Comatose

Chapter 6

Chapter 6

                Angelica stopped swimming after putting quite a bit of distance between her and the dock.  She needed time to think.  She also didn’t think she could stay there and listen to Kevin anymore either.  Deep down she had always been aware that she cared for him more than he did her.  She just never wanted to have to face the truth of it before.  However, being trapped and unable to walk away from the things she didn’t want to admit to she was forced to face them head on.  The experience wasn’t a pleasant one.  If she wasn’t his wife and mother to his children, she wasn’t sure who she would be.  Her whole identity had been dependent on her role in her family for so long she didn’t even know who she was anymore.

                Angelica floated on top of the water weightless and adrift.  Her thoughts drifted through her mind with more weight then her less then physical form.  She didn’t even notice when the fog started rolling in across the top of the water.  It drifted over her, but she was too lost to her thoughts at that moment.  It was some time later that she noted her return to the white foggy world she was considering her safe haven.

                “Some facts are hard to have to face, aren’t they?”  Her doppelganger asked as she took her seat next to Angelica’s head. 

                “I don’t want to talk about it.  Go away.”  The other version of her shrugged her shoulders in response refusing to budge.

                “The truth may set you free, but it also hurts like hell.  If it didn’t no one would appreciate the lesson very much.”  Angelica turned her head and glared at the other figure.

                “What do you want from me?”  She snapped bitterly.  All she had wanted to do was lay there licking her wounds until she felt better and here her subconscious was just picking away at them. 

                “Why are you here this time?”

                “To see if you’ve figured it out yet?”

                “What?  You mean what I lost?”

                “That’s part of it.”  The look a like admitted.  Angelica looked at the other woman who was looking off into the distance.  She sat up to see what was so interesting but regretted it the minute her eyes landed on the seething black mass that had reappeared.

                “What is that?”  She asked drawing the attention of the other figure back to her. 

                “You’re not ready to face that yet.  At least not until you’ve recovered what you lost.  Until you do you won’t be able to concur what you need to before it’s too late.”  The figure stated solemnly.

                “Will it come for me?”  Angelica asked watching the mass as it sat at a bit of a distance from them.  The figure looked back at the mass as well sighing in resignation.

                “No.  When you’re ready you’ll have to walk into it.  It’ll follow you wherever you go but it can’t do anything to you.”  Angelica sighed out in relief at the other woman’s words.  She could live with it hanging in the background as long as it left her alone.  There was something about it that just completely repelled her very being.

                “Are you ready?”  Her subconscious asked.

                “For what?”

                “Your next hint.”  She held out her hand to Angelica waiting for her to take hold.  Resigned Angelica reached out taking the hand of the other her.  The fog lifted and with it the apparition of herself disappeared as well.  Angelica was left sitting all alone in the middle of a field of wildflowers.  It took her a moment before she recognized the place.  Smiling she soaked in the feel of the sun on her skin.  Getting up she began her search for the class.  She found the first student not too far away, but she continued walking on.  She was looking for one person in particular.  Several minutes and many students later she found what she was looking for.  She rolled her eyes as she caught sight of the young teenager flirting with a boy sitting next to her.  So far, the only thing reliving the memories of her youth were teaching her was that following the rules had never been her thing.

                Moving closer she looked at the sketch pads laying on the ground.  Neither really had anything drawn on them as they had been abandoned the moment the teacher had left the students to their own devices.  Apparently, to young Angelica that had meant to flirt with her crush in the class.  As she recalled she had failed the assignment that day and it was more than clear why.  On the other hand, she had gained her first boyfriend.  Angelica chuckled as she watched the young couple that were too wrapped up in each other to care about anything that was going on around them.  Looking at the boy who sat next to the young teenage girl Angelica smiled fondly at him.  She remembered him well even if things hadn’t worked out between them.  His name had been Trent and he was one of the football players at her school.  His golden blonde hair seemed to light up in the sunshine accentuating his tan skin.  His hazel eyes twinkled as he looked at the young girl that smiled at him.  His dimple peeked out from his cheek when he smiled brilliantly back at her.  He was the complete opposite of who she had ended up marrying.  She remembered they had what Angelica had thought to be strong feelings for each other.  When they had been together, she couldn’t imagine ending up with anyone else but him.  She had been so naive back then.  They had ended up breaking up a year later and it had been her to break things off when rumors had broken her young fragile heart. 

