"You can come in now," she said walking back to her bed and getting under the covers. As soon as she was healed she was determined to go to Africa or Florida or Hawaii or just anywhere where it never snowed, she'd hated being cold for as long as she could remember and right now laying by the beach, sipping a Pina Collata, and getting a killer tan sounded very appealing.
"Do you feel better?" asked Cristian sitting down on the chair next to her bed.
"Well it feels good to be in normal clothes, I have nothing against designer outfits and silk pajamas but it feels good wearing something old and tattered, it kind of makes me feel more like myself."
Cristian looked at her and smiled trying to organize his thoughts about what he should tell her about who she was, he wanted her to know, he wanted her to feel complete, but he wasn't sure that him telling her would be the best thing to do.
"Natalie,"
"Cristian," they both said at once.
"You go first," Cristian said.
"I was thinking that maybe you shouldn't tell me about my past, I mean if you tell me and it doesn't bring everything back then I'll be constantly trying to be that person that I'm not. I want to live my life now and if my memory comes back then that's good and if it doesn't then it doesn't, I just want to be Natalie Balsom right now and I'm not sure that you telling me about everything is going to help me be true to myself, am I making any sense?" she said with a small laugh.
"Yes you are, and I agree, you should be who you are now, not what everyone wants you to be."
"Exactly."
Cristian looked at her and saw something in her that before that night he never would have guessed was there, in her eyes there was such a vulnerability, an innocence, that after her hard childhood she still had, until Allison Perkins had come along and destroyed it. He was seeing the real Natalie, the one that he'd witnessed the night of the accident, the sweet, sensitive, beautiful woman that she'd tried to hide, but she wasn't hiding now and he realized how much in these few days that he had come to care about her.
"Cris?"
"Yeah? Sorry, what did you say?"
"I said thank you, for wanting to help me. It meant a lot to me that you were willing to tell me the truth when no one else would."
"It was the least I could do for you Natalie, I want to help you in any way I can."
Natalie shivered, "But it still meant a...."
She tried to move the steering wheel but the tires were sliding on the ice, she couldn't control the car but she tried, it was dark and she screamed as the car seemed to fly off of the road and down the embankment, it was so dark, so she kept screaming.
"Natalie?" Cristian asked as she suddenly stopped and stared into space. He moved closer to her and all of a sudden she started screaming.
It was freezing, and she knew she had crashed her car, but she couldn't move and her head hurt and she was all alone, calling for him...calling for Seth. The scene in her mind changed and Natalie started to panic, she was back in that cold place that she had never wanted to remember, that she had worked as a child to convince herself that it hadn't happened, that it was a nightmare. She was laying on her bed, no older that six, and it was freezing, Roxy had forgotten to pay the gas bill again. She tried to get warm but the sheet she used as a blanket didn't hold the heat in so she clumsily folded it, trying to make it warmer. Maybe she should go check on Rex and make sure he was okay, she had to be the big sister, she had to make sure he was warm. She got out of bed and was about to go to Rex's room when the man came into her room, he was Roxy's new boyfriend. She knew by the way that he stumbled into her room that he was drunk. He walked towards her and she tried to get away but he grabbed her and threw her on the bed as she tried to fight him, but she was so small and cold and he was so strong.
Cristian held her as the scream turned into a whimper and tears ran down her cheeks. He wanted to call someone or get Mr. Davidson but he didn't want to leave her alone, and after a while she stopped crying.
Natalie held on to Cristian like a life preserver, he kept her anchored to sanity, she refused to remember that night, she would never remember what that man had done to her, she pushed it out of her head repeating silently to herself over and over again that it never happened and finally the memory left. She held on tighter to Cristian, he would protect her and make all of the badness go away. "Don't leave me," she whispered.
Cristian layed next to Natalie, she was asleep now, he didn't know what had happened, maybe she had remembered everything, but whatever had happened it had taken it's toll on her. She still held onto him, even in her sleep. He stayed awake, holding her, sometimes dozing but never really sleeping, he wanted to be there when she woke up, he didn't want her to be alone with what had happened. She had asked him to stay and that's what he would do, he wasn't going to go anywhere.