"Mother?"
"Yes. My daughter, you wish to know your name right?"
"I wouldn't have anyone else tell me."
My mother takes a seat with a giddy smile. She must be excited that I am okay.
"Your name is Sera, Sera Mei Tefoe."
"I have a nice name. What is your name, mother?"
"My name is not as pretty, it is Fayla."
"I think you underestimate your name, mother. I think it is a good name."
She smiles warmly while looking at my face, but that smile fades as she drifts toward my ugly scar.
"I wish I could have stopped that from happening to you. I failed as a parent."
I could have said that it wasn't her fault, and I probably should have, but I had no idea what happened for me to end up the way I am. So instead of comforting my mother, I shamelessly asked for more detail.
"There was a fire at the house, I tried to get to you…"
Her voice trails off, her face drops, her gaze leaves mine… It must be hard to talk about this kind of thing when your job as a parent is to watch out for your children.
"It's okay, I'm sure that it wasn't your fault. After all, you stayed with me the whole time I was unconscious. That's what the doctor told me."
"Yes I did."
After a few moments pass she says that she has some work to do and that she will see me tomorrow for my release. A quick hug and she leaves the room. The next morning I was greeted by Rebecca the blonde nurse.
"Sera, in a few minutes we will do the final reading to make sure that you do not have an ability. While we were at it did you want to try another memory reading?"
"Yeah, it couldn't hurt to try. If possible, I would like to learn about myself as much as I can."
"Then I will be back in just a few minutes."
Man, she is a cold talker. At least she lives by her word though. By her word she returned in a few short minutes with the two others who will examine me.
"First the ability test, whenever you are ready, go ahead Dr. Ly."
"Very well. Sera, this will be a more thorough search so prepare yourself."
At those words I became a bit nervous, what does he mean "prepare yourself?" At that moment, Dr. Ly takes no hesitation as he steps up to my bed, and instead of grabbing my hand, puts his thumb on the middle of my forehead. The rest of his hand wraps around the top of my head.
"Aaaack!'
Everyone in the room just stares as I start to cough up a moderate amount of blood. They all seem calm, this must be normal. Then why can't I stop myself from screaming?
"Aaaaaahhhh!"
"Cal… …n se…, … are a…ost done."
The pain blocks almost everything that Dr. Ly is saying to me, but he looks as though he feels terrible about what is happening to me. This ringing in my ears causes me to squint and before much longer, I am finding it harder and harder to stay awake.
Violation of the mind has been detected. Attempting to resolve, please stand by…
What? Was that real? I swear I heard something just now, I can't open my eyes. I can hear a thumping sound near me as if something squishy has fallen.
"Dr. Ly! Someone contact the emergency staff, now!"
I can't speak. I can't move.
"Nurse Rebecca, make sure Sera's vitals are being monitored. Listen up ev-!"
"What's wrong mom?"
The sound of my mother crying echoes throughout the hallway.
"Don't worry Sera, I'm okay. Just thinking about some things."
I peek around the corner, mother is sitting at the kitchen table. Something sizzles in a pan on the stove. I slowly walk over to my mother, a tear can be felt running down my face.
"I miss him too, mom."
"I know, it doesn't seem to make it any easier though."
A picture frame can be found wrapped up in mother's hands, a man. Kind of looks familiar…
I open my eyes, still in the hospital. What was that? A memory?
"Sera, you're awake."
"Yeah, what happened? Is Dr. Ly okay?"
"Dr. Ly is just fine. As for what happened, we aren't really sure."
"The same thing happened when Alix tried to read some of your memories. We will have to ask for more visits from you to see if we can figure out these anomalies."
"Do I still get to go home today?"
"Of course, we wouldn't rob you of your life, haha."
With that note Dr. Nilum leaves the room with the promise to be back to sign me out in no longer than an hour. Is it really time for me to go home? It feels like this hospital is all I've known. I wonder how I will feel when I am laying down in my own bed, I mean it has to be more comfortable than this thing. I am sick of these crinkly sheets.
"Heya kiddo."
I am surprised how much I jump from the abrupt sound, yet relieved to find that it was just my very own mother glancing inside of the room.
"Hi mom. Is anyone else nearby?"
"No it's just us, why do you ask?"
"I had a dream... who did we lose?"
Mother's face has now gone from joyful eyed to grey faced, it takes her a second to collect herself again. This much is known, a reaction such as the one I just witnessed can only warrant one thing. We lost someone recently, probably just before the fire happened.
"Your father. He was a victim of a rampaging high tier on the loose."
"Oh. That's why I recognized him."
"The doctor said that your memories will come back on their own, but that it will take a while though."
I figured as much, I already had a dream about my dad which turned out to be true. Maybe I can get behind what happened to cause the fire without putting my mother through a hard time. At least I hope so…
"So, are you ready to get out of this stuffy hospital?"
"You have no idea."
"Over the past three months I have been getting the second house ready to be moved into, lucky for us last week it was finished."
Oh yeah, I guess that since the other one got burned up, we won't be able to go there. That's quite a shame, maybe if I had seen some of the rooms I would be able to remember a few more things. I might have even been able to remember how the fire started and what led up to it.
"You said that it was a second house, have we always had this house?"
"We have had it for quite some time now, thanks to your fathers work we have had an easy life. We still get the income from his work and will continue to get it until the copyright goes out. Don't worry, that won't be anytime soon."
Just how good do we have it? Are we rich? I guess the house from my dreams wasn't small, and now that I think about it they were actually quite elegant. I wonder if I will remember the second house?
"Mrs. Tefoe, can I get you to sign these for me? After these papers are signed you two are free to go. Don't forget to stop by the front desk so that we can get you another appointment set up. Take care now."
After mother signs the papers we get up and head for the front desk. Since I have no idea where we are heading, mother leads the way. Down one big hallway, down an elevator by three floors, and through a cafeteria (a huge one at that.) Finally we reached the front desk.
"These are Sera's sign out papers, we were also told to schedule a follow up for a month."
"Alright, how does the 16th of October sound?"
"Perfect, thank you very much."
My mother is very kind, I thought rich people were supposed to be snobby, and how do I have these ideas? I thought I had lost all my memory? (Readers note: Things learned are mostly not affected by memory loss depending on the severity of memory loss)
"Ready to go Sera? The car is just outside the main entrance."
"Okay, what is the house like?"
"Well, it has two stories and a basement."
For a second house??? Just how much money do we have?
"The outside has a decently sized yard, the color of the house is kind of like a brownish grey."
"Sounds like we are rich, mom."
"Well your father worked very hard to keep us well off."
"I can remember his face, I miss him…"
I didn't expect those words to come out of my mouth, but I kept seeing his face and a smile that he was always wearing along with a clean black suit. Makes me think that he loved me very much.
"I'll bet anything that he misses us too… Let's see… What else about the house, what else… Oh, it's got a huge balcony in the front facing the yard, it's a great place to read a book in the warm afternoon."
"Did I read a lot?"
"Almost everyday."
A warm breeze hits my face as I walk out the main entrance, I see a blue SUV. I have a feeling that it is my mother's car.