Perfectly Dysfunctional

The mood in the van was tense; extremely tense. I sat in the front seat, my head facing the left to glare out the window as Jayne drove us to the hotel we’d be staying in until they could get a new bus out to us – which Jayne had got right on after finding out we were okay, apparently. I could feel the tension in the van, and I’m sure as Hell that everyone else could feel it.

When we’d got in the van, Jayne had jumped to everyone, asking if we were all okay, but other than the answers and the small attempt at small talk there was no noise in the van. It only took her a few moments to realize something had happened.

“Guys, am I missing something?” she asked after a while.

“Ask her!” Nathan screamed.

“Ask him!” I spat at the same time, and then we both simultaneously huffed and glared out of our windows again.

“O-kay...” Jayne quickly looked behind her for answers from anyone else who all shrugged, bar Max, who stared at the floor of the van. “Forget I asked.”

As soon as she pulled up outside the hotel I flung the door open and slammed it closed with my good arm, throwing my hood up and storming back along the road, pulling my phone out and calling Emma. It was only nine am, but this couldn’t wait.

“Whoever this is better have a good fucking reason for waking me up!”

I sniffed back my tears, “Emma?”

“Jenny?” Suddenly she sounded more awake, “What’s up, what’s happened?”

“What hasn’t happened in the past few days?” I sniffed and sat down on the kerb of the sidewalk, “Remember you asked if I’d had any other death threats and stuff?”

“Yeah...” Then she gasped, “For fuck sake, another one?!”

“Well... This time it wasn’t so much aimed for just me.” I filled her in on everything that had happened, and about how the bus driver was talking about someone screwing with the engine.

“Jenny, stop stressing,” I was about to ask her how she even knew I was getting that anxious, sick, nervous feeling in my gut but she spoke over me, “You’re breathing’s getting laboured and shaky, just breathe normally.” I paused for a few moments and composed myself and she was silent. “So did you manage to ask about what they were talking about?”

Tears escaped my eyes and I let out a loud shaky breath. I could tell Emma wanted to say something but she bit her tongue, “I asked about it, yeah. Nathan wouldn’t tell me, though; like, flat out refused any knowledge of what I was talking about. And when I asked Max about it he just panicked and closed up and started stuttering and shit, and it’s clear he knows, too. So I started shouting at Nathan and Max outside the hospital then Jayne came to get us. I’ve not even bothered asking anyone else, cos they’ll all do the same thing, and being pissed off at two people is enough at the moment.” I sighed.

“Oh my God, they’re such twats! Why do you reckon they won’t tell you?”

“I don’t know,” I huffed out air and I heard movement behind me, “Maybe because Nathan Sykes is a fucking-” I’d absentmindedly glanced up behind me to see Nathan standing there, “What do you want?” I spat.

“Is that him? Let me talk to him, c'mon, let me ask him!” She shouted down the phone, probably in the hopes that he’d hear her, and if I wasn’t so pissed off with the man standing before me I’d have laughed.

“Well I was going to apologize, but fuck it, if you’re going to be like that.” He turned on his heel and started to walk away but I jumped to my feet.

“What do you mean ‘if I’m going to be like that’? You’ve been lying to me for like, a month, you flat out lied straight to my face earlier, and you’ve got everyone else lying for you, too! You can’t even think of giving me shit for acting this way!”

He spun back round and marched right up to me, “Don’t accuse me of that, don’t you dare accuse me of getting people to lie for me!” He came really close to me and I swear I wanted to hit him.

“How else could you explain it?” I yelled in his face. He faltered, “Exactly, you can’t, because you know I’m right, so why don’t you just stop the lying entirely and just tell me why I was shot, why both mine and Siva’s drinks were spiked, and why the Hell we were all in a fucking bus crash!” I screamed and turned away from him so he didn’t need to see me wiping my eyes. I still had my phone attached to my ear and I could hear Emma breathing slightly on the other end of the phone – probably having heard all the shouting and trying to calm her self before she started screaming down the phone, too.

“Well then let me try and explain it to you!” he said after a few moments and grabbed my free arm to spin me around.