Flight Risk

Capitulo Veinte

A vaguely familiar voice spoke in an urgent, but hushed tone and I could only decipher some of the words, “Accident… Jeep…tree… Serenity… Trinity.”

I groaned at the sound of my name as I fought to force my eyes open.

“Trinity! Oh my God, please let her still be alive! Trinity! Can you hear me?”

My eyes either didn’t or couldn’t comply and I fought to stay calm as the possibility of blindness ran through my mind.

I tried my hardest to ask the stranger that knew my name where I was and why I couldn’t see anything, but it came out as an unintelligible rambling. This only served to increase my panic and my breaths started to come in shorter and shallower. Light began to penetrate my darkness causing blurry images to come into focus. My relief was only tainted by the pain. Oh, the pain. I was never so aware of every nerve ending in all my life. They screamed for reprieve, but the longer I focused on the pain the less the individual nerves were defined.

After what felt like ages, the stranger spoke again, “Trinity, don’t move! You’ll only make it hurt worse!”

His face swam into view and even though he was blurry I could still make out his basic features. He had dark brown hair, cerulean blue eyes, broad shoulders and a toned athletic body.

“Brian?” I croaked. The pain aside, I felt smothered like there was no oxygen in the air. My lungs felt like they were not only on fire but filled with liquid. I tried in vain to clear my throat, but it only made it worse. Never again, I thought as coughs wracked my broken body.

“Shh,” he told me.

Blinking a few times to clear my vision, I tried to focus on the familiar stranger’s profile. When that proved ineffective, I tried again to say his name.

“Bri-”

“No. It’s Zach,” he interrupted.

His name literally stole the small amount of air God had granted me from my lungs and constricted every vessel in my body. I squinted and strained, my eyes finally bringing Zach into focus and my body otherwise frozen from disbelief. I knew he would look older, but it still surprised me to see how much he had aged. His five o’clock shadow and the tattoo of a cross on the side of his neck made him seem like the dark harbinger of death, as did the halo of darkness that slowly began to engulf him.

Something brushed my face and I barely heard him say, “An ambulance is on its way, just stay with me.”

His voice seemed to be getting further and further away as I began to slip in and out of consciousness.

The last three words I heard before I passed out from the pain were “please forgive me.”

**

I used to dream about finding prince charming. He would sweep me off my feet and romance me until I was completely and utterly blinded by love. I used to joke around with my friends and say he would be tall, dark and handsome. He would serenade me and whisper sweet nothings in my ear. Of course when I said that I was still young and naïve and totally taken with Sam even though he was dense and none the wiser.

Then Brian came along and I thought, “Maybe Sam was just a phase. Brian could definitely be it. Jock girls ended up with Jock guys, right? We are a match made in heaven.”

To my credit, Brian certainly met most of the criteria. He was tall, handsome and good on my ego. Well-liked by most of his peers and a natural born leader, Brian seemed like prince charming. Even though part of me was still convinced that I was settling, the majority of me was swept away by his charm and that was enough for me. I even convinced myself that I was in love with him. Thankfully Ashley came along and ruined it for me. He damaged my already grief stricken, broken heart, but in retrospect, everything happens for a reason.