01

She awakened to pain so severe that it robbed her of a shallow breath. She moaned, her head aching something terrible, feeling twofold its normal size, her mouth feeling as though she swallowed a fistful of desert sand.

She's vaguely aware of the stiff, rigid mattress beneath her and the crispness of linen draped delicately atop her. Cold, hissing air hastened from somewhere within the room, most feasibly a cracked vent that cast her in a chill that which her meager sheet could not prevent.

Her eyes flutter, feeling their heavy-lidded and swollen above all else. They peel open to an onslaught of florescent lighting hanging above and she's momentarily blinded. A mewling sound permeates the air-conditioned room and alarmingly she realizes the sound had escaped her.

The pain is excruciating. It resonates throughout her limbs; pangs of shooting spasms lacing her muscles, tingeing her bones all the while a throbbing ensuing fiercely at her temples.

She closes her eyes and blissfully succumbs to the darkness rushing up to embrace her.

When she awakens again it's to a haze of blurry faces. Her eyes waver heavily amongst a blurred circle of white coats.

Her head is swimming and she groans.

How did she come to be here?

Where was here?

"Miss Channing?" someone called softly, a man's voice, firm and reassuring. She clung to it briefly somewhat comforted by it as she treaded the edge of darkness.

She feels the coolness of a palm against her heated brow and it jars her back to awareness.

"She has a fever." Spoke another voice, softer, more of a soothing, gentle pull and noticeably feminine.

The sudden wisps of air against her flushed skin forewarned her of jostling movements and a fleeting panic erupted in her achy chest.

Who were these people?

Why was she so unbearably hot?

She could feel beads of perspiration dot her forehead, trickling a path at the nape of her neck.

She began pushing at the onset of hands.

"Leave me..." she groaned in a cracked, broken plea.

"Relax, Miss Channing." That gentle voice murmured gently.

There was a sound of shuffling followed swiftly by a sudden pricking along her sensitive skin. She gave a tiny gasp before slipping unto her blackened solace.

She awakens later to dulled lights, blinking until her vision clears and she's staring blankly upon tasteless, eggshell walls. Her eyes avert to a lone chair propped against one of those plain walls, noticing distinctly the absence of no one in particular.

It struck a chord within her. Shouldn't someone be there?

Her head felt unhinged with pain and intangible thoughts incapable of piecing together.

She shut and reopened her eyes, blinking as if to make sense of the room and her predicament.

A swift, curt knock came sharply, the sound like a thunderous boom to her terribly aching skull.

A man loomed suddenly before her, his noticeably statuesque frame donned in one of those noted white-coats, the surname 'E. G. Jenson' stitched cursively into its stiff material. His eyes glinted warmly, almost sympathetically, beneath dark-set brows and a wealth of peppered hair.

"Miss Channing?" he drew her attention, that voice oddly familiar and reassuring as he stepped up to the side of the bed, "I'm Dr. Jenson, how are you feeling, any pain or nausea?"

She stared momentarily in mute silence. Her mouth parting with its dryness as her tongue darted out to wet her painfully cracked lips. She swallowed, its effort causing achy discomfort.

Her eyes did a quick perusal of the man and then accessing the room briefly.

How could she have not known?

White coats, impeccably sleek, checkered linoleum and a sterile smell that clung to the vastness of the room.

She was in a hospital.

Panic erupted anew within her. How had she come to be in a hospital?

"Wha-" her throat constricted painfully, the word barely a rasp as all other syllables failed her.

Dr. Jenson settled closer and immediately his cologne wafted to her senses. He raised her chin ever so slightly, noticing particularly his carefulness in touch as his eyes examined her closely.

"Do you recall what happened, Miss Channing?"

Her eyes drew away from his, attempting to piece together the last fragments of how she came to be here. Her head was too clouded to form a coherent thought let alone decipher what occurrence led her to a hospital bed.

His dark eyes continued to access her, "You've experienced some trauma and are suffering from acute amnesia." Dr. Jenson assured, his eyes moving over her face in a way that made her slightly uncomfortable. "Can you tell me your first name?"

Only one came to mind.

"Kate." She managed feebly.

He nodded, "Very good."

Again, she attempted to force some words past her throat, "Wha-" she breathed in a large breath and winced against a sudden, sharpening pain.

"Relax-" he commanded gently, placing a hand gingerly to her shoulder, "-you have a cracked rib, some severe bruising and swelling among the temple. Can you tell me what happened, Kate?"

Her head was throbbing, painfully so that it started at the back of her eyes and worked its way through her skull.

How could she possibly remember anything with this insufferable pounding?

He watched her attentively with a digested look that held more information than he cared to share.

She was drawing a blank. She managed to shake her head beneath his intense scrutiny.

He nodded but the silence that ensued only confirmed her suspicions that there was more than what he was telling her.

"You're very fortunate to be alive, Kate."

He started to rise from the bed and she latched onto his wrist with a desperation that almost startled him.

It caused her great discomfort, but she managed weakly and quite sorely, "What do you mean?"

A man in his practice was accustomed to facing and answering inquiries either comparable or in great contrast to hers, yet, she detected a glint of absolute reluctance in the warmth of his eyes, as if the answer would devastate her. What was he not telling her?

The mattress slumped with his renewed weight and when she hadn't released him entirely, he merely tightened her hold with his own hand in a means to reassure.

"Kate-" he started, his voice dropping to an incredibly alarming rate that propelled her heart into overload. She sensed the seriousness of his tone which indicated that whatever he had to tell her was bordering cataclysmic. "I'm sorry to tell you-" he paused a moment, letting the words register slowly before adding despondently, "-but you lost the baby."

She blanched as if slapped. Her stomach did a fierce wrenching that did a number on her nausea level and beneath the dull lighting, she paled considerably. Her mouth dropped on its own accord with an uttered word of disbelief and shock, "B-baby?" she murmured.

Her brows knitted together. Surely it was a mistake? She would've known that she had been pregnant but as she sought her scrambled mind she could not recall there ever being a baby.

Her chest squeezed ever more tightly and she pressed a clenched hand against a sudden rising ache as she shook her head at the Dr. Jenson, "No-"

His dark eyes softened, "I'm terribly sorry."

She shook her head more forcibly, causing the insufferable throbbing to flare furiously, unaware that tears began to stream her face as more burned at the back of her eyes.

A baby.

The reality of it gripped her more cruelly and her nausea intensified.

Dr. Jenson peered at her somberly, his hand tightening a fraction to soothe her sudden grief but she found no comfort in it.

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