*Mafia boss and his lost love*
Alessa Romanov had endured a difficult childhood. Kidnapped at two years old, she had no memory of her biological family and spent fifteen years in captivity. It wasn't until her stepfather's death that she was finally...
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Bright lights.
Am I in heaven?
Then I opened my eyes, feeling a rhythmic throbbing in the back of my head. I shakily tried to sit up straight, but everything seemed fuzzy. I sat back down on the pillow with a groan after failing in my attempt. I gingerly reached for my temple in an effort to numb the pain, but all I found was a thick white bandage.
I looked in the mirror in the room next to where I was lying. I don't remember tying up my messy hair, but it was done up. I appeared as though I had spent the entire night doing drugs, dancing at a strip club, jumping off buildings, and crawling out of graveyards.
My cheek was covered in tiny bandages. I carefully removed one while savoring the pull of the skin to reveal minute scratches. Most likely from the road's debris.
I quickly recognized I was in a hospital after giving myself a once-over and looking down at a thin blue gown. Under it, I was completely exposed, and the idea that someone might have seen me like that while I was unconscious made the already chilly room feel even colder.
My thoughts were entirely focused on the events of the previous few...hours? as I sat in the room. Could have been longer. My stepfather had died, the only person who had been there since I was a child, and I couldn't help but feel sad. I couldn't help but feel relieved that he was gone and no longer able to torture me.
A nurse entered after the door squeaked open. She yelled out the door, "She's awake!" which made me flinch and raise the blanket higher. "Excuse me, miss," she said gently, "I need to take some blood. I'll get the supplies."
Slowly nodding, I flinched when it hurt.
"So you're a minor," she continued. "Do you have any family we can contact?"
I let her draw my blood while shaking my head. I hardly felt the needle enter a vein in my wrist. I felt sick to my stomach at the idea of being all alone once more. After what happened to me, I had no relatives with whom I wished to maintain contact. My biological family had abandoned me, I was aware of this. They had left me.
I couldn't help feeling resentful of my biological family as the nurse finished drawing my blood. They had never been there for me, and I had no desire to ever meet them.
"The doctor will meet you shortly," she said. "Don't worry," she added, "if you don't have family, I mean. The hospital will send you to a happy home—"
Foster care.
There was no family for me. It was either foster care or the home of my biological parents. I was going to be sent to foster care, back to some house. Probably in a position far, far worse than I was in earlier. The same spiral, only this time I might not have a way out.
With his clipboard in hand, the doctor had at some point entered the room. Knowing the doctor was a man made things worse because he would have seen me naked. If he worked in the ER, it's safe to say he wasn't phased by it, but it made my skin crawl.
"...discharged in two days... concussion," he was saying. He then nodded and walked out.
Two days. Two days until I was back in some kind of abusive household.
