Finding Olivia

Chapter 34

I was floating...but I was suspended, at the same time, like a balloon whose string was held by a small child. I was trying to escape the grasp that was holding me, but it was too strong.

Someone was speaking, no, pleading, with me.

I tried to make out their words, but it was like I was underwater, while they were above.

There were so many noises, but I blocked them out, focusing on what the voice was saying. I knew it was important, and that I needed to hear what they had to say, before I floated away forever.

I finally managed to distinguish what the voice was saying, more like screaming, at me.

"Olivia! No! Breathe, baby! Breathe! Come on! You can't leave me! Let me go!" The last part was addressed to someone else. "Listen to me, Olivia! You can't leave me like this! I love you! Do you hear me? I love you! We have our whole lives ahead of us, Olivia! Please, don't leave me!" The voice pleaded desperately. "We're going to get married one day and have lots of pretty babies that will look just like you, Olivia! You're going to write that book! But most importantly, you're going to live, Olivia!"

"We have a heartbeat," another voice said, just as the blackness swallowed me once more.

★★★

"Wake up, please, wake up," a voice begged.

I swam for the surface, my arm outstretched, trying to reach it.

"Wake up, Olivia," it pleaded, "open those pretty brown eyes."

I kicked my arms and my legs, my lungs about to burst with the need to inhale oxygen, but I was still too deep in the water.

I kicked faster.

"Come on, Olivia. Open your eyes. You can do it."

My eyes came open and air rushed out of my lungs in a mighty exhale.

The pain was excruciating, and if I had the energy, I'd yell at the person who had woken me from my peaceful depths where there was no pain.

"Oh God, Olivia," the voice cried and gently took one of my hands in their own.

I slowly turned my head and found Trace bowed over my bed, sobbing.

"I thought I had lost you," he cried. "I've never been so scared in all my life."

I wanted to comfort him, somehow, but I couldn't get my body to work. Tubes and wires seemed to run from every part of my body into various machines.

I tried to say his name but no sounds came out of my mouth. Finally, he looked up at me with red-rimmed eyes. "You've been asleep for a week, Olivia. I thought you were never going to wake up," his voice cracked. "They told me to keep talking to you, so I did. I've talked about anything and everything, trying to get you to wake up," he took a deep shaky breath. "I thought I was never going to see those pretty brown eyes ever again." He gently brushed my hair away from my eyes, carful of my injuries. "I watched you die, Olivia. I watched your heart stop beating." He swallowed thickly and I knew this was hard for him. But there was nothing I could do but listen. "I vowed, after watching my dad die, that I would never witness anyone I loved dying, ever again," his voice was fierce and carefully contained tears shimmered in his green eyes. "I felt so helpless, Olivia. I couldn't do anything but watch you drift away from me. When I thought you died," he choked, "I wanted nothing more than to die too. I know that sounds dramatic, but when you find the person that completes you in every way, when something happens to them...it happens to you too. I can't live without you, Olivia." He placed his hand gently in my open, bandaged, palm.