                She had listened to a friend who said that Trent was being unfaithful.  At first, she hadn’t believed it and had merely brushed the words aside.  Her friend had proved it to her at a party one night when she had caught the two of them making out in a room upstairs, or so she had thought.  She broke up with a very confused Trent the next day, but he had tried to tell her that he didn’t know what she was talking about.  He tried for weeks to win her back, but she would always snub him in the halls and run off crying when he was out of sight.  She had learned the truth a couple months later when she had walked into one of the girls restrooms and over heard her “friend” telling another girl how she had found another boy that night that looked enough like Trent to convince a drunk Angelica that he was just like all the other boys.  She laughed hysterically over how gullible Angelica had been and admitted that the only reason she had done it was because she had wanted to date Trent herself.  She had left the bathroom unnoticed by the other occupants inside.  She was devastated and crying silently when she walked out only to come face to face with Trent.  He had looked like he had wanted to say something but the girl on his arm pulled his attention away long enough for Angelica to escape humiliated.

                The scene around Angelica changed once again and she found herself inside the art classroom this time.  A forlorn teenage girl sat hiding behind her easel.  Angelica remembered this time well.  The girl who had been on his arm that day outside the bathrooms claimed to be his new girlfriend and had even gone so far as to transfer into his classes.  She sat beside him now talking his ear off as he concentrated on his picture.  Angelica would take peeks from around her own canvas to discreetly watch the young couple interact.  It was like the teenager was punishing herself for not believing in him when she had the chance.  Something about the memory seemed odd to her as she watched it unfold.  It was playing out just as she remembered but there was something different about it.  Maybe because she wasn’t looking through heartbroken eyes or perhaps it was wisdom that came with age, but she could see the scene now for what it truly was and not a teenage angst-ridden memory as it had been.  As Angelica moved about the classroom taking things in with a new perspective the scene stopped and froze around her.  She gave it only a passing thought figuring her subconscious was allowing this to happen.

                Ignoring the heartbroken girl across the room she moved to the couple who sat in the opposite direction.  Everything was clearly visible to her still which meant that she had seen all of this even if it hadn’t registered that she had.  It must have been the times when she had gotten up to wash brushes or get paint or any number of small tasks during the class that gave her a new angle of view.  Angelica stood in front of the young couple truly looking them both over.  The girl was reaching out to make physical contact with Trent and Angelica could remember seeing her doing that every few minutes through out the class.  What she hadn’t noticed that day was a look of desperation shining in the girl’s eyes as she gazed at the boy beside her.  Her smile was wide but overly stretched and tense as if she was forcing herself to appear happy to those around her.  Intrigued Angelica turned her attention to Trent.  His hair was longer and unkempt then it had been in the first memory.  His eyes no longer sparkled but held a deep sadness in them.  They were also a bit swollen and bloodshot either from lack of sleep or crying she wasn’t sure.  His lips were turned down slightly in the corners too.  Not enough for most people to notice but for the girl who had been half in love with the boy she had picked it up.  She stood up from where she had bent down to observe faces and moved in behind the couple.  The girl’s canvas hardly had anything on it as she was clearly too busy trying to get and keep Trent’s attention.  Trent’s canvas however made Angelica gasp in surprise at what she saw.  The theme of that day had been the still life that the instructor had set up in the middle of the room for them to work on.  Trent’s canvas held a different picture all together.  Two things about it shocked her to the core.  The first was that Trent was quite the talented artists.  Angelica had never seen his work before and had never asked figuring he, like the other jocks, just wanted a fluff class.  The second thing was that the picture was of her teenage self.  Not as she had been in the class that day but as she had been the day they had flirted in the field. 

                Backing away from him she went over to her younger self chuckling at the horrible painting she had been working on that day.  Angelica had never been good at art but had loved the freedom of expressing yourself through it that it offered.  She looked at the stricken expression on the young girl’s face as she watched the boy she had lost from across the room.  She smiled sadly at the poor thing wishing she could have seen his suffering then as clearly as she had felt her own.  Stepping away from the girl she walked to the classroom door.  She wished she could revisit the first memory she had seen so she could look more closely at what she hadn’t noticed at the time.  Hesitantly Angelica reached out expecting to be met by the invisible barrier again.  Much to her surprise she passed right through the open doorway making her way out into the hallway.