Last Chance Read online

  @2014 A.L. Wood (Andrea Wood)

  Published in 2014. All rights reserved. This book is copyright. Apart from the fair purpose of study, research, or review as permitted by the Copyright Act, no part nay be reproduced without written permission.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to the actual, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, and not intended by the author.

  This book is licensed for your purposeful enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your copy.

  Book Cover designed by Cover Design Studio

  Edited by Tammy Lindey at Butterfly Dreams Proofing and Editing

  Last Chance: Rock Romance #2

  Written by A.L. Wood

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Epilogue

  Dedication

  What is a writer with no words? I find myself speechless when trying to form a dedication to let you know how much I truly appreciate every single one of you individually. There are no words to describe how thankful and grateful I am for all of the people I have in my life. My life is filled with some of the most amazing and thoughtful people. Every single one of you are forever intertwined to me. I pull inspiration from every one of you, and only you would know where you are in my stories. I wouldn’t be where I am if it were not for you. My heart is combusting with love for each of you.

  Chad & Boog

  Tina Bina & Carl

  Amber & Steven

  Mom & Dad

  AJ & Toni

  Chris & Janice

  My nieces & nephews

  To you.

  There’s this piece of advice that I always share with my loved ones, whenever they are going through a moment of self-doubt or relationship issues. Really any time they find themselves questioning what they are doing with their lives. So I thought I would share with you.

  Whatever you do in your life, whatever kind of person you choose to be. Always be selfish in one aspect- Your happiness. If you find yourself unhappy, discover what it is that will make you happy. Don’t question how anyone else will judge you. Don’t ever give anyone the power to anyone to make you question yourself. To make you feel invaluable or unconfident. It doesn’t matter; it is your life.

  Always. Do. You.

  “When the night has been too lonely and the road has been too long

  And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong

  Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snow

  Lies the seed that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes the rose.”

  - Bette Midler

  “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”

  Prologue

  Layla

  Just getting off from my eight hour shift at the hippest local bar in Boston, I am exhausted and ready to hit my bed full force. Luckily I had a day shift, so it wasn’t nearly as busy as it is when working the night shift. I can’t get Nat out of my mind. In the past week I have only heard from her once.

  When I dropped her off she promised me she would stay in contact. This is the longest we will be away from each other since we’ve been alive. I also know this is a way out of her comfort zone. The members of “Steele’s Army” are daunting, and I know she puts on that tough exterior act, but she can only hold that facade up for so long.

  I couldn’t help but push her into this. After five years of seeing her live her life hidden beneath this shell, as her best friend, I refused to stop being her enabler. She ought to have so much more than what life has thrown at her, forced upon her. I know my parents; my father more so, feels extreme guilt.

  I also know that since the tragedy Nat has never blamed my dad. I have never needed her confirmation; we have always been a family. The accident ruined my dad. He killed his best friend, his brother and his wife.

  After that day, he could never keep eye contact with me; a big part of the reason I agreed and supported Nat’s decision to leave New York. I was tired of my family not being able to linger around me for more than ten minutes. They thought that money could somehow substitute their absence.

  Do I enjoy the money? Is it cold in Antarctica?

  I enjoy not having to rely on student grants or loans to pay for college. I also enjoy not having to wonder where my next paycheck is going to come from, and worry over how each bill will get paid. I like being able to help people, others that are not as fortunate as I.

  I enter the apartment throwing my car keys down on the kitchen counter, too lazy to attempt at cooking something to eat, I throw ramen in the microwave. While my food is cooking, I decide to go into Natalie’s room. This week has been agony for me. Being without her here in this apartment isn’t the same. It’s lonely without her music jamming loudly at all hours of the day, hell it’s just lonely without her.

  I have probably slept in her room four nights this week. Finding comfort by enfolding myself in her blankets. Our lives were planned to be intertwined long before we were born. Natalie will always be my other half. A part of my being. She has always felt that I was her sanity, her reason to keep moving every day. She’s always voiced her opinion on that.

  What she doesn’t know is that I feel an overbearing guilt at what my father did. Accident or no. If my dad had just suggested they call a taxi, her parents would still be here. She wouldn’t be as closed off as she is now. She wouldn’t be severely heartbroken trudging along in life. Sometimes I think she can see through me. See why I do what I do. She puts on the hard shell to her exterior never letting anyone but me in. I do the opposite. I let people in all the time. But only for a few nights of fun. Those few nights allow me to feel alive again. But I am not deserving of feeling alive.

  So when the guilt makes its way in, slowly creeping along my soul. That’s when I kick them out of my bed. To be honest, they don’t deserve it either. If I let someone in, and let them know how much I ache for Natalie, how much hate and disgust I have for my parents, Or how much these thoughts consume me, they would only look at me with indifference. No one could or would ever understand.

