As I Fade (One Breath at a Time: Book 1) (17 page)

He seemed very interested in what she had to say. I wasn’t the only one that seemed curious, but, not in what Katharine had to say, but in the fact that Dr. Tagorski dropped his tasks at hand and followed in Katharine’s footsteps.

The young blond nurse who held my legs down released me and stared pointedly at the doctor. Her eyes narrowed, nostrils flared, and she blanched, turning to a notable shade of green. She covertly whispered something to the nurse closest to her.

“
Doctor, what should we do next?” the blonde nurse called out trying to interrupt his conversation with Katharine. It appeared she was vying for Dr. Tagorski’s attention, too. With her attention on them, it gave me a few seconds to try to eavesdrop.

“
Jane, you are one of the best nurses on staff, and frankly if you don’t know how to proceed, then please leave the area and make room for someone that knows what to do. I will discuss in
detail
procedure with you later,” Doctor Tagorski spoke harshly to her. The room grew silent; you could have heard a pin drop. All the other nurses stopped and stared at Jane.

“
I just thought...fine, Doctor,” Jane sassed back. She turned beet red, steam poured from every open cavity in her head. She threw her arms into the air and stomped out of the room. The entire scene was extremely unprofessional.

How embarrassing that he reprimanded her in front of all her colleagues. I suspected two things: he knew she had purposefully interrupted them, and of course, that he had extremely high standards when it came to medical procedures and expected the nurses to act accordingly. Nothing like teaching someone a harsh lesson, she’d know what to do next time that was for sure. Honestly, I believed she knew how to proceed, but her jealousy got the best of her, and he made her pay for that one.

“Please, proceed ladies,” Doctor Tagorski ordered in a soft voice to the remaining nurses, who were now all gaping with open mouths, and then he directed his attention back toward Katharine.

I eyeballed the doctor and Katharine as they spoke in the corner across the room. Suddenly, I became acutely aware of a large presence hovering over me. A mannish looking nurse grinned down at me, preparing a syringe. My eyes widened, there was no time to brace myself. Without notice, the battle-axe nurse jabbed the long needle into my arm.

Oh shit, that hurt like a @#$@&%.
I wanted to curse her up one side and down the other. However, I refrained, after all look where my temper had gotten me. Justified or not, my fury found a cage.

I lay there so still, fat tears streaming down my face. I was trying to come to terms with the horrifying situation I may have to face. How did I find myself in such a deplorable place?

My eyes languidly closed as I spiraled into a hypnagogic state, half-awake and half-asleep. I could still hear whispers and rustling movements around me. However, I was unable to move.

“
Hold up.” I clearly heard Dr. Tagorski order with authority. “Let’s just give her time to calm down before we go any further,” he said. Relief poured through me when I felt the palm of his hand pat my forearm in a comforting manner. “She’s such a spit ball of fire...like a comet that fell from the sky.”

A comet, someone had called me that once before.
In my current daze, I couldn’t recall who that was. I heard a few other nurses muttering on about how out of control I was.

Mean Bitches!

“Yes, doctor...but I think she might be more than a comet, there’s something special about her.” A female’s voice piped in. I was certain it was the nurse named Katharine. I recognized her melodic voice. I believed she saved me from having my brain scrambled like one big egg—then it hit me hard, the intruder, the man who had appeared in my doorway had definitely come to warn me!
Who was he?

-13-

No Service

The room grew silent, sucking me a million miles away. My eyelashes fluttered like wings against the eclipse of the narrow light; my reaction was to not fight it.

Clouded memories soared through my mind, and it felt like I was balancing on a pillar of light, looking down on the world, or was I viewing this from the outside in? Behind me there was blackness, an accumulating bleakness. I felt watchful eyes on me from behind a smoky glass window. I had always felt like someone was watching me. It was a constant feeling that I wished sometimes would go away, but then, I would be lost without an audience.

* * *

The loudest crack of thunder woke me from the induced trance I was under. I fought against the powerful drugs they had forcefully administered to me. I was hell bent on getting out of there. I struggled to open my eyes, and once fully opened, it felt as if I had on a thick pair of glasses.

My eyes darted around the hospital room. I was alone. I examined every inch of it the best I could. A thin light spreading into the room from the bathroom had caught my attention. I noticed through the cracked door a small green locker. My curiosity heightened. This was something worth checking out.

I threw the blanket back and flipped out of the bed...when my bare feet hit the floor my knees buckled. I reached out and grasped onto a metal standing tray, it rolled forward, and everything, including my body went crashing to the floor. There was no way the nurses would have mistaken this as roaring thunder. I lay there on the cold vinyl tiles, breathless.

What an epic fail...

“Miss Eden. What happened, are you okay?”

“
I think so,” I whined.

When I turned my head, my eyes came parallel with Nurse Katharine’s white nursing shoes. She quickly dropped to her knees to get a closer look at me. Her hands rapidly inspected my legs, ribs and arms for possible injuries.

“Do you hurt anywhere?”

“
Not anymore than I already did. I had to use the ladies room,” I lied, pressing up to my elbows.

“
You should have called us on your buzzer—we’re here to help you,”—
Maybe you are, but I don’t think anyone else is
—“You haven’t walked on your legs for over a week and doing so without assistance could cause further injuries,” she said, quietly scolding me.

“
Can you help me now? I need to go really bad,” I lied again.

“
Yes, of course, perhaps I should call for help...” She flashed her eyes toward the door. “Never mind that...I think I can manage since you’re such an itty-bitty thing. Here slip your arm around my shoulder.”

