In The Hospital

Chapter 27

In The Hospital.

Lyla Atelo.

On my way to work the next morning, Michael tried once again to convince me to resign.

"You can take the day off, Lyla." He looked over me worriedly after placing a mug of coffee and some toast in front of me. "You had a nasty fall into their swimming pool. I'm sure they will give you a sick leave. You don't have to overwork yourself. You need some rest!"

"It's barely three weeks since I started working here, Michael. I can't just go on a sick leave. Besides, I'm doing fine as you can see. There's no need to worry." I ignored the toast on the table and grabbed my handbag and car keys. Then, I stopped with a thought. "Can I use your car? Mine is making a lot of terrible sounds."

He stared at me for a while before he began with his excuses. "Lyla... You see...the thing is... I have something to do today, and I—"

"You told me you had started working remotely." I reminded him of one of our late night discussions on how our separate lives were going.

His eyes widened slightly and he scratched the back of his head. "Lyla... You know..."

"Don't worry about it, then." I knew he wouldn't let me touch the car. It was only a test to see if he had really changed.

I sighed heavily and made my way out of the house. "I will see you later when I get back from work."

*

The first thing I noticed when I got to school was how rowdy it was. School was usually calm and quiet, but this was a first.

"What's happening?" I drew in one of my colleagues to ask while looking around the school.

She squinted at me with amusement all over her face. "Are you kidding me? I should be asking you. Sage isn't in school. Surely, you should have known about that."

I frowned slightly. "Why would I have to know about his whereabouts?" I asked, but deep inside me, I knew the answer to that question.

"You're his favourite teacher, duh!" She rolled her eyes and giggled. "You think we are all blind? You think we haven't seen how much he cares about you? You think we haven't seen the videos?"

My heart leapt to my throat. It was like my chest tightened as well as my throat. My palms became sweaty as I remembered last night's video. It was still on my phone...the one that was sent anonymously.

"What video?" I tried so hard not to panic in front of Camille, but she didn't seem to notice my reaction which was a good thing.

"The one where he didn't think twice before jumping into that water to save you." She said. "Which other video did you think I was talking about?" She frowned and stared at me suspiciously.

I matched her facial expression, looking her dead in the eyes and lying my way out. "No, I just didn't know there was a video."

"We also know he stayed at your bedside all night. He didn't allow the nurse to leave until she made sure you were okay. How sweet..." She cooed.

I knew my cheeks were about to be inflamed but I put on a stony expression. "Get your head out of the gutters, Camille. I'm only bidding my time in this school, and you know it."

She chuckled and shrugged. "Well, we can't be too sure, can we?"

*

Two hours later and I waited to see the students quiet down. Teachers didn't seem to care about their loitering in the corridors. To them, today was a rare occasion where they could be rowdy without any risk of expulsion or disappearing from the face of the earth with their families. It surprised me when I understood how much power Sage wielded in this school.

I spotted a familiar brown mane of hair from the corner of my eyes, and my heart rate picked up. Yes, he could give me answers.

"Mr. Rudiyah? Hello? Can I speak to you for a moment." I found myself approaching Sage's best friend.

And... He. Did. Not. Look. Happy. To. See. Me.

"Mrs. Lyla." He spat my name out like it was some kind of dirty word.

I pretended not to notice. I didn't care about that. My only interest was about the dark-haired, dark-eyed tall man who occupied my daydreams recently.

"Hey. I hope you're well." I didn't try exchanging pleasantries because from the look of his face, he wouldn't reply. "How is Sage? He's not in school today. Is he alright?"

His facial expression tightened. I could see he was torn between answering me and walking away.

"Stay away from my friend, Mrs. Lyla." He finally said after a whole minute of trying to restrain himself. "Thanks to you, Sage is in the hospital with tubes attached to his nose to help him breathe."

"What?" My voice rang higher than I expected, but I didn't care. What did he mean? What happened to Sage? He seemed fine last night. Did he get into an accident after dropping me off?

I felt the tears prickling at the corners of my eyes. "What do you mean?"

"Do you know he has a terrible respiratory problem? And he didn't think twice when he jumped into that cold water to save you. He didn't think of himself! He didn't think of his health! All because of you! He didn't get himself warmed immediately, instead he stayed by your side the whole evening!" He stubbed a finger at my shoulder with a pained expression on his face. "Stay away from Sage. He has gone through a lot of shit! He doesn't need you to compound his problems!"

Everything was too much to take in. A hot pain seared through my heart. Sage was sick? Sage was in the hospital? All because of me? All because he had saved me? Was I this much of bad luck?

I wanted to ask him more, but he had disappeared from my line of sight.

"Elijah?" I spun around, trying to find him when there was a light tap on my shoulders.

"Lyla?" It was my colleague. She looked worried. "Are you okay? You look like you're about to cry."

I wiped the tears from my eyes immediately. "I'm sorry. I'm fine. It's nothing." I tried to brush things off, but I was failing miserably. I wanted to find Sage. I wanted to know which hospital he was admitted into.

"The faculty meeting is in five minutes. Are you still coming? The principal wants everyone to be in attendance."

"Yeah, yeah. I'm coming." I sniffed and wiped my tears, following behind her.

I would find Elijah before the day was over. I only hoped that he would tell me what I needed to know.