  I open her bedroom door and straight away notice she’s laying in her bed.

  What the fuck?

  Why is she here in her room?

  She should be on a tour bus right now. How the hell did she get here?

  I walk over to her bed and start shaking her awake. She doesn’t respond. I shake her again, this time a little harder.

  “Nat!” I yell out.

  “Natalie!”

  Her not responding to me has my stomaching overturning. To set my mind at rest, I lay my head on her chest, just to hear her heartbeat. It’s beating, slowly. I start screaming her name out loud. Hoping, no praying that she will
answer me or make some kind of movement. Her face is abnormally pale

  I jump off the bed and yank my cellphone out of my pocket, furiously dialing 911. Natalie what did you do? The dispatcher answers the call. Rushing the words out I tell her my friend is laying in her bed, not responding to anything I do and that her heart is barely beating. She tells me she’s sending an ambulance. That everything will be all right.

  Right now I am having a very hard time accepting that everything will be okay. I have never seen Natalie like this.

  What happened?

  As the dispatcher is still on the phone, she directs me to check Nat’s pulse. To keep checking it to make sure she hasn’t stopped breathing altogether. Sitting on the bed beside Natalie’s body with my thumb on her wrist, I glance at her nightstand and notice a piece of paper sitting there.

  A letter. Addressed to me. Oh Natalie. She did this on purpose.

  Chapter 1

  Layla

  Day One: Last night we arrived by ambulance in the emergency room. Doctors shoved me out of the way to work on Nat. I waited for over five hours in the waiting room, just to hear news that she was alive. That she would recover. Unfortunately, the news that was reported to me wasn’t as good as I had been praying for.

  Natalie was in a coma. It was conceivable that she could wake up, but they were unsure because of the amount of oxycodone she consumed. They pumped all they could out of her stomach, but she had evidently been laying there for a few hours.

  The next twenty four hours would be the most important. It would give the doctors an idea about her chance of making a full recovery. When they let me in to see her, it took all I had, to not run over to her and hold her in a tight hug. It required every ounce of strength I had left, to not start screaming at how unfair this all was.

  I can’t remember at what time I finally found sleep. I woke up to a nurse checking in on Nat. Sometime last night I came to the conclusion that I had to go home. I had to talk to them, for Natalie. I waited around long enough for the doctor to come in and tell me that he had no new updates.

  There were no changes as of yet and I left my cellphone number with him, making him promise that if there were any changes, they would call me as soon as possible.

  I took a cab home so I could pick up my car. Not taking a second to step foot in our apartment to shower or change my clothes, I ran straight to my car after paying the cab driver. I started my car and switched the air conditioner on, while I made my way to the thruway.

  **********

  Sitting with my legs crossed, while plucking grass from the ground and slowly scattering it about, I glance at the marble headstone before me; a beautiful monument, representing such short lives.

  Natalie’s parents were buried next to one another. In life, they were by each other’s sides, so it was only fitting they stay that way for eternity.

  I want to tell them how much I miss them, how much I wish things had happened differently that night. I want them to know how I tried so hard to look after Nat. That I didn’t want this for her, and I hoped, they were with her now. Protecting her, holding onto her.

  But I don’t.

  I don’t say a word.

  My mind has been a muddle the past few days. I haven’t gotten a chance to change my clothes since the day I found Natalie unconscious. I had thought I was an emotional wreck before.

  I was so, so wrong.

  Living without Natalie has caused me to jump ship into the deep end. Normally this is the last place I would have seen myself.

  I haven’t visited this cemetery since the day they were dropped six feet into this very earth. The hollow abyss of guilt has been too strong. I felt unworthy to visit them, to talk to them. And here I am, even after all that has happened, still feeling undeserving.

  Tears of melancholy silently drip down my face, my emotions catching my voice.

  I am here to beg. To plead.

  “Please. Just protect her.” I say into the air, my voice quivering.

  I sit silently on the slightly damp grass for a while longer, unable to speak any further. Reminiscing of memories past. A long ago, almost forgotten, past.

  When life was good.

  When life wasn’t full of pain and emptiness. It was so much easier then. If I could give anything up, I would. Just to have those days back.

  Natalie was never despondent. She didn’t hide anything from me then. Her feelings easily played upon her face, her heart on her sleeve for all to see. She had a glow in her eyes that shined brighter than any star in the sky. That night diminished any brightness she had in her. My dad ripped it fast away, and stole it from her.

