Revived

Prologue

I woke up, sitting up so fast it hurt. I blinked as light suddenly blinded me, my eyes taking about a minute to adjust. I looked down at myself. I had dreamed I'd been a mess with blood all over my favorite yellow sweater, but now I was in a strange white gown with blue polka-dots. It was familiar, but my mind was so hazy I couldn't put my finger on what it was.

"Oh, Kitten! You're awake!" I was suddenly brought into a bear hug, making the breath rush out of my lungs. "You worried me senseless," my dad's familiar deep voice said. He grabbed my shoulders and gently pulled me back so he could see me, allowing me to observe him. The first thing I noticed was the worry in his brown eyes. The second thing was how the rims of those very eyes were red. His usually brushed russet hair was sticking out in all kinds of directions and his fair skin was oddly pale. He was wearing a blue shirt under a thin green jacket that was meant for cool falls, blue jeans, and his familiar brown boots with mud stains in different spots.

"Dad, what are you doing here? Well, actually, where in the world am I?" I asked, even though it should have been obvious if it wasn't for the fact that it felt like my brain was still waking up. What was wrong with me?

"Kitten, you're in the hospital." When he said the old nickname he used when I was a little kid, I started to smile, but the throbbing pain in my forehead made me wince and rub my head instead.

"What happened?" I asked, eyes narrowing in frustration. For some strange reason, my memory was blurry. All I remembered was running through a forest, trying to get away from the person following, someone yelling my name, and pain. Lots and lots of pain.

"I'm not exactly sure," he admitted. "The police said that you and your mom had a car accident."

As soon as he said the word "mom", I felt panicked. I remembered blood along with the pain I'd remembered moments before, and then I remembered her cry of agony. "Where's Mom! Is she okay?" I demanded. My heart was racing as if it was trying to get out of my chest to search for her itself. My father averted his gaze to the ground, which only made me worry more. "Dad! Where in the world is Mom?"

"She's in the ER. They don't know what's wrong with her. It seems she might have had a heart attack or something, but they just don't know," Dad finally told me, his voice low, and despite the fact I knew he was trying to hide, pain.

I threw the covers off and got to my feet, running out the door, ripping off a few IVs, which was quite painful. I could hear my dad yelling protests at me as exited the room. I had a really bad feeling what was causing my mom to die was not a heart attack. I was only thirteen. I wanted, no! needed more time with my mom. There was no way she was going to leave me now. She couldn't! She wouldn't!

I almost ran into the information desk. "Where's the ER?" I questioned the person behind the desk.

The nurse, who was reading a book, looked up to look at me. She had short blond hair, bright blue eyes that reminded me of a blue crayon, and tan skin that made her look like she belonged in California rather than West Virginia. I thought that was were we were, at least. She wore red scrubs with black shoes. "Shouldn't you be in your room, Miss Kry?" the nurse asked, surprising me when she said my last name. She met my eyes, giving me a stern look. Behind the sternness, though, I thought I saw pity.

"Where in the world is my mom?" I asked, my eyes showing my pain, but that wasn't needed. My voice cracked slightly on the last couple of words.

"I'm sorry, Miss Kry, but you need to get back into bed." The nurse came around and grabbed my shoulders, her grip gentle. "You have to trust me when I say your mom will be okay."

I heard my mom's cry echoing in my ears and felt her hands against my shoulders. She'd been talking to me, trying to calm me down. "No," I mumbled, and then backed up so the nurse lost her grip. After that I ran around her, following the signs to find the ER, the nurse, like my father, calling after me as I ran. I didn't know how, but I knew without a doubt my mom needed me right now more than she ever had.

I burst into the room that read ER, and then I think my heart skipped a few beats when I saw her. Rebecca Kry lay on a bed with doctors surrounding her, tubes coming from her and going to all sorts of machines. Her long black hair was matted with blood, her tan skin unnaturally pale, and her beautiful blue eyes halfway closed.

"What are you doing in here?" a red haired doctor asked me.

Ignoring him, I pushed through the other doctors to get to my mom's side. "Mom! Mom, it's me," I said, my eyes wide as they swept over my broken up mom.

Her eyes slowly focused on me. I had to force back my tears as I saw her eyes, which was becoming harder by the second. I could clearly see the pain in them, but now it was being forced back by the love she felt as she looked up at me. "Kat." She brought up one of her shaking hands and pushed back a few strands of hair behind my ears. "Honey, I'm so glad you're okay. I needed to see you one more time, Kat." With every breath she took I could see her pain more.

"Mom," I began, my whole body feeling like it was being weighed down by my grief. "Don't talk like that. You're staying with me. You just have to." I grabbed the pale hand that was retreating from my face, holding it with both hands. I flinched when I felt how cold her hand was. The hand started trembling, but I wasn't sure if it was my hands trembling and making hers or if it was the other way around. When I saw her smile weakly at me like she always did when she knew I was wrong, a tear escaped. The dam that had been holding my tears broke and tears flowed from my eyes like little, thin rivers. No matter how hard I tried to put the dam back up, nothing happened. The tears still came.

"I'm so sorry, Honey. I'm just so tired." She met my eyes, pleading with me to understand. "That wreck did something to my heart that can't be fixed," she told me. "Stay with your dad. Make sure he doesn't weep on the couch all day, okay?"

I felt myself nod, even though all I wanted to do was hold her in my arms, trying to will her soul to stay in her body. "Mom," I choked out. When I spoke again, I was surprised that my voice had gotten stronger. "I will , Mom. I love you, and I always will." I forced myself to smile, but the smile felt wrong. Why should I smile in a scene so sad? Why should I even pretend to look happy? As I did, I tasted a few tears enter my mouth.

My mother smiled weakly again, and then took her hand from my hands. She touched both my cheeks where my dimples were. "You remember what your dad always said about those dimples?"

I nodded. "Yeah. He said you must have kissed me on both cheeks when I was born," I replied, willingly inviting the happy memory up front and center so I could replay every time he said that.

"Yes. They always said you get dimples from being kissed by an angel." My mom let out a laugh, and then started coughing a cough that was so rough that I felt my heart squeeze as I watched her. "Honey, I'm so sorry, but it seems that I will be an angel soon," my mom said after the coughing fit was over, making me cry harder, now positive it was me shaking. "I'll always be right here, though." She brought her hand down from my cheeks to place her hand on my heart. "And I'll always protect you, no matter how far away my soul goes."

"I love you, mom," I repeated, feeling like the weight of my grief was going to crush me. How as it possible to feel so much pain? Should it be impossible? I wished it was.

"I love you, too, Honey. With all my heart." Something about the sentence made her smile. She grabbed my hand and gently hugged it. "I'll miss you."

I couldn't speak. I just closed my eyes and cried my eyes out as her hand went limp in mine. "I'll miss you, too, Mom." My knees buckled underneath me, the pain apparently weighing too much for me to bare any longer. I fell to my knees, still holding her hand. "I'll miss you more than you'll ever know," I sobbed, and then started crying so hard it hurt. Then again, it was nothing compared to the emotional pain I was feeling. What had made us wreck again? My eyes suddenly widened. Everything before the moment I woke up suddenly went blank, momentarily making me stop crying stare.

I slowly got to my feet and looked down at my mom. Why couldn't I remember anything since the moment her and I left my father, saying we needed to leave for a while. I slowly looked at my mom. I couldn't remember the crash when just moments I at least had hazy memories of what had happened.

"Sweetie, you need to leave," a black haired nurse said, grabbing my shoulders. She saw my blank eyes. "What's the matter?"

"Idon't know," I admitted.