Chapter Re-post: I know what you're thinking - you already read this chapter! Lol, but I was reading it again and came across some typing errors, which was strange as in my word document they didn't show up! Anyway, I'm a little too much of a perfectionist so had to edit it, probably because this was my favourite chapter so far.
Original A/N: Thanks again for all the feedback so far! Really hope you like this chapter – I wanted to make sure it was believable with the right amount of emotion and suspense, so I kept going back and adding more to it. Anyway, enjoy! :)
Her breath caught anxiously in her throat as she prepared to tell Troy the truth. Finally, she blurted it out. "I don't belong here," she stated, knowing that she was going to have to elaborate on that soon. For the moment, though, she closed her eyes and let him hold her in a silent embrace. Then he spoke, having taken in her odd statement. "What are you talking about? What would make you say that?" Gabriella knew he was trying to comfort her, thinking that she meant she simply felt 'out of place'. But that turn of phrase was the biggest understatement imaginable. "Troy, you don't understand," she whispered tearfully.
"What is it? What don't I understand?" he asked, close to tears himself now at seeing Gabriella in such distress. "Baby, please tell me. I'm worried about you." She still wasn't sure how to say this. So she started with the thing that was most worrying her about her forthcoming admission. "I'm scared that when I tell you, you'll leave me. Because when you hear this, you'll think..." she couldn't finish. The thought had been running through her head all night. Troy reached up to tuck a few strands of her hair behind her ears, then cupped her face with his hands. "Hey. I told you I would never think you're crazy. And I would never leave you, because I love you. Okay?" he said softly.
"You won't say that when I tell you," Gabriella replied. "Before I say it, I need you to know that what's happened to me...I would never have believed it in a million years if someone else had told me it had happened to them. But it's happened to me, and I can't explain why. Do you remember how we first met?" she asked slowly. Troy allowed a fond smile to form on his lips as he recalled that day. He nodded, then continued to listen intently. Despite the pleasant reference to their first meeting, he had to know what she was talking about. What had happened to her?
"Well, the things I said that day, when you found me lying in the street...they were true. I was in a car accident. And what I said about the year... I really was only sixteen in two-thousand and five...at least, in the two-thousand and five that I knew," she told him. Her face was completely serious, and she could only pray that Troy would see that and understand that she wasn't trying to fool him. He had taken note of this already, but he didn't know what she could possibly be saying to him. She wasn't making sense. "I don't...you...what?" he stuttered. Gabriella couldn't judge what his reaction was going to be when she got this all out. The only thing she could do was finish her story.
"I wish I knew a better way to explain this. But whichever way I say it; it's still going to sound crazy. Until the day I met you, I was a law student living in the year two-thousand and ten," she stated the year with emphasis, trying to make it clear that she wasn't just delusional. "I was running late for work at a coffee shop, which was the one I told you about that day. The name I gave you that you'd never heard of, that's what it's called. This car came round the corner as I ran across the road. I remember being hit, and then falling through the air. The next thing I knew, I woke up and you found me, and there wasn't a scratch on me. We were standing on the same street I was on just before the accident, but my coffee place wasn't there...and then you told me the date, and I thought I'd gone mad," she finished, without looking at Troy.
He was, however, looking at her. His face was a mixture of shock and amazement. Gabriella was right. What he was hearing did sound crazy. And yet, he didn't think that she was. But he was at a loss for words right now. After a few more minutes in which neither of them said anything, Gabriella bravely turned to face Troy. "I promise you, this isn't a joke. And I'm not mentally unstable or schizophrenic; I know my own mind. But I understand if you don't believe me. If you want to leave now, I won't blame you," she said. That last statement left her on the verge of tears again. She honestly believed that this would be it now; that he would walk away from her and never look back. So when he instead got up from his place next to her and knelt down in front of her, taking her hands in his, she couldn't believe what she was seeing.
