Page 10 of Velvet Deception

Who was she? Why was she here? What happened?

“It will be okay.”

It will?I wanted to be blind and take a leap of faith to just believe her, but how could I? When nothing, not even my identity, was familiar, how could I rely on what a stranger said?

Is she a stranger?

Who is she?

Who am I?

The more she struggled to transport my immobile deadweight, with me trapped in my mind, more hits of pain reached me. She dropped me, and the jarring impact seared my skin that was already injured. She struggled to hold me, putting too little support on the weaker portions of my body. It wasn’t a graceful maneuver, and I flashed in and out of consciousness until I could speak.

“Who are you?”

I knew it was my voice. I didn’t know how that was familiar and could ground me, but it did. Thiswasmy voice, croaky and stiff.

“Sofia,” she replied, still sounding so sweet and calm, melodic with clear concern in her reply.

“What do you want from me?” I struggled to wake up faster, to open my eyes as the cool air wafted over my skin.

“I will help you,” she replied, unhurried and certain. She’d said it a few times, and again, I wanted to believe she would, that I wouldn’t be as completely lost with her aid.

Like an angel, looking over me.

I frowned, registering what those fireworks had to mean.

This woman’s voice was all I could focus on, but I didn’t know which woman would be the one to offer me comfort. I’d had a woman close to me before, but that was so long ago.

Another blast went off in the sky. A firework?

Alboradas.

It had to be the first of December. It was Christmastime. How I could recall that, but nothing else, should have alarmed me further, but I took comfort in being able to sleuth outsomething, no matter how trivial. It had to mean more would come back to me. It had to signify progress, but as I realized the sticky liquid dripping from my head had to be blood—myblood—I let myself drift back into the warmth and comfort of sleep again. Lured to rest and not think, I fell once more into a deeper rest.

Only one semi-coherent idea drifted through me.

Angel.

I had no clue what happened to me or what would come next, but I had found my Christmas angel to keep me from sinking into this nothingness and fear that I was alone.

5

SOFIA

The fireworks finally stopped. Booms became more infrequent, sporadic late into the night, and then they ceased.

Alboradas was over. The first Colombian festivity was finished, and the rest of December would follow with all the joy and excitement our country’s beloved holiday brought.

Not me.

This night—or the results of it—were far from over for me. I’d brought a stranger, a wounded and unconscious doctor, home.

And from my clinical opinion, he wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

A deep sigh heaved out of me, blowing the errant strands of my hair from my face, only for them to fall right back into my vision. I saw him—Diego, according to the medical ID tag attached to his doctor coat.

Diego S. The missing surname surprised me because it was usually the first initial on credentials and ID fobs at the hospital.Then again, some visiting faculty and specialty practitioners had a different system for nomenclature that was based on where they came from.

---