Enclosed in its cold metal partitions and icy stone tiles, she leaned against the bathroom wall, crying. She'd probably been crying for a long time. Her train ticket was in her hand, crumpled and bloody. Her clothes and hair were damp from the downpour outside. She shivered. Trains and commuters whirred by outside, engulfed in their own lives and almost in a traveling coma. That was the opposite of her problem. She was engulfed in so many other lives it had become overwhelming. Her life before she found out, her life of lies, her life during the investigation, and the many lives she had to choose from to live after it was all over. She really didn't want to live anymore. Forced into choosing her fate when so far, fate had chosen nothing but force for her. Her bag of belongings lay tangled beside her. Finally moving, she shifted and threw her train ticket into the toilet, as it had expired. She started crying again. Her other hand was wrapped tightly around her wrist. She began to feel woozy. It had been an hour already. She removed her hand to reveal a suicidal slash across her right wrist. Her tears fell to the ground, mingling with the blood droplets on the tiles. What she wanted, nobody knew. Why she skipped her train, not even she knew. Maybe fate did.
Maybe fate knew.
The sleeping child opened her eyes to the sound of the silent witness prodding her with it's calm harmony. Her parents only played classical music after her bedtime. They only turned it up this loud when they were fighting. She heard glass break and her mother scream. Rolling over, she tried to tune it out by pulling her covers up high over her ears.
She didn't want to wake up. Not again. She was tired. And the sun wasn't up shining in through her window yet. But her sister insisted. And the music had stopped. She wrapped her little sister in her favourite woolly sweater and escorted her out to the backyard. They sat there a long time. Like before. Like the many times before. A light flickered on in the Weiss residence across the field. A minute later it died into the monotonous night and camouflaged into the blue that curtained the environs. The little girl snuggled up to her sister, still half asleep. Still half asleep. Her sister kept a keen watch over the sounds inside. She was a lot older than the sleeping child. She was a lot wiser. But they were equally clever. She ran her fingers through her little sister's hair as she slept. The yelling didn't stop. The older sister had thought about running away. She thought about it. Maybe to their neighbour's house. The Weiss' would understand. She wanted to protect the little one.
The yelling continued.
She took her sister down underneath the porch, it was warmer there. And against the house, the heat was pocketed into a slightly warmer cloud than the great outdoors. She sat her sister there, and crept back inside to fetch a blanket.
Another glass shattered.
That's when the little one woke up. She'd woken to a strange sound she'd never before heard. One that would stay with her forever. An unforgiving spirit.
It was the sound of her older sister, her wise and angelic sister, crying. She stayed in that spot under the porch, traumatized. The yelling had finally stopped. She waited fervently for the yelling to start again. She needed reassurance her family was still alive. She stayed in that spot, that spot under the porch. Where nobody found her. Nobody found her there. Not the men in scrubs who came in the loud, sparkling trucks. Not the doctors, not the young cop who sat twenty feet from her hiding spot, puking his guts out. Nobody knew where she was. In fact, nobody knew she even was. Not a single soul except her older sister. But she didn't speak for a month and a half after that. And fate knew.
Oh yes, fate definitely knew.
As that last image faded from her mind, she woke up. Opening her eyes like slits to just see where she was, she realised she wasn't dead. Maybe dying. But not dead. She closed her eyes again. The lights hurt them. She pretended to still be sleeping. Then somebody grabbed her hand. And held it, gently. The somebody carefully turned over her wrist to observe the injury. The hand that held her hand felt sad. She still didn't want to open her eyes. She wasn't dead. Her soul sang joyfully. But her mind fumed. She wanted to die. She wanted to die painfully. Hopefully she was dying. Her heartbeats beeped electronically as they were recorded by the monitor. Then another somebody joined the sad someone who held her hand. It sounded underwater. She couldn't hear what they were saying. She couldn't distinguish words. But she heard the sorrow in their voices. Then whomever was holding her hand let go, and left. The new person sat beside her in the place of the former occupant. The new person was probably another social worker. She had no family. Well, not really.
She finally opened her eyes. It was him, him from before. Oh it killed her to remember his name. Could she remember her own name? She didn't know what she didn't know. But he was one of them. From the investigation. He wasn't looking at her, so he didn't know she was awake. He was looking through a file with a San Francisco PD logo on the front. Crap! Was she in 'Cisco? Why? She looked at the monitor. Her blood pressure was lower than usual. Well, she thought, as usual as it could get for a hemophiliac. But why was she in California? Oh, right. She took the train. Did she? No, she took one train and was supposed to take two. She sighed. He looked up and saw she was awake. He looked surprised. She looked at him, trying to remember who he was. He rolled the chair over to beside her bed, and grabbed her hand. Why is it people liked to hold her hand? What was she? Dying? Then she remembered. She probably was. Which was fine. Whatever. She just realised he was saying something. She couldn't really hear him. He was underwater. He looked confused.
"Rachel! Can… can you hear me?" He asked. Rachel? She wondered. Who?… Oh… her… but, oh. Whatever. But oh yeah! She could hear him. She nodded slightly. He looked excited. He took his cell phone and dialed somebody. He still held her hand. Her dying hand. She still couldn't remember him.
"Yeah, Sara… she's awake!" He exclaimed.
Why was she in San Francisco?