When Sally and Nick noticed the feigned serenity on Dana's body language they knew her mental resolve. She thinks they are joking and it broke Sally's heart. She turned to look at Nick who had a solemn look in his eyes. This had to be done, they had already spoken about this the previous night after the car incident which seem to have eluded Dana's mind. Nick placed his fork down and stretched his hand to place it ontop of Dana's unoccupied one. She stopped eating and tipped her head a bit up to meet her father's eyes. When she saw the look on his face, the feigned serenity crumbled to be replaced by one of incredulity.
They are actually being serious about this!
As the gravity of the situation finally registered with her brains, she sighed and the split second emotion that had hooded her eyes cleared.
"When do we leave?"
They hadn't expected her to agree so easily, without even voicing out her concerns or even elicit her own terms about going to her grand parent's place. They knew not to celebrate their victory, neither did they remember what they had drawn out to be the 'good thing' about this trip. They shared a knowing look and Nick had the inclination to just dive in but Sally beat him to it.
"We had thought to leave as early as tomorrow sweetheart but if you still need more time . . . say to pack and get ready, its fine we can extend . . . Its not like there is an emergency to evacuate" Sally tried to restore her shattered morning.
"That's fine, I'll call in at work and let them know we have a family gathering in The Meadow and my presence is of utmost importance" her voice had turned sour and withdrawn, almost sarcastic. She didn't want to go but it looks like she only had the option to go now or go later so she dicided on it being rather sooner than dragging it out for later.
Dana pushed her plate away and curled the spoon in her hand in a rotatory anti-clockwise direction before putting it down completely to mark the complete shut down of her flimsy appetite, needless to guess it was due to hearing about the dreaded family road trip.
*Why oh why did I have to be conscious* she scowled to shadow the direction of her thoughts. Her thoughts started straying again while Nick and Sally stood there watching the dilemma in her head.
She strayed as far as to imagine what it would have been had she been lying in a hospital bed, with life supports machinery tethered to her body and before she got carried away by her dark thoughts, she figured that she is only kidding herself because they were just going to wait until she regains her consciousness enough to travel around.
Dana made her way up the stairs back to her room with exaggerated foot steps, with every step she took she felt herself nearing the edge of doom but she soldiered on anyway. She opened her bedroom door and sauntered in. She grabbed the telephone near her bedpost lamp and dialed the Library line, a female voice picked up and redirected her to Theresa 's office, the only available executive to sanction her leave of absence. Although she knew Theresa was one of those people who hated someone because the people she makes an effort to be noticed by them, brushes off her efforts to go after people like Dana. She kept the conversation as polite and as short as humanely possible. Theresa wished her goodluck on the journey ahead and that was at least one thing down. The other person to call was Sasha.
Just the mere thought of Sasha brought up pleasant feelings to Dana who had all but categorised the event with the hallucinogenic dreams she's been having because there was nothing real to remind her of the actual event to be real. It's not that she was expecting to find a long, permanent scar or something scary but just anything to remind her of her last moments with Sasha. Strange enough, not even her family remembered to mention it until she called Sasha to have someone pick up in a throaty voice and say Sasha has passed on. Its not some universal prank day so Dana knew it's the truth.
"Wait, this is not funny" she said to get a painful sob as a reply. She couldn't even think straight anymore, her head going in a dizzying speed trying to process the news.
"Look if you knew Sasha you would've been informed because we took the initiative to inform Sasha's close friends and colleagues of the unfortunate event so . . . how do you know Sasha?" the voice seemed to trail at the end.
Dana wasn't sure what to say. This wasn't right! This just can't be real. She was just with her and . . .
That's when the memories came flooding back to cement the fact her subconscious had tried to shield her from. Like someone had gone to extreme lengths to make this particular event insignificant, but why?
Who was that man in the park? Why would he decide to kill Sasha? The whole thing was just absurd, a man shows up after their intimate explorations and rambles shitty stuff about her then decide to steal her first kiss along with the memory altogether!
She had cried as subtle as she could beneath the smile to try and mask her fear. She had tried to be brave for her. She promised her that everything is going to be okay. She believed that Dana can do something to make things right again, and she let her down.
She felt drained and lifeless. She had failed Dee and now she had failed Sasha as well. What is it about her that fuels her guilt like there is actually something she could have done. Her head suddenly snapped and she bolted out of her room to try and find her parents. All the fuss about seeing her grandparents from hell forgotten.
Nick was just appreciating his wife for being the best wife and mother to their not so young Dana even in difficult situations like these where hard decisions had to be made and someone had to be the voice of reason, when they heard the hurried footsteps coming down from the stairs they both stood up to see a livid Dana take the stairs two at a time with tears ceaselessly streaming down her puffy face.
"What happened at the park?" Dana blurted haphazardly.
"Calm down Princess" Nick could see Something happened to trigger that much anger but he wasn't sure what exactly.
"Why has no one said anything about the park, mom?" she gave them pointed looks and they could tell that she was trying so hard to put a leash on the rising hysteria.
"We didn't think you wanted to relive the horrible experience Princess seeing that you said nothing about it either, we were just giving you time to digest it without us putting unnecessary pressure on you" Sally treaded to ensure she has no substantial addition to help her unhinge the last thread of sanity. She didn't know the big deal about the park after the doctor's clearance that she had no signs of anything inappropriate happening to her in her unconscious state, all that did little to stop Nick from saying-
"And besides, I don't exactly see the big deal about it when the doctor assured us of your safety"
Sally was always the one keeping the peace and she was able to do this by first detecting the signs before the last screw goes completely loose, which was obviously a tactic that Nick virtually lacked which led to the tragedy that befell next.
Dana had imagined they will have a calm conversation and come to a lucid conclusion and then take it from there but her dad just made the mistake of not filtering his words in an attempt to comfort her. Blue veins started bulging out, creating patterns on her face as if they wanted to be imprinted there permanently and she screamed until all electric wires disconnected from each other and whatever they touched in their wake was left fried.
"Dana" Sally screamed for her to stop waging war with the house when she noticed that it was out of pain, was it deeper? that she went on a rampage and only then did Nick realise the grabity of his simple words