Forgotten Self (Forgotten Self #1) (2 page)

2

I drove up the
winding roads into the mountain pass. It was mid-afternoon already – I'd gotten held up when my car wouldn't start. It wasn't old or anything, but once in a while battery problems would pop up and then disappear just as quickly. I knew I should probably ta
ke it in, should've months ago, but it didn't matter right now. My thoughts were filled with Kelly.

One of my clearest memories of her was when we were young. We were near the river behind her house, playing with her new dolls. That innocent act would bec
ome a scary story told around the table at Thanksgiving. Absently I wondered how memories changed each time we replayed or retold them.

Was it less real now than it had been?

*

As Kelly washes her doll's hair in the river, I watch a small worm inch acro
ss the ground. I pick it up and give it a good look. I feel like it is in the wrong place on this dry patch of grass, so I gently place it in the moist soil near the water.

As I perform this task Kelly is getting closer to the river's current, attempting
to dunk the doll. The worm is digging its way into the ground when I hear a small plunk. I look over at Kelly, who is no longer there. Then her hand pops out of the water. Fear shoots through my small body. “Mom!” I scream, running over to where I can see
the hand. “Mom!”

No answer.

The hand dips under and without a thought I jump in. The water is cold, and fast. Already I am being pulled along, zipping past the tall grass. Kelly must have held onto something or she would have been far down the river befor
e I did a thing. But whatever she'd done to fight the current is no longer working. I can see her hand again and her head pops up a moment, just long enough to take a breath.

I am panicking. But even then, at seven years old, I know that will not help me s
ave my cousin. Channeling the one swimming lesson I'd had so far, I paddle my arms and kick my feet in an uncoordinated way. “Kelly!” I call over the water. Nothing. No part of her is visible. I realize she is beyond my reach. I feel no fear, only grief. I
stop paddling, no longer compelled to fight the current.

A bright light appears on my left. The water pulls me under before I have a chance to look. It is cold; there is no solid ground here. I float, race along,
become
part of the water.

A hand grabs mi
ne and pulls me up. My head breaks the surface and I gasp for air. The bright light has returned. An indescribable feeling flows through my rescuer's hand into me. It is okay.

Don't worry, Abigail.

The message resonates through my mind as this person, this
being of light, holds me in the water.

By chance, two fisherman see Kelly race by and pull her out. I am found soon after, grasping onto a branch near the river's edge.

*

The sun made its slow, steady way down to the bottom of the sky. It would soon set
. This had been when Kelly and I would make our way up here, parking the car on the gravel and laying on the hood, watching the show. I pulled my camera out of the glove box and stepped out of the car. I didn't know why I'd never thought of doing this, but
I would document this place, this scene. I even had Kelly's car – my car. It would seem like it had been
before
.

I snapped a hundred pictures during my time there, taking a moment to quietly watch the
gorgeous colors mark out the day's end. There was some
thing glorious about the way the sun came and left. Almost like silent, heavenly music – uplifting and peaceful. I was never religious, but I'd always been spiritual. I knew there was something more to this life than what we saw in front of us. It meant mo
re. I found comfort in that, especially after her death. That tragedy wasn't a part of my everyday life anymore – grief fades – but when I did ponder on it, the knowledge of something
else
brought some alleviation at the thought of her loss.

Kelly and I h
ad often talked about just that – the “something else.” It was a special knowing we'd shared.

*

The sun is gone but its light still splashes color onto the lowest clouds. Kelly lets out a long sigh. I turn my head and look at her. “What is it?”

She clos
es her eyes. “I don't know, Abby. I feel like I don't have the language to describe it.”

“
I think I know what you're talking about.”

Her face turns to mine, eyebrows raised. “You do?”

I smile slowly. “You feel it when the sun sets, right? Like you're float
ing, happy, peaceful, joyous, awed, and grateful all at the same time?”

Kelly laughs. “Exactly.”

“
It's like I get this one...I don't know, clouded glimpse into eternity and then it's gone,” I tell her a little sadly.

“
Hmmm.” She looks back up to the stars,
her glow bright in the darkness. “I feel it everywhere.”

She is taken from me not long after that. 

*

I tilted my head back and wondered why I hadn't thought about that in so long. It was a treasured memory, after all. I'd often felt that there was som
ething more to our conversations. Some hidden meaning...or maybe subtext that neither of us understood. But there was no use in thinking about it now. I shrugged to myself and capped the lens on my camera. The sun was long gone and a chill flowed through m
e – something didn't feel quite right. Probably because I had a million things to do at home. I made the decision to leave – homework awaited. Even though the seniors had graduated, the rest of us still had a week left. I hurried back to my car, thinking a
bout my calc test on Monday. I was definitely going to flunk. Stupid, useless math.

Once I got in I buckled my seatbelt. The rocks around me became illuminated as a light came down the pass. Another vehicle traveled the road.

My car started with one turn
of the ignition and I looked over my shoulder to back up. An anxious feeling ran through me. The light was too bright now, too close. Too late I realized what was happening and frantically tried to get the door open.

Then a thousand unpleasant sensations
happened all at once.

