Temperance's Story

Chapter one-A Childhood Torn

Temperance’s Story

Children are innocent and then they grow up.

They go from believing in fictional creatures to overlooking real monsters.

It’s the fine line between the two that make a difference in our lives.

My name is Temperance Paige and this is my story.

A Childhood Torn – Chapter one

I don’t remember much of my younger childhood or my parents. I can only remember back to when I was ten. I woke up in the hospital very afraid and confused.  I could hear the doctors and nurses talking about a car crash and how I was lucky to be alive. They didn’t think that I would make it through the night. I remember my whole body hurting. My head hurt and my eyes wouldn’t open all the way. I had IVs connected to each of my arms. Wires were connected to my chest and ran to a monitor on the wall that had green and red bumpy lines going across it. I couldn’t talk because there was a brace around my neck and I would have to move too much to get my jaw to open. All in all I was a mess. I remember thinking back to what I was doing before all this and I couldn’t. I didn’t remember anything at all. That frightened me the most.

After a couple hours, that felt like a life time, of people leaning over me and adjusting me I was left alone. I remember waking up and a guy was sitting next to my bed in the dark.  He whispered, “Sshh, don’t be afraid. Everything will be ok. I promise.” Before I shut my eye to drift back to sleep I caught a glance at his arm. He had an IV running from his arm to mine. You know how sometimes you just know something and you can’t explain how or why. Well, I knew his blood was entering my body. I don’t know how but, I knew his blood was special. My body could feel it but before I could react my eyes closed as if ordered to do so and I drifted back to sleep.

I spent the next couple of days with nurses and doctors fussing over me. They couldn’t believe how well I was doing. They would come in and stare at me and discuss the rapid closures of my healing wounds. They allowed me to get up and walk once they decided that there were no broken bones or internal bleeding like they had thought. I was deemed the miracle child in the hospital. No one said a word about how I had ended up in the hospital though.

A couple days later a man came for me. His name was Max Leidecker and he told me that I was to go live with him. I didn’t understand why I was to go live with him until he explained the reason I was in the hospital to begin with.

“Temperance I know you don’t remember what happened and this isn’t easy to tell you so I need you to be a big girl. You and your family were in a car crash about 8 days ago.  Your father was driving when something ran the car off the road. You are the only one who survived Temperance. I was a friend of your father and he asked me to take care of you if anything were to ever happen to him or your mom.”

My heart sank when he told me about my family. I hadn’t even remembered them. I couldn’t remember what they looked like or how their voice sounded. It was then I that I felt the most alone. A man that worked for him came in and packed what little stuff I had up and loaded it into the car.

The nurses that had been by my side for those 8 days all walked me out. They were like my family. They were the only people I knew. Max took my hand and helped me into the car. He was to be my new family and at the age of ten he was all I had left in the world.