Here, Here, and Here

Chapter 1

For the Third Time This Week

I woke up to a bolt of fiery light striking close to the outside of my window. The rain was splattering against the glass and I could see the trees shaking through the slit in my window shades. I was sitting in my pitch black room staring at the ceiling a when I realize that I was sweating. My previous dream lingering in my mind...

Dad, Please don't die, I thought, you need to be strong. My father was a well built man with black hair and hazel eyes much like my own. He was six foot seven, very strong, and muscular. Now the muscles and fitness had all been stolen away by a mysterious sickness. I was holding his hand looking at his weak expression upon his face. He was as white as a ghost curled in a ball on his bed with his eyes tightly shut. "Be strong not just for me, but for mom too." He opens his bloodshot eyes, looking at me with a sad expression.

"Nicole, I can't hold on forever. I am being as strong as I can and I don't think its going to be enough. Let me tell you something," he says looking as though he would just spring out of bed and say he was going to be better,

"Look with to your heart, listen with your mind, and love with your ears." I look at him as though he`s crazy.

"Look with your heart, listen with your mind, and love with your ears," he repeats looking at me with a strong expression on his face.

"I want you to remember what I just told you, its the most important thing I will ever tell you." My dad starts to sink back into his bed looking weaker then before.

"Heart, mind, and ears. Heart, mind, ears...," he says as he falls asleep.

I look around the room realizing that he only told me this a few nights ago. I need to get to that hospital. I leaped out of bed realizing that I don't have a car, license, or any other way of getting to the West Lake Hospital. Crap, I need to talk to him, I think getting furious. I open the door to be bedroom just a crack. I wince as it shrieks a squeaking noise in protest, and I slip out. I stopped and thought getting there isn't going to be easy. I race out of my room staring into the dark house. Great now I can`t see anything either. I feel around the room for items I knew and their places. I could feel the leather chair next to our sofa. I kept walking into the blackness. There is the fridge now. Ok now, I'm getting closer, I should be next to the door. I reach out and feel a fuzzy object in the place of the door.

"What the heck?" I say feeling it. I find the light switch and turn the knob so it would be almost unlit. The next thing I knew I was staring into the face of my mother.

"Oh, um hey mom." I say with a nervous expression sitting upon my face. I turned to look at the clock and it was four in the morning.

"Nicole, this is the third time this week. You can see your dad tomorrow." she says angrily at me and she just turns around and walks away. My mom is a short woman of about five feet and six inches. She has brown hair and brown eyes and she looks just as stressed as I have been for months. Her once beautiful toned skin had turned pale from fear and worry lines had carved their way into her face.

I turn around and walk back to the hallway to my bedroom and close my squeaky door.

"Damn it!" I scream into my pillow. I turned around to look at the ceiling and drift into another dream of my dad...

"Dad! I've missed you so much!"

"Nicole, its only been a few hours."

"I know, I know, but I wanted to ask you somth..." The next thing I knew the doctor walks into the room.

"Are you the Antonello family?" simultaneous nods came from me, my dad, and mom.

"Hello my name is doctor Shubert. We have completed a few tests and I have bad news. Mr. Antonello... you have stage four melanoma." I felt my heart drop into my stomach like I was going upwards in an elevator to fast.

"It's a very awful cancer that most people don't survive." The next thing I knew I was balling my eyes out. I grip my fathers hand and just start to cry and I seems that I would never stop. I know the doctor begins to ramble on about treatment and hospital stays but all I could hear was the sound of my pathetic sobs against my dad`s chest. I can hear the heart monitor the he`s hooked up to begin to beep faster. "Beep! Beep! Beep!..."

"BEEP, BEEP, BEEP...BEEP. BEEP. BEEP...BEEP. BEE-"

"SHUT UP!" I scream as my small hand comes down hard on the top of my alarm clock. It continues to blare into my ears until I push it off my nightstand with a powerful WACK! The chord pops out of the outlet and the beeping ceases. I roll off one side of my bed and collapse in a heap on the floor, sheets still wrapped tight around me. Waddling into the dusky bathroom, I feel along the wall and flip the light switch on.

