Page 80 of One Second After Another

“Someone,” the male voice responded quieter like maybe he was worried someone else might overhear.

Penny wanted to blink, especially when the bright white circle moved beyond the vision of her one eye and then the other, but she couldn’t. In fact, she quickly realized she couldn’t do anything. And while her hearing seemed to be taking in the strange, unknown voices around her, the fuzzy darkness allowed her no sight other than whatever that light was.

Hey, she wanted to say, help me.

“You’re seeing this, right?” the woman asked.

“I am.”

“Do you think—”

“Reflexes, maybe. It’s been a month. While her reconstructed valves in her heart have taken well, and the ventilator has allowed her body to rest after the trauma of the heart surgeries... this coma wasn’t induced, Trin. Studies have shown time and time again that some activity is just ... activity. Nerves that are awake, or brain waves running on autopilot. Like an electronic—”

“Dr. Morrisey, I know how this works.”

Well, then.

But at least Penny had figured out part of the mystery.

Heart surgery.

Surgery.

On her heart.

And not one—but surgeries.

She was in a hospital. One with a name she didn’t know being treated by doctors and nurses that didn’t know her ... if their earlier discussion meant what she thought it did. The news also explained the constant beep-beep-beep in the background coming from various corners of a room she couldn’t properly see.

“Her lips are quite dry—would you grab a cup and one of the stick sponges for me?”

“You’re going to moisten her—”

“Why wouldn’t I?” the man asked. “She’s a patient—I’m already here.”

While Penny was interested in trying to decipher the dynamic between the doctor and the nurse, she was also starting to see shapes. And color. Not clearly—the edges were still quite fuzzy, she wasn’t able to blink, but things were ... better.

The shadowy figure that moved away from the bed was a giant, pale green blob while the white one leaning in closer to Penny murmured, “I’ve tapped your lids open for the moment. If you are capable of hearing me at the moment because your pupils are reacting beyond the usual dilation, then you should know you’ve been in the hospital for a month. And you will be here for months more yet. The tube in your throat supplying the air to your lungs will be removed this week—should you wake up sooner, try to remember its there. It makes our job far easier when we aren’t trying to fight with a patient attempting to rip it out.”

Huh.

The doctor continued on, saying, “That bullet you took to your heart did some serious damage, and it is only because we have the best heart surgeon in the country that you are alive. Because you certainly were not when you first arrived, Miss Doe.”

Miss Doe—

Oh.

Right.

Penny wasn’t surprised that her identity was unknown—which probably explained talk of the officers who were making the job of her doctors and nurses more difficult than it needed to be.

The white blob of the doctor had started to clear in Penny’s vision, but not enough that she was capable of discerning the features of his face beyond a smile that curved his fuzzy mouth. For some reason, that smile felt kind.

Something she should trust.

“What were you doing there anyway, hmm?” he asked. “Why were you on the other side of a cemetery where a murder had just happened only a hundred yards away?”

A hum followed the question.