My bruises, Your Pain

Chapter 17: Uncertainty

Aysa

The ride home felt longer than I remembered, my face squashed into the window staring out the window looking at the trees flashing by yet still in perfect focus. Weird how one’s brain is still able to form a picture from the little information it has. The trees quickly became a backdrop as my attention was drawn to the fog on the window, each droplet separated exactly the same distance apart, one droplet made up of several other droplets….but my mind was one thing and my heart well, I blinked and tears rolled down my eyes. The memory of what happened earlier is still so fresh on my mind, so much information yet not a single step closer to where I wanted to be, heads up, I still don’t know what that is.

So let’s recap, my mom left me a diary, well not exactly my mom she send her sister, but not her blood sister, one of the children she grew up with. The diaries tried to explain the reason she abandoned me. Then I found my mother’s sister- earlier explained- which I hoped would be my mother and she in turn told me that she knows about the diaries as well as the fact that my mother has been taken to a hospital after she collapsed. It’s like I said, information but no details such as which hospital? That remains a mystery. According to Shelly my mom wasn’t taken to the nearest hospital and no one seem to know where she was taken. I am angrier than what I was, why couldn’t she just stay out of my life? She has brought more hurt and pain into my life now than when she didn’t exist and I so badly want to go back to normal. Normal? That sounds like a day where I could be in bed with my husband and my son could run up to us (well more like a wobble) but he would jump on the bed with us and we would laugh and giggle while tickling each other and it would end with him kissing both of us on our heads and I would smile at him and of course wish we were alone.

I sighed, my mind went to the only place I knew and that would normally make me happy but in this moment not even my own little bubble could make me forget and regroup no matter how hard I tried.

“Babe, are you okay? I know it’s hard but I am with you every step of the way. It should mean something, right?”

I heard him, I saw his caring face but yet it still doesn’t make me feel better. I try to steer his attention back to driving but instead he reaches over for my hand, kisses it and whispered “I love you.”

I know he has my back so I gave him a faint smile reassuring him that he is right although it  doesn’t make it naturally better, I just never thought that I will have to revisit a time in my life that I would much rather wanted to forget. What everyone think about this situation is that even though it was hard that my mom gave me up but now I have the chance to get to know her and try and built a relationship. But in fact, no one considered ones that I have to relive how I grew up and even though I was also hopping from home to home her reasons while not clear it seems fair, she was damaged and she was just trying to protect me.

I got so caught up in the past, seeing myself in a little white gown with two ponytails in front of a church- which was where most of the homes were before I got adopted- and I would look up in the sky thinking my mom was looking over me that my heart started beating so fast It felt as if it was going to jump out of my chest, my mouth felt dry and everything felt so far away. I had a panic attack my hand was shaking uncontrollably, my past wasn’t rosy but it wasn’t horrific either but combining the two scenarios, it became too much. I see him let go of the steering wheel, grabbing my hands trying to calm me down and out of the corner of my eye I could see a truck approaching, he was so focus on me that he couldn’t see it. I screamed and screamed and I could hear my voice echo in the car. He looked up and immediately placed his hand on the steering wheel, pulling on it to get us back into the lane and I swung to the window bumping my head. I could see everything happening in slow motion…his voice resonating and I knew something was wrong.

The car tyres were screeching, he pulled left and he pulled right trying his best to keep the car on the road but finally he let go of the steering wheel and threw his body towards me. Seconds later, a loud bang vibrated through my eardrums. Glass pieces scattered everywhere, red tainted pieces and just before everything became silent, I caught a glimpse of Austin of what seemed to be a lifeless body oddly weighing me down. I tried to lift my head, it was very heavy and everything seemed to hurt. I heard voices calling for me or was it one? Was that a shadow moving? I lifted my hand, well I tried very hard but it didn’t seem to work. My eyes suddenly felt so heavy, I tried to keep them open but it was a battle every time I blinked it got even harder to keep them open and finally everything went black.

The silence was so peaceful, I was happy and there he was, Austin, my hero holding out his hand for me to grab onto. I smiled and reached for his hand which appeared more difficult, every time I got closer he just went further and further away. Why was everything so bright? Was my life flashing in front of me? Am I dead?