Chapter 4

"Do you think Daddy will like it Mommy?" the little girl asked as she stared at the shiny beaker in her Mommy's hands.

"Daddy will love it darling, and all the more because you chose it for him" her mother told her with a gentle smile "we will get the nice man to put a special message on it too, so that every time Daddy uses it he will see that we love him very much" her Mommy continued, handing the funny beaker over so that she could look at it too.

"But Daddy's too big for a beaker Mommy" the little girl said, raising big blue worried eyes at her Mommy, eyes that her Mommy always said were the spitting image of her Daddy's. Her Mommy laughed softly, a gentle tinkling sound that made her feel all warm and tingly inside. She loved it when her Mommy laughed like that.

"It's not a beaker darling, it's called a hip flask, and Daddy will love it"…

The woman in the bed stirred slightly, her eyelids fluttered as if she was watching something in her sleep. The monitor beeped in alarm before once more settling into a rhythmic beep. A few moments later a nurse walked into the dim hospital room and checked that everything was ok. She adjusted and checked things, her mind not really on the patient in the bed, but on the job at hand. Not because she didn't care but because she couldn't allow herself to. It hurt too much when they died if you did.

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The little girl huddled into the thin blanket and tried not to cry, she wanted to be brave just like her Daddy, but it was really hard to do. She didn't know how long she had been here but she knew that everyone would be worried and looking for her. She kept telling herself that her Daddy and his men would come and rescue her, that they would make the bad lady go away. She just wished he would come quickly, because she didn't think she could be brave for much longer.

She crossed her legs, trying not to thing about the fact that she needed to go to the bathroom desperately. She had told the mean lady when she had come in here a long time ago that she needed to go, but the woman had ignored her. She had just stared at her in a funny way before walking back up the old wooden stairs without a word. She wriggled slightly, her tummy aching with the need to go to the toilet, but as she wriggled the blanket began to fall of her shoulders and the cold crept in. She bent over to grab the blanket, putting pressure on her full bladder. She froze in horror as she felt the warm liquid flood down her legs, chilling quickly in the cold damp air. As her urine pooled onto the thin mattress her tears flowed unchecked down her face. She sat there as still as a statue and begged her Daddy to hurry.

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The doctor stood at the foot of the bed and reviewed the chart of the Jane Doe in a coma. "Has any progress been made on her identity?" She asked the nurse with her.

"No Doctor, the police have been unable to find anything, I had hoped that federal agent might, but he hasn't been back to visit." The nurse told her with a sad shake of the head.

The doctor sighed and shook her head, "She's been through a lot in her life" she said, remembering the x-rays she had seen, the multiple healed fractures, the old scars and burns on the bruised and battered body. "I'm going to recommend a DNR be obtained for her" she said softly, hating this aspect of her job, hating that she played God with peoples lives sometimes. The nurse nodded but said nothing, knowing that she would hate to have to make such a choice.

The young girl huddled in the dark, listening to the scratches and sounds around her. Her eyes were wide in the pitch black, as if she could see what was making the noises if she just opened her eyes wide enough. She pulled her arms and legs closer into her body, trying to make as small a target as possible for the rats and spiders. She shivered in the cold, praying for the daylight to come, at least the sun managed to penetrate the damp and broken wooden boards over the high slim windows, at least then it wasn't this all encompassing darkness.

She had long since stopped crying, she had realised after about the fifth time of being shut in this old coal cellar that crying and screaming got you nothing, it didn't help and it achieved nothing. Nothing helped, and nothing ever would she thought in despair.

The doctor looked up from the chart she was signing as the monitor on her patient began to beep alarmingly. She rushed forward to examine her patient but as suddenly as it had started the beep returned to normal. She stood silently for a moment, her hand still resting on the wrist of the frail woman in the bed.

"I don't think it will be long" she murmured to no one in particular, as she gently lay the hand back on the bed and left the room to arrange for the Do Not Resuscitate order, that would eventually end this young woman's life.