Chapter Twenty Seven - Ana
Milo's P.O.V -
When I woke up I expected to see Lincoln sleeping on the floor but the space was empty. I got out of bed not bothering to get changed from my black shorts and grey t shirt.
Once I reached the living room I could here voices coming from the kitchen. I poke my head in the doorway to see my mum chatting with Lincoln as she cooked breakfast. Marco was sat at the island his head resting on the surface.
"Good morning Milo." My mum greeted me with a smile once she spotted me.
Lincoln turned to look at me with a smile before continuing to cut some fruit.
I sat beside Marco watching Lincoln and my mum interact with curiosity. "Morning." I spoke slowly.
"How did you sleep?" My mum asked flipping a pancake.
"Okay." I lied.
"Milo." My mum spoke up turning to me seriously. "How do you feel about going to school next week?"
I could tell by her tone that she was hesitant to ask me, I knew that if I showed any doubt she would let me stay at home.
"Fine." I told her in a bored tone.
"Okay good." She smiled. "I've been talking to the principle of your new school and he wants you to start sooner than later so you miss less school."
"Eastwood?" I guessed.
"Did I not tell you?" My mum gasped. "You got in! How wonderful is that?"
I glanced over to Lincoln who had a small smirk on his face as he cut the fruit.
"That's great mum." I replied, my voice still monotone.
"You get to go to school with Lincoln, and that other boy that Lucy is dating." She told me turning back to the pancakes.
"Wyatt." I corrected her.
"That's it." She nodded. "You're going to love it there."
Lincoln put all the fruit into a bowl placing it on the island as my mum finished making the pancakes.
"Is Alfie not awake?" Marco asked his voice muffled by the counter.
"Not yet." I answered.
Lincoln took a seat opposite me placing a pancake on his plate beginning to eat. He had a wide smile on his face as he listened to my mum talk about some show she's been watching recently. He seemed weirdly happy this morning considering how upset he was last night.
"That kid." Marco shook his head. "He sleeps more than anyone I know."
My mum smiled. "Marco he's a teenager they sleep a lot, like babies."
Marco chuckled. "What about Milo? He's awake, so is Lincoln."
"Well they're different." My mum looked over at the two of us. "Most teenagers sleep a lot. Ana used to be in bed until five in the afternoon on the weekends."
I looked back down at the plate. Ana wasn't asleep she was in her room drinking and doing drugs but I didn't want to correct her. Lincoln noticed my change in mood and gave me a warm smile.
"It's Ana's birthday soon." Marco spoke carefully. "Are you going to do anything for it?"
"She's dead." I responded bluntly. "Why would we celebrate her birthday?"
"Milo." My mum scolded with a look of disapproval. "Don't talk about your sister like that."
I rolled my eyes before quickly finishing my food. "I'll be in the living room."
I stood up with my crutches leaving the room. It wasn't long until Lincoln walked into the room sitting beside me on the couch.
"Are you okay?" He asked me concerned as he reached out to grab my hand.
I nodded. "I just don't like thinking about Ana."
Lincoln squeezed my hand. "It must be hard."
"Yeah." I breathed.
We sat in silence for a few moments as Lincoln kept opening his mouth to speak but nothing came out.
"What?" I asked him softly.
"Sorry." He mumbled. "I was trying to decide whether or not it would be appropriate to ask what happened."
I didn't say anything as I thought it through, I was going to have to tell Lincoln eventually. So why not now?
"Okay." I let out shakily.
"You don't have to." He assured me. "Not if you don't want to."
"No, it's fine." I responded taking a deep breath. "My sister and I were really close throughout our childhood. She was two years older than me but we acted like best friends. I spent more time with her in school than I did with Lucy.
I blinked quickly so no tears would fall.
"We drifted apart when she went to high school, she was a teenager while I was still acting like a kid. She had ADHD like me but she struggled with it a lot more, the medication and therapy never really helped her. When she went to her first party she came back high and drunk, she said that she finally found something which reduced her symptoms." I explained.
"Oh." Lincoln mumbled his eyes growing wide.
"Her main problem was that she couldn't afford weed so she decided to exchange her ADHD medication for it with this group of kids in school. She became good friends with them and soon enough she would be going out with them every night. She told my mum and dad she was studying at the library or that she was going to a sleepover. Somehow mum and dad never realized she was drunk when she got home, Ana was good at acting sober but I could always tell." I continued to tell the story.
"Were your parents together at this point?" Lincoln asked me slightly confused.
I nodded in confirmation. "They got divorced after Ana died, my dad gave up on life and became a drunk himself so my mum kicked him out. She said she didn't want me around that stuff anymore."
Lincoln listened intently before nodding.
"Anyway, um." I stopped to remember what I had already said. "This continued for the next two years. I don't think I realized how bad it was until I joined high school. I would see her smoking in the halls and drinking alcohol without even bothering to disguise the bottle. The teachers never said anything, they didn't care. I decided to tell my mum after a year about everything when I saw Ana sneaking out through her window despite being grounded. I can't remember why she was grounded anymore."
