The Test

Chapter Sixteen

   I opened my eyes slowly, wincing as the light assaulted my senses. I blinked rapidly, trying to get used to the brightness. As I looked around I saw that I was in a white room, with no windows and fluorescent lights on the ceiling.

My heartbeat sped up, and my heads started to sweat as I looked around. What happened? And why was I in the hospital?

I tried to get up, but my whole body was sore, and I had a slight throbbing in my stomach and throat, making it difficult for me to move.

I wracked my brain, trying to remember what had happened, but I drew a blank. Maybe I had gotten into a car accident? I had no idea but I was extremely confused.

"Layna!" someone called out. "Quick, Steve, get over here. She's awake!"

I flinched in pain as the noise caused a soft pounding in my head, but it was a relief to know that my parents were here; they would obviously know why I was in the hospital.

When I looked up at them they were both crying, just staring at me with wide eyes and holding each other at the door to my room. Steve broke apart first and came over to me, gently sitting on the bed beside me. I tried to sit up and hug him, but the burning pain in my stomach prevented me from moving too much.

"Don't try to move too much yet; everything is still going to be very sore," Steve said, gabbing onto my hand, and giving it a small kiss. "I'm so happy you're okay."

Tom came over as well, sitting on the opposite side. He leaned forward and gave me a soft kiss on my forehead.

"My little girl," Tom mumbled softly, "How do you feel?"

"Everything hurts," I whispered, my voice coming out hoarse.

"The doctor will be in here soon, and he'll give you some more medication for the pain," Steve said, running his thumb over the back of my hand.

"Okay," I said, laying my head back down on the pillow and closing my eyes. All this talking had increased the pounding in my head. "So what happened to me? Was I in an accident or something? Why am I here?"

There was an extremely long silence, so I looked up, excepting my parents to have left, it was so quiet.

They were both staring at me with shocked looks on their faces, and their jaws basically on the ground. Tom snapped out of it first, snapping his mouth shut. "What do you mean? Don't you remember?"

"Uh...no. That's why I was asking you. Did I get hit by a bus or something?" I joked, trying to lighten the mood. None of them laughed.

"No." Steve said, holding onto my hand a little tighter. "What do you remember?"

I thought back to the last thing I could remember. It hurt my head, but I vaguely recalled that it had been a Friday and I was babysitting, everything else was a little blurry. I told them this, and they just looked at me blankly.

"Layna, honey, that was ten days ago."

My heart stopped beating, and I felt nauseous. Ten days. I couldn't remember ten days of my life. What the hell had happened?

Before I could ask my parents, the doctor came in, with a nurse hot on his tail. He checked up on me, asking me how I felt, and prescribed some more medication for the pain. When Tom brought up the memory loss, he told us that he wasn't sure what could have caused it. Apparently I had hit my head hard at some point, which could have played a part of it, or it was because my brain was unconsciously suppressing the emotional trauma of whatever I had gone through. It also could be a mixture of the two, but he couldn't be sure.