“Fucking worthless,” Nathan murmurs angrily as he throws the plate of food to the floor.
In his eyes I could never do anything right. All I ever was good for was for making mistakes.

“Why can’t you do anything right!?” He shouts angrily as he grabs me by the arm.

I stare at him as my lips begin to quiver, I was afraid to reply, anything I said was never the right answer.

“ANSWER ME!” He screams causing me to flinch.

I wanted all of this to be over, but all of this was my fault. My fault for all the strong words; my fault for all the abuse; my fault for all the pain; my fault because I let it all happen.

I guess in a way I let it happen because I was punishing myself for all the pain I had caused Ariana, for a long time I thought I deserved all of it, but I didn’t.

“I’m not worthless!” I shout, defending myself for the first time in a long time.

“What?” he hisses.

“You heard me!” I hiss back as I try to break loose.

I wasn’t going to let him get to my head. I wasn’t going let him try to convince me that I deserved this, that he hated doing this to me, that he had no other choice, when in fact he enjoyed that he was stronger than me.

I shove Nathan out of the way as I break loose from his grip.

“You can’t hurt me anymore,” I shout at him as I start heading towards the front door.

“Get the fuck back here!” He shouts before he grabs my short hair and pulls me towards him.

“Let me go!”

“You’re not fucking leaving me, you are mine!” he hisses throwing me against the wall.

“I’m not yours, I never was!” I spit angrily as I stumble to get up.

He glares at me and before I can move, his fist connects with my face again and again.

I cry out in pain pleading him to stop but that only causes him to keep hitting me.

I lay on the floor surrounded by my own blood as I try to contain my sobs, but the more I tried, the harder it became.

“Get the fuck up!” Nathan shouts but all I could do was lay there.

“I said to get up!”

“F-Fuck y-you” I manage to choke out.

Nathan took hold of my shirt and pulled me up, his face only centimeters away from mine.

“Fuck you whore,” he grinned and then I felt my head hit the floor with great force.

_____________________________________ALEX.

It was so weird having Ariana around, even though she had forgiven me I knew there was still part of her that couldn’t stand looking at me, and that hurt. I wanted us to be the friends we used to be, without all the drama and pain.

I sighed and smiled as I noticed Sydney had gone to sleep on my arms.

I stood up and headed to the back of the bus, where Ariana and Jack were sitting down talking.

“Sydney fell asleep, I’m just putting her in her crib,” I whispered laying Sydney next to Savannah.

“She’s still not answering,” Ariana groaned

“Maybe she doesn’t have her phone with her; I mean it’s ringing right?”

“I guess, or maybe she’s ignoring me because she hates me.”

“Who are you trying to call?” I asked curiously.

Ariana looked at me and then back at her cell phone before sighing, “Meghan, but she isn’t answering.”

“Oh.”

“Have you talked to her?” Ariana suddenly asks me

I shake my head just as Ariana’s phone begins to ring.

“Hello?” She answered.

I could hear someone crying at the other end.

“Mom, what happened?”

“W-What?” Ariana stuttered as her face turned pale and her eyes widened.

“Oh my god, where is she?”

“Mom please calm down, don’t worry I’ll go and I’ll call you as soon as I find out how she is.” She says and then hangs up her phone.

“What happened?” Jack asks before I do.

“Meghan is in the hospital,” she whispers.

“W-What happened?” I ask but deep down I knew the answer.

“We have to go to the hospital.” Ariana says frantically.

“What happened?” I ask again.

“The hospital called my and they told her that her neighbor found her unconscious on her apartment floor covered in blood and bruises.”

“You guys go, I’ll take care of the girls,” Jack says as he gives Ariana a small kiss on the head.

“Oh my god, what if she doesn’t make it.”

“Don’t say that, she’ll be okay,” I tell her.

“She’ll never know how sorry I am for all those hateful words I told her, she won’t know that I’ve forgiven her.”

“Ariana, she’s going to be okay, now let’s go.”

We walk out of the bus and get a taxi thirty minutes later we had arrived at the hospital.
Ariana runs to the front desk.

“How can I help you?” A nurse asks from behind the desk.

“I need to see my sister,”

“What’s her name?”

“Meghan Carlson.”

The nurse types something on the computer and then looks up at Ariana.

“She’s in the ICU on the fifth floor.”

“She’s going to be okay.”

“She’s in the ICU, Alex! She’s not okay. If I had just forgiven her sooner this wouldn’t have happened.”

“This isn’t your fault, it’s all mine.”

She wiped away some tears and walked towards Meghan’s room and just as she reached for the door knob a nurse walked out of the room.

“Oh sorry, are you related to Miss. Carlson?”

“I’m her sister, is she okay?”

“She’s in a coma at the moment, she went through a lot I’m glad she has somebody else in this world.” The nurse said with a small smile and walked away.

We walked into the room and my heart dropped as soon as my eyes landed on Meghan.

I was going to kill Nathan.