Bac to 1956

II: Awake

July 19, 2018???

Evelyn slowly opened her eyes, gradually beginning to regain her consciousness. What she observed first greatly alarmed her. The complete front window of the car had been smashed out and it had appeared to be morning. The last time she could remember being conscious, it was definitely night.

Suddenly all of the events of the past night washed over her like a wave and panic began to sink in, drowning her.

Almost immediately she turned her attention to the driver's seat and what she saw made her stomach flip and her heart race.

Her husband, James, looked a ghostly white color and appeared to be inanimate with shards of glass scattered all over his lap. But on a good note, he was however still strapped promptly into his seat by his seatbelt, as opposed to be thrown from the car.

'Thank God he wore a seat belt this time,' Evelyn briefly thought to herself.

Evelyn noticed numerous cuts and bruises on his face and a trail of crimson red stained his shirt from his forearms to his biceps. But what she could she from his outside appearance didn't bother her as much as what she couldn't see. What concerned her most was the possibility of internal bleeding.

Evelyn had observed internal bleeding first-hand from patients she had worked with in the past and she knew that if internal bleeding wasn't treated immediately, then she could only expect the worst.

"James...," Evelyn said, her voice cracking as a result of a dry, burning throat.

She received no response, not even the slightest muscle spasm. Her heart began to pump violently in her chest now.

Evelyn leaned towards him, wanting to touch his pale white face but was suddenly halted by an overwhelming pain that shot to her left shoulder. Evelyn grabbed her shoulder and winced in pain. Her shoulder felt sprained, or worst, broken.

Evelyn paused a few moments in her seat and slowly took deep breaths in an attempt to calm her pounding heart and lessen the terrible pain in her shoulder.

She then took the time to carefully observe her surroundings.

They're car was completely engulfed by large tree branches, and what appeared to be smaller trees. Evelyn ran the events of the previous night through her head. When James made the hard left, they had probably drove and crashed through many trees until there car had hit the bottom of the ravine. And from what she could see from the position of the passenger's seat, the car had taken a horrible beating.

The whole sight of the incident was overwhelming. Evelyn couldn't believe that the turn of events had occurred in less than the blink of an eye.

'Goddammit James, why couldn't you keep your eyes on the road,' Evelyn thought to herself, alittle angry, but her anger was soon stamped out by her tremendous concern of his condition.

She now turned her attention back to her husband and frowned. He desperately needed her help and she desperately needed to get out of the car and call an ambulance.

With careful moves Evelyn slowly unbuckled her seat belt, brushing off a few shards of broken glass from her lap. She then made the immediate move to retrieve a cell phone, being careful not to harm her shoulder in the process. But after a few minutes of frantic searching, the sickening realization hit her that their cell phones were not in plain sight.

"Dammit!," Evelyn cried out of frustration. There was no way possible she could even thoroughly look for their cell phones with the condition they were in, as well as the car. They were in the middle of southeast Alabama somewhere with no cell phone and more than likely nowhere near town. Evelyn felt like having a mental breakdown right there. Instead she turned her attention back to her inanimate husband, trying to not think about how increasingly frustrated she was starting to become.

Evelyn gently cupped his right check, hoping for a response but receiving nothing.

Her light brown skin contrasted significantly against his ghostly pale skin, there was no more color in his skin.

"Please baby...," Evelyn mumbled with clear desperation, "James, please wake up."

He looked scarily....... But Evelyn couldn't bring herself to complete this thought.

She slowly traced her fingertips to his eye lids and pried them open as gently as she could.

His blue eyes were moving frantically in his eye sockets in every direction.

Evelyn sighed in relief, this was good. This meant that although he was unconscious at the moment, he was not in a coma. And most importantly, it meant that he was alive. This meant that he would eventually wake up, but she knew his condition still called for immediate attention, regardless of this fact.

"Thank God," Evelyn said while planting a kiss on his right check, "I love you. Please stay with me sweetheart, please."

The thought of losing him absolutely made her feel physically and mentally ill. She quickly stabbed the thought from her head. He was going to be fine. He had to be.

Evelyn cupped his check once more and quickly kissed him, this time on the lips.

"I love you so much.... Please stay with me."

And with as much energy as she could muster up, Evelyn pried open the heavily damaged car door and set out into the forest and up the ravine in hopes of finding help.