3

Now

I open my eyes.

My head feels strangely full. Elevated feelings of pain course through my body.

I am upside down.

It all comes back, the lights, the crash. Something thick is coming up from my
throat into my mouth. The radio is playing static softly, a horn is blaring with no respite somewhere behind me, and blood is dripping onto my car's ceiling.

My thoughts come slower than usual, so it's a few lengthy seconds before I think of my cell phone.
It's in my pocket, isn't it? I should call 911. I attempt to pull my hand up and reach my pocket but a shock runs through my arm. Hazily I can see a large piece of metal has gone through it and into the driver's seat. Blood chokes out of me as my gag refl
ex is set off.

Focus, Abigail. Try your other hand. Slowly I pull up the other arm, no pain. Now which pocket was it in? My head feels like its been sledgehammered and I have to blink blood out of my eyes to see what I'm doing. For a second things are clea
r. The overhead light is on – the passenger door has been wrenched off  – and I see that the phone is in my right pocket. My hand shakes but I slide the phone out. As I do, a fit of coughing comes over me, causing the phone to slip out of my hand and clatt
er down the inclined ceiling.

More blood drips down my face and I take that and the goner of a phone to be an omen. Maybe I should just relax and see where death takes me...

A loud voice from outside forces my eyes open. “She's still alive,” a man yells a
t someone. I draw in a ragged breath. Thoughts come even slower. Another person's talking before I register the first man's message. The EMTs must be here.

“
Damn it, Ebed. How the hell could you screw this up?”

“
I did what he told us to do. I rigged the c
ar's brakes and everything.” The first man sounds afraid now.

“
Just pull her out and finish the job.”

Someone walks heavily up to the car. I'm unable to turn my head to look, but I hear him drop to his knees and crawl partway in toward me. “What a mess,” h
e grunts as he snaps my seatbelt off. I fall like a limp doll. He rips out the metal piece pinning my arm to the seat like it is a toothpick. New, fiery spasms of pain wash down my body and end just before my legs. Somewhere in the back of my mind I know t
his means something not good.

As the man pulls me out of the car, and lays me on the ground, I somehow manage to laugh. I've just been in a major car accident, I'm choking up blood, men are plotting my imminent death, and I'm worried about being paralyzed
?

“
What the hell?” the second man says to the one named Ebed.

I continue to laugh, coughing intermittently.

“
Maybe she's brain-damaged,” Ebed comments.

A low humming causes vibrations beneath me. I stop laughing, needing the energy I have left to listen.

“
Alright, Eb. It looks like you won't have to do much.”

“
Yeah, I -” Ebed cuts off as he seems to notice the humming for the first time. It has kicked up a notch in volume, and so have the vibrations. “Kedar -” The humming turns into a shrill siren but I
can still hear the two men screaming and smell burnt flesh. I breathe in and out,

in and out,

in and out.

Stop.

The earsplitting noise stops. The screaming stops. I feel something warm coming closer to me. Not on my skin, but something inside, deeper, cl
oser to the heart. I cough again, forgetting about everything but that and the choking as my lungs force blood up my throat. Someone grasps my hand. I see -

I see light. That day on the river I had just been remembering rushes back again. I know this hand.

And then I'm gone.

*

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

I sit straight up and slam the alarm clock beside me. 6:30 AM, it reads. Light is already filtering through my window. Something feels weird...What am I forgetting right now? Something, something...

A knock
at my bedroom door distracts me. It opens and my mother pokes her head in. The long, thick brown hair that we share covers her shoulders, and she seems to be combing it. “What are you doing up so early?”

“
Uh.” I stare at her and then rub my eyes. “Don't kn
ow. I don't think I slept very well last night. And this dream...”

She waits for me to finish my sentence, but when I don't she smiles and says, “Well, don't worry. It's Sunday so go ahead and sleep in!” My mother shuts the door behind her.

The bedroom fan
spins slowly. I shake my head, attempting to rid myself of the confusion muddling it. What am I freaking out about? Echoes of a high pitched shriek, lights behind me –

something painful –

“
Forget about it, weirdo,” I tell myself, lying back down to snug
gle under the covers. And I dream.

I hear screams and smell something awful, like death. Then a still silence ensues. I can hear only my breathing, and then my coughing. A warmth envelopes me and a hand grabs mine. A voice speaks to me.

Abigail.

I spit bl
ood and ask, “What's
happening?” I'm starting to lose things, my grip on the present and what just occurred.

You're safe now.

As he says this I open my eyes and can see nothing. There is only light here. A thought comes to me – I've been in a car crash, I
was severely injured, and there were two men trying to finish me off. I must be dead.

No, you're definitely alive.

I am being held close by someone. The warmth I'd felt before increases exponentially. It's like pure love.

Suddenly the light and its goodn
ess splinters off into a darker place. I am running in a fog. A voice calls out somewhere behind me, asking me to come back. I keep running. The fog shifts, strangles itself into black shapes of grotesque demeanor. One forms more quickly than others. What
is it? I look more closely and see the outline of a hand. It reaches out to me. I stumble back, trying to get away, but the hand grabs me. It has me and it will never let go.