I though for a moment before drawing a blank. "My mum didn't believe me straight away but she did once she saw that she was gone. The next morning when Ana came home my mum flipped out, she could smell the weed on her clothes. Dad yelled at Ana for hours and she was grounded for longer. My mum made sure to padlock her window so she couldn't sneak out again. Ana was mad at me for snitching on her, she didn't talk to me for weeks and stayed in her room."
I felt a tear fall down my face, which Lincoln wiped away quickly.
"You don't have to continue." He told me.
"I'm almost done." I insisted. "When it got to December loads of people were throwing parties and Ana got bored of missing them. So she decided to sneak out through my window. She threatened me not to tell our parents, she said she would tell them I was gay. I wasn't even sure how she knew, I had only just figured it out."
Lincoln frowned at my words. "Would she really do that to you?"
I shrugged. "I don't know, I think it was all the drugs talking. I didn't take it to heart, even though that's the last thing she said to me."
Lincoln gaped at me. "I'm sorry." He spoke sympathetically.
"At the time I was the best player on the basketball team they were going to make me captain, the first ever sophomore captain." I explained. "So I was told about all the parties, even the senior ones. I knew who's party she was going to, it was this boy called Harry. He has a party once a month but they were chaotic, hardly anyone in our school went to them because of how dangerous they would get. The only people who would go is the druggy kids, or in other words, Ana and her friends."
Lincoln looked as if he knew what was coming.
"She did what she usually did at parties, alcohol and drugs. Lots of drugs. My mum found out she had snuck out and concluded she must have gone through my room, so she began to interrogate me and try to find out where she was." I looked down at our hands as more tears fell. "But I wouldn't tell her, I resisted for a while but I finally lied and said she was at a different party. I was invited to a party at this rich girls house but decided I didn't want to go, I said Ana went there. My mum made me get dressed and I directed her to the house."
"She went looking for her?" Lincoln spoke sadly.
"She searched that party for about an hour, asking everyone if she had been there." I swallowed harshly. "Mum found out I was lying and started to yell at me. I gave in and told her the truth so we made our way to Harry's house. She went into the party and began to look for her again. At the same time Lucy started to call and text me, she was freaking out. Apparently some guy who she followed on social media had started posting photos of him and his friends having sex with Ana."
"What?" Lincoln spoke astonished.
"It's disgusting." I agreed. "Except when I saw the photos I realized she was unconscious. They were raping her and putting it online."
Lincoln growled lowly at my words.
"I was ready to barge into the party and find her but my mum started calling me crying." I bit my lip to stop a sob. "She found Ana passed out naked on a bed, foam pouring out of her mouth. She demanded that I stayed in the car and I listened to her, I didn't want to see Ana like that."
"Milo." Lincoln looked at me sadly. "This is awful."
I decided to continue the story. "The ambulance arrived quickly and took her away, my mum went in the ambulance with her. I was stuck in the car for a while, I had no way of getting home. Two of Ana's friends, Matt and Allison, offered to drive me to the hospital. They were obviously drunk but I accepted their offer anyway. We sped there and fortunately were not stopped by the police. I went to the reception and they told me the number, I rushed to the room only to find a nurse packing up the machines. She told me that Ana had died."
I noticed a few tears falling down Lincoln's face.
"I sat with my mum in this grievance room at the hospital, my dad stayed at home because he was in no state to drive. They did some tests and found that there was only two things in her system, Alcohol and a huge dose of some date rape drug. I forget what it's called." I wiped my eyes. "They said that they might have been able to save her if they had gotten their sooner. I held a lot of guilt for a long time, I still kind of do, if I hadn't lied to my mum we might've gotten to Ana sooner and saved her."
"It's not your fault." Lincoln replied instantly. "It's whoever did this to her's fault."
"They got them, the people who did it." I added. "They're in prison right now, all five of them. They got eleven years in prison, which personally I didn't think was enough but the lawyers said we were lucky for even getting them convicted."
Lincoln rubbed his thumb over my hand.
"My dad moved out, my mum threw herself into the church and I became depressed." I rested my head on Lincoln's shoulder. "I quit the team because I didn't have the energy to do it anymore, I no longer enjoyed it because it was something Ana and I shared. She had been on the girls team in middle school and we would always play together in the garden with the hoop my dad drilled to the wall. I stopped being friends with Lucy for a few months which really upset her, but I didn't think I was worthy of being her friend."
I knew Lincoln wanted to speak but he decided it would be better if he listened.
"It took a while but I got back to normal by the middle of Junior year. I rejoined the basketball team, but I hadn't played for over a year so I wasn't as good as I used to be." I lifted my head to look at him. "And I know you're worried about me now but I'll get back to normal, just like I did after Ana's death."
Lincoln gave me a small smile placing a kiss on my head. "I know you will."