“
Thanks,” I said as she lifted me to my feet and guided me to the private bathroom.

“
I can make it from here, thanks.”

“
I shouldn’t leave you unattended.”

“
Really...
crap
...I can’t pee when someone is watching me.”

She sighed and tilted her head, slightly. “I’m the same way,” Katharine whispered, clearly embarrassed, a red heat crossed over her cheekbones. “Okay go potty,” she spoke to me in child-like terms. “I’ll have to stand outside the door until you’re finished.”

“I’m okay with that.” I smiled genuinely at her.

When alone inside of the bathroom, I glanced at my reflection in the silver coated safety mirror. My image was distorted. From what I could see, I looked like
shit.
My face appeared sallow, slightly thinner and terribly pale. Of course, the lighting in the bathroom caused an overall unflattering affect.

I had a yellowish bruise under my left eye and one along my jawline. I bit my lips, trying to draw some color into them as I tucked my wild tangled waves behind my ears. There was no reason to primp and no time to either.

I quickly knelt down on the floor next to the small locker. I flushed the toilet to create a sound barrier, in case the locker made any noise when I unlatched it. Bingo!

Inside, I found my clothes neatly folded into a pile with only one high-heel beneath them.
One shoe? How odd,
I thought.

I quickly fumbled through my jeans pockets.
Nothing.
I grabbed my coat and searched the pockets.
Nothing again.

When I began refolding the items, I felt something between the outer and inner lining of my coat. Quickly, I stuck my hand into the pocket, down through a small hole in the lining and found my cell-phone. What a relief!

“Are you okay in there?” Katharine asked me through the closed door.

“
Yes...just a minute,” I called back to her. My vision blurred, but I knew my phone like the back of my hand. Power on...with my thumb, I scrolled to Nuilley’s number,
hit the send button...connecting...call failed...no service
!
Damn it! Try again.
I stood up, held the phone in the air, searching for a signal.

“
Miss Eden...” Katharine said, knocking softly on the door. I heard the handle wiggle.

“
Please, don’t come in. I’m almost done,” I gasped.

“
Miss Eden...if you can hear me alright, I just have to say the doctor is really worried about you. We don’t know if you were involved in a raid, or well—that would have been just awful. He thinks you are suppressing what happened to you. We don’t blame you—you seem very confused...and well, I have noticed things too—like the way you speak so forwardly...and even your clothing—”

Oh shit.
“I’m coming out.” I reached over, flushed the toilet, knelt down again then quickly folded my clothes—pressed the locker door shut, with the phone still in my hand...thinking...
I need to hide this somewhere.
I quickly tucked it into the elastic waistband of the granny panties they had put on me. I pulled my battered body from the floor and managed to take a few steps, clinging to the walls. My strength was waning.

Back in bed...Katharine gently brushed the knots out of my messy hairdo.

Katharine was incredibly beautiful, but not in a super model way, something more internal, reaching, something that touches you from far away. Her beauty had nothing to do with her heart-shaped face, high cheekbones, or red-fringe setting off her light aqua blue eyes, or her soft lips, and her full curves all in the right places.

“
Miss Eden, your hair is so lovely. I always wanted long blond hair like yours.”

“
Oh, I think yours is drop-dead gorgeous.”

“
See, you say the dandiest things.
Drop-dead
”—she tittered—“Hum, but thank you—I think,” Katharine replied with a puzzled expression in her eyes, and I winced.

What an odd girl
, I thought. “Just so you know it’s a compliment, Katharine. Oh, by the way, please, call me Brielle. I mean we are around the same age. Actually, I’m probably a few years older than you—but either way, it still feels funny when you call me Miss Eden all the time,” I admitted.

Katharine merely watched me and smiled curiously, but she didn’t say a single word. I hoped I hadn’t embarrassed her. That was not my intention.

There was something that was old about Katharine. Instinctively, I knew she had seen things that most girls her age hadn’t or never would, but what? That didn’t matter. I innately knew this when I looked into her eyes. Soulful eyes. The only words that best described her, aside from incredibly beautiful, were “an old soul.”

I watched Katharine, she moved like a quiet breath of fresh air, as she tucked the blanket tightly in at my sides. My grandmother used to do the exact same thing, in just the same way.

She carefully placed the note Dr. Tagorski had given to me in my right hand.

“
You’re hands are so cold.”

“
Raynaud’s disease...I inherited it from my grandmother.” I frowned.

“
Oh dear...I have the same thing. Don’t worry its not too dangerous. You just have to keep yourself warm. And you mustn’t allow yourself to worry too much, too.” Her lips turned up into a reassuring smile. She gripped my hand in a comforting way.

“
Thank you.” An overwhelming emotion rose in me, tears pressed against the back of my eyes, but I managed to hold them back. With Katharine nearby, I felt safe.

“
There now, you should sleep...the medication they gave you should take affect soon,” she said, adjusting the side-rails that attached to the bed.

“
Do you mind? Can you please leave those down? They make me feel trapped.”

“
I understand.” She smiled and complied.

Suddenly, I felt a rush of affection for my caretaker. “Nurse Katharine, I would like to thank—”

“Oh dear don’t cry. You’re going to be just fine. Don’t worry your memories will come back. Our doctors are the best in all of France. Especially Doctor Tag—”

Doctor Tagorski’s voice interjected, “I’m just doing my rounds and wanted to check in on you. How’s our star patient feeling? I’m sorry if we frightened you earlier,” he said as if he were speaking to a child. That seemed to have been a common practice with the staff.