Bright light stings my unadjusted eyes and I shut them promptly. I rip of the bed sheets from my arms and throw them to the floor as I move forth in my stocking feet, towards the mirror. After glaring at my reflection with half opened eyes, I run warm water in the circular sink. Cupping my hands, I fill them with the water and splash my face until I wake up fully. I then turn my face upwards to stare the girl in the mirror. My wavy dark hair is cut short, almost to point of being a boy`s, and sticks out at strange angles. I gave up on brushing the scary mess long ago. I watch the water drip down my fair skin and into the sink. I examine my face for visible blemishes finding a few. Thankfully, I had gotten through the brunt of my acne, braces, and glasses phase before high school had rolled around.

I leave the bathroom and dash back into my room. Dressing myself in a blue hoodie over my white t-shirt and a pair of faded denim jeans, I slip on my converse and slide out my door. I hop on the railing of my stairs and ride it the entire way down. My mom sits at our wooden dinning room table, the morning paper folded up in front of her face. I skirted around her slouching figure and picked up a piece of uncooked bread and popped it into the toaster. After layering butter and jelly on it I yelled goodbye to my mother and hopped out the door.

As I walk down my gravel driveway I stare down at my black converse until I realized something. Great, another boring day at school. School was only a quick walk from home. I approach the large gray building staring at it and watch the teachers in their window prepare for the day. They are all running back and forth double checking their work pretending that they even care. No one really did work at school anyway. While the teachers shove their idea of learning down our throats, we all just stare at the clock hoping to make the time pass quicker. Some people pretend to do work and others have tiny conversations. Were not a very productive school. I reach the door and swing it open to reveal a hallway filled with chattering teens. Here we go... I think, beginning to make my way through the crowed corridor. I receive the usual amount of stares and whispers from my less-than-friendly peers. Keeping my eyes on the shinny linoleum below, I push forth through the assorted globs of noisy teens.

I arrived at my locker that was between my two best friends, but neither of them were in sight. I sigh and gather my much abused books. They have been used for more then four years which I`m guessing exceeds their usual life span. On my math book there were the answers to various problems and on the side was written I love... and the rest was scribbled out. I grabbed my notebook which someone gave to me because they didn't use it. "School sucks", and a heart was drawn filed with the initials of I. P. + B. R. was on the inside cover of my notebook. I tried to scribble over the initials as best as i could so no one would think that it had to do with me. I grabbed one of my other books completely covered in white out graffiti and closed the metal door.

I heard the first bell alarming us that class would start soon. I dragged my feet down the hall and climbed the stairs to my first "death room". Great, one hour of algebra, in the morning, just what I need. A push through another wooden door led to the bright room filled with stuffed animals and the teacher also known as Mrs. Mugmore. Mrs. Mugmore cared for her students but also could be a little over bearing sometimes...

"Good morning my babies!" Here we go... I think as Mrs. Mugmore rushes excitedly into the classroom. She flies past our desks to reach her larger wooden one and she grabs papers and glides past us again. Were does she get this energy? I wonder.

"First turn your homework in, and then I will pass out your tests!" Only a few people got up to actually turn something in. Mrs. Mugmore gives back our tests which half of us threw away. I stare at my grade. B minus. Hmm.. could be worse, I think shoving it into my backpack.

"Our lesson today will be about the quadratic formula!" As soon as she said that everyones head simultaneously turned to look out the window, or bent downward to sleep. I take out my sketch book and begin to draw as usual. She keeps rumbling on about how to use the formula while our class sits there starring into space thinking about the end of the day. This is going to be a long day.

Authors` Note: Hey guys! This is our first NATM fic n our first fic in general! Ya we know it`s borin but it gets better, hopefully.. the natm stuff doesn`t really come in till the 3rd chapter but this is just the beginnin so bear with us n please review! Thanks for readin! Oh n yes, this is party based on the song "Here, Here, and Here" by Meg&Dia. We dont own anythin besides Nicole n anyone else ya dont recognize. And eventually we will name the chapters, not yet tho!

-the u.m.