She waited for him to say something, anything that would tell her what he was thinking. Finally, he did. "I believe you," he said simply. "Let's just get one thing straight first. I am not going anywhere, alright?" he clarified sincerely. Troy may have been stunned by her revelation, but he meant what he said. He genuinely believed her. He had always read about these kinds of experiences. Of course, the stories had all been fictional; but he had found himself understanding how it could be possible. After all, in training and studying to become a doctor, he had seen and read about how people entered into comas after being involved in accidents. Who was to say that these people didn't find themselves in another time in their state of unconsciousness?
It wasn't a question of denying his own existence. In fact, one of the reasons he believed Gabriella was because this made more sense than other theories based on the idea. He didn't believe that people could enter into a universe that was entirely created for or by that person. But the idea of finding oneself in another time period, with people as real as yourself - Troy bought into that theory. "Did you just say you believe me?" she asked incredulously. He stood up without letting go of her hands, and gently pulled her up to a standing position too.
"Yes, I do. And I don't think you're crazy. I've always wondered whether this was possible. If anyone else had said it I would have thought they were joking. But you described everything so vividly, so accurately," Troy replied. She let out a long breath, and then closed her eyes as she uttered quietly, "do you mean it?" He nodded without hesitation.
"Yes. I know it's real," he told her clearly. Gabriella looked at Troy as he spoke, so happy that he hadn't run a mile that she could have cried all over again – but this time in joy. "Thank you. I really needed you to believe me. You're the only thing keeping me sane. Everything is so confusing, I don't know what's happening to me. But there have been things that have happened here that link to the accident," she told him as they sat down again.
"Like what?" he asked curiously. Gabriella, now able to look at him freely as she spoke, began to explain the rest of the story. "That day when I fainted? It was because I got this awful, throbbing headache. It overpowered my whole body, and I'm sure it means that I suffered a head injury in the accident. Then when I woke up in the hospital, I heard my mother's voice trying to soothe me. But the room was empty, and of course she wasn't there." Troy had been thinking it over as she talked, and now decided to tell her what he thought this all meant. "Gabriella, I think that accident might have put you in a coma."
She nodded at him. She had considered that possibility too. "That's what I've been thinking. But what does that make this place? I know it's not just in my imagination. I couldn't just imagine someone like you," she replied quietly. Troy smiled at her words, knowing what she meant by her reference to him. "Besides, I saw someone else that made me realise that the people here are most definitely real. It was Scott, my ex," she added, cringing at the memory of seeing his face again.
"What happened? What did he say to you?" Troy asked, seeing the look on her face. The tense look on Gabriella's face lessened as she answered. "He didn't. I knew him, but he didn't know me – he's only sixteen here, just like I would've been. We met in college. But when I saw him, I figured out that all of this isn't just some fantasy world." Although it feels like that when I'm with you, she added silently, resting her head against his chest. "I don't know why I'm here. I'm so used to having all the answers, but...I'm scared, Troy," she whispered, clinging onto him as though he might disappear into thin air if she let go.
"I know, baby. I know. But you don't have to be scared anymore. I'm here," he whispered back softly, hugging her close. Gabriella made no move to pull back from Troy. She stayed in the same position, inhaling his scent; reassuring herself that he was real. "Will you stay here with me?" she asked. "I don't want to be alone, it makes me feel like I don't exist here." Troy pressed a kiss to her temple and held her, letting her know that he wasn't going anywhere. Then he lifted her into his arms and carried her into her room, carefully laying her down on the bed. He lay down beside her and leaned towards her, so that their foreheads were touching.
Gabriella reached out a hand in front of her and quickly found his. Lacing their fingers together, she then ran her other hand through Troy's hair and then stopped still, keeping it there. She closed her eyes but couldn't stop a few tears leaking out. She was scared right now for so many reasons. She didn't know for sure what she was doing here; whether she would ever see her mother again; if this was life now or just some kind of existence. But there was one more thing that she was desperate to be sure of.
"Tell me this is real. You and me - please tell me it's real," she pleaded, opening her eyes. Troy used his own free hand to gently caress Gabriella's cheek. Looking into her eyes, his response was simple, but heartfelt. "It's more real than anything I've ever felt before."
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Next chapter...Gabriella now has Troy to confide in, but what happens when both of her worlds start to blend?