  Our parents had their own houses, but our families’ always coincided near each other. They had been friend’s way before we came along. Our dads grew up with each other, and as Natalie and I have only followed the same path, they attended college together too. That’s where they met our mothers. It sounds like a made up fairy tale, our parents’ relationships. Our parents never hid their affection for one another. They were lucky to have found the one so young.

  Both of our fathers became lawyers, which only made the accident more ironic. They lived by the legal system and then, disobeyed it. They built their own law firm from the ground up. My mother owned her own interior design business, her base office in our house. Natalie’s mother was a high school guidance counselor.

  Our parents coincidentally conceived around the same time, resulting in mine and Natalie’s births only months apart. We were raised as one big family. Our lives always conjoined. Flashbacks of the great lives we had, only makes the life I now lead, dreary.

  I glance at the headstone one last time, imprinting it into my memory, because this will be the last time I visit for a while. I silently beg one last time, that they protect Natalie. Standing up, I brush off the scraps of ripped grass I now have all over my pants, and walk over to my car. I grab my cellphone out of the console positioned in between the seats. Thirty minutes, that’s how long I have been here. The four hour drive to only stay for thirty minutes. I hope it makes a difference.

  I start my car and put it in drive, hoping I will make it home before darkness falls. My parents still live here, but I am not visiting them. I haven’t since Nat and I left for college. My mom calls once in a while, and I always answer. Whenever she and I talk it’s always uncomfortable and awkward. It’s like she always wants to say something but decides against it. I haven’t told them about Natalie yet. Prolonging having to see them, I hit the thruway headed back home, to Boston.

  Five hours later, only because I hit a major traffic rush, I pull into the parking lot to our building complex. I am worn out physically and emotionally. All I want is to sleep, but I know I will only end up lying in Nat’s bed, with sleep evading me.

  Entering our apartment, I slip off my shoes and throw them to the side of the door, toss my keys down and head to her room. Not wasting what little bit of energy I have left, I don’t change into pajamas. I pull Nat’s blankets back and throw my body onto her bed. Swathing myself with her comforter, I close my eyes and pray for Natalie. For everything to be okay. For this nightmare to end.

  Chapter 2

  Layla

  Day Two: As soon as I woke up this morning I drove to the hospital. Praying to hear something good today, I stop at the nurses’ station before I head in to see Natalie. The nurse grabbed Natalie’s doctor for today, and he informed me that after running more tests, they still weren’t sure if Natalie would wake up from a coma. She’s showing limited signs of brain activity, and they had to place her on a respirator to help her breathe.

  Leaving the doctor upset, I walk into Nat’s room. She hasn’t moved; she’s still lying there unresponsive. I wouldn’t know she was alive if it weren’t for the heart monitor’s continuous beeping. She has tubes coming out of her body from various places; intravenous fluids and medicines are being pushed into her bloodstream. Most of the machines that are keeping her alive are on her left, so I sit on the right
side of her bed, careful not to move anything that’s connected to her.

  I take her hand in mine and close my eyes in silent prayer. Praying to God that she just responds. That she would squeeze my hand back letting me know that she would be all right. Feeling like a crazy person, I start talking to her out loud. I tell her how much I need her. How I couldn’t live without her, that what she did wasn’t fair to her or me. I tell her that she has so much more to give this world. Tears start falling from my eyes. I kiss her on the forehead and tell her I’ll be back.

  Giving her hand one last squeeze, I stand up, having to leave this room. I am unable to accept this, so I decide to run to our apartment to retrieve her some clothes for when she wakes up. She is going to wake up. She has to.

  Easing my conscience of leaving her, I tell myself the excuse is to grab her a change of clothes, so she has something clean to wear when she does wake up. Then I’m going to make an effort to reach one of those fucking douche band members, to see what in the hell happened for her to feel like this was the only way.

  I pull into the parking lot of our apartment complex. I stay sitting behind the wheel, regretting my decision to leave her alone in the hospital. What if she wakes up and I am not there?

  She will think that I just left her there all alone. That I am mad at her for what she did. I mean, I am mad to a point. I’m mad because whatever it is that had happened on that fucking bus, she didn’t feel the need to call me. I would have left work as soon as I heard her voice. I would have driven all the way there to pick her up, and I wouldn’t have left without hurting whoever had caused her that much pain.

  I run into the apartment leaving the door open behind me. I make a short call to a local taxicab company to pick me up. I would rather not have my car, so I’m not at risk of driving on so little sleep.

  Grabbing a plastic bag out of the kitchen pantry, I walk into Natalie’s room and start opening dresser drawers, quickly throwing some random items of clothing into the bag. I search for her cellphone, which luckily was still in the bag she hadn’t unpacked, near her bedroom door. I grab her cell and charger, and run back outside to a waiting taxicab.