Happy Never After

Chapter 32

I'd never been more relieved to be awake in my life.

"You're okay Tom!" I said, saying it out loud so I could hear the truth.

"I was so worried about you Emily. I wish I could have helped but I didn't see the van in time before it left." Tom said. He looked like he was almost crying and it made me think how long I'd been gone.

"What day is it...how long was I gone for?" I asked, looking from the nurse to Tom and back.

"You were gone for about twelve hours and you've been either sedated or asleep since Monday evening. It's Thursday morning." Tom said.

"You were asleep until Tuesday morning, but then you had your operation on your shoulder. You came out of that about mid-afternoon on Tuesday, but we later found there was slight damage to your head so you had to have brain surgery." the nurse explained.

"Brain surgery?" I exclaimed. How was it that bad? I hadn't even noticed that there was anything wrong."

"Well, we will need you to tell us about what happened so we can work out what caused it. But you wouldn't have noticed, it was a small bleed that wouldn't have had much impact straight away. Though it is why you collapsed by the road."

"Oh...would it be why I fell asleep in the room, even when I wasn't tired?" I asked.

"It's likely." We sat in silence for a moment when there was a knock on the door. Looking up, my heart sank when I saw two policemen.

"Emily? Would we be able to ask you some questions?" the first man said. I looked down and nodded, Tom squeezing my hand as I did so. It was going to happen sooner or later, so I might as well get it over with. They came in and took a seat by me and looked at the nurse and Tom to leave, but she just shook her head.

"I'm afraid I'll need to hear what happened too so we can make sure she's healthy." she said.

"And I'm not leaving her side." Tom added. The policemen didn't look overly impressed but they said nothing, instead getting on with the questions.

"What do you remember of the area you were held in?" they asked.

"Well...I don't remember how I got there, other than in the back of a van, and when I woke up it was in a really dark, cold basement kind of room. There was an iron door with a square of bars that let a bit of light through and it was right at the bottom of some stone stairs. The actual house was really old and dirty, not much more than a kitchen, bathroom and living room, maybe a bedroom I suppose, and the doors and windows were really old and dusty. Outside was just nothing really, a tree outside the house but then just a road that went on for ages. There was nothing between the house and where I was found." I said.

"Okay. So it was the only house on the road?" one of them asked and I nodded.

"I couldn't see any in the other direction and there definitely weren't any in the direction I ran."

"You say when you woke up. What happened before that? And after?"

"When...Tom was shot I was grabbed from behind and thrown into the back of the van. I didn't see what kind of van though. They tied my hands and feet up and taped my mouth then knocked me out, then I woke up later in the basement. The guy was waiting there, then he started talking to me about why I was there. It was the same guy who attacked me last year and who started the fire in the park, and who was in my house. Then he saw the scars on my arm...and he got his knife out and cut me." I was ashamed to admit the part about my scars to the police, but they weren't interested in that at all.

"What did the man look like?"

"He was quite tall and muscly, with dark hair and green eyes." I said. That's what I thought, anyway. It had been quite hard to tell in the dark room but it was about as close as I could get.