***
I startled awake.
I didn’t remember falling asleep, but that’s not what startled me. It was the empty hospital bed in front of me that had me shooting up. My eyes scoured the room, but they quickly found her. She stood in a hospital gown on the other side of the unlit room. Looking out the window that peered over the city and the darkly lit sky.
Speechless, I remained in my chair beside the bed, watching the girl that admired the twinkling city lights. Her face was solemn as she studied the sights below, and her hands were folded to her chest. Her hair was a mess of tangled coils falling down her back. Her skin had more color to it from what I could make out against the limited light reaching in through the window.
She was like an angel, glowing in the dark of the night. My heart was racing in sporadic, life-threatening rhythms as I waited and watched. Unsure if my grief had broken my ability to see reality or if this beautiful miracle wasmine to keep.
Tied up in the hands she had pressed to her chest was the book I’d been clutching to for dear life. Maybelle held to the journal like I had, like it was the only way to breathe.
When her eyes finally slid to me, I couldn’t read the expression in them. She was quiet as she took a couple of cautious steps toward me.
My whole body was screaming at me to throw myself at her. To touch her, make sure she was real, that this wasn’t a dream, but I held still in my chair. I didn’t know all that happened to her after she got into the car with Richard.
Besides the accident, I sensed that those long moments in the vehicle took much from her. I hadn’t been able to be with her then, but being with her now, there was one thing I had the power to give her.
I wanted her to have the choice of what would happen next. I wanted her to have the control here.
Maybelle stopped at the foot of the bed, her blue-green eyes piercing into me with a thousand emotions. Relief soothed the tension in my shoulders at the sight.
“Trey,” she rasped.
“May.”
She sighed, hugging tighter to the book as she said, “Can you take me home?”
Joy had me leaping from my chair to her. I was ready to cradle her in my arms all the way home. Except Maybelle fell back a step, halting my approach entirely.
“Sorry,” I whispered, and that had her body loosening with tension and my heart aching. “Of course I can take you home. My mom will be happy to see you,” I said, trying to soothe her.
“No,” she said in a barely audible voice. “I mean, my home.”
My heart ceased pumping. My soul caved in on itself. “You—you remember?”
Maybelle pulled the book from her chest. Again, I couldn’t discern the look in her eye as she answered, her attention locked on the journal.
“I remember everything.” When she looked back at me, silver lined her eyes. “Take me home, Trey. Please.”
42 Can I Hold You?
Maybelle
Trey.
He’d been the first thing I felt, saw, and smelled when I woke up. But just like last time I woke up in a hospital bed, my head hurt, my body ached, and the confusion was almost unbearable.
Except this time, I had time to collect myself. I could take in my surroundings, remember the last moments before unconsciousness took me and... Everything else.
Each memory, detail, dream and nightmare were back in their designated files.
Then I saw the book.
My precious journal in Trey’s hand. It was important to me before the return of my memories. I understood the sacredness of its contents, but now it was like being reunited with an old friend.
I held to it desperately as Trey and I snuck out of the hospital. We didn’t think the hospital would actually bar me from leaving. Trey took me not wanting to talk to people and my desire to be home as soon as possible very seriously. So, he decided that sneaking me out was the best option.
Before running, he mentioned it would be best if I wore something other than the open-back hospital gown.I agreed. He offered his hoodie, that skated past my mid-thigh. It was all we had in terms of modesty and disguise.
