Hidden Heart (25 page)

He felt embarrassed for
being so honest, but Chiara hugged him and said, “Thank you. You’re
a wonderful person. Tessa is so lucky to have you in her
life.”

***

The next morning Chiara
went to the hospital. She stayed in Tessa’s room until Alessandro
arrived shortly after five o’clock. There was no change in Tessa’s
condition. They kept this routine for several days. Chiara spent
every day in the hospital, read and talked to Tessa, massaged her
arms and legs. Sometimes tears choked her voice; her little sister
lay there motionless, hurt and broken. Nobody could say if or when
she’d wake up. It seemed as if Tessa didn’t want to live anymore,
didn’t want to be in contact with the outside world.

Chapter 13

Tessa
stirred under her covers. Her body hurt. She felt the needle
poking her vein and the plastic tubes in her nostrils. Someone
lifted her left eyelid—a nurse—and flashed a tiny light in her
pupil. Tessa blinked confused, and turned her head, trying to lift
her head from the pillow. She felt dizzy as she fell back on the
pillow.

The nurse hurried out of
Tessa’s room, yelling down the hall, “She’s awake” and returned
followed by several other medical staff.

“
Miss Cosma, you had an
accident a while ago, but we’re glad to have you back,” the doctor
said, taking her pulse. He asked her to breathe in and out, then to
hold her breath while he examined her. “Everything seems normal,
but we’ll keep you monitored for a little longer.”

When the room cleared,
Chiara rushed closer to the bed, took Tessa’s hand and said, “Hi,
honey. How are you feeling?” She kissed her sister’s
forehead.

Tessa’s eyes filled up with
tears. She recalled with perfect clarity what had happened to her.
She remembered Daniel hitting her, dragging her by the hair. She
remembered him straddling her and… She put both hands on her
abdomen.

“
My baby?…”

Chiara hugged her, rocking
her slowly. “Oh, honey, you lost the baby…but you’re young and
you’ll have others…Alessandro really loves you.”

Alessandro.

Tessa remembered wishing
for him to save her from Daniel’s hands. He never came. She never
had the chance to tell him about the baby.

She sobbed in Chiara’s
arms.

“
It’s okay, honey…let it
all out…it’s okay…” Chiara whispered into her hair. She continued
to rock her like a mother rocks her child. “Octavia will be coming
soon…we’ll stay with you until you are on your feet…you’ll recover
and get back to your normal life…”

Her normal life had been
shattered. There was no normal life for her. Her sisters weren’t
really her sisters; just half-sisters since she had found out from
her mama’s letter.

“…
And Victor said you can
return to work whenever you want to, no hurry.”

Her career was over.
Signing contracts without reading their content was illegal and her
mistake were unacceptable.

“
Why did I have to wake
up?” Tessa asked between sobs. “Why? Why didn’t I die?” Her sobs
turned to screams as she pushed Chiara away. She curled into a ball
and hit the pillow with her tight fists. Two nurses showed up and
held onto her arms while a doctor administered her a sedative. Her
wailing became a whimper and within seconds she fell
asleep.

“
What happened?” Alessandro
asked when he entered Tessa’s room and saw Chiara crying in a
corner. She wiped her tears off. “She woke up, we talked a little
and she began screaming…they had to sedate her,” she said. She
shook her head and looked sadly towards the bed. “I don’t know how
she’ll be able to cope with this…” She picked a tissue from the
nearby table and blew her nose. “She’ll be out for a few hours. You
should go home, I’ll stay with her.”

“
I’m not going anywhere,
Chiara. I have to be here when she wakes up. What if she needs
me?”

***

An inhumane shriek made
Alessandro jump out of the chair. Tessa’s fists beat the air while
she struggled to fight someone or something. He ran to her and
caught her in his arms. She fought to free herself and kicked at
him with her legs.

A nurse rushed to help him.
She turned on the lights, took a syringe out of her pocket and
injected Tessa’s shoulder. She opened her eyes and blinked quickly
trying to focus on the person holding her. Tears flooded her eyes
as she tried to lift her hand to his cheek, but her arm dropped
heavily back on the bed. The nurse left, turning off the
lights.

Alessandro held Tessa’s
limp body against his and rocked her. He caressed her hair, her
face. She looked so frail, so thin. He covered her and pulled a
chair next to the bed, where he sat and watched her sleep, holding
her delicate hand. He fought to stay awake, but at last fatigue
took over.

Someone’s hand shook his
shoulder.

“
Alessandro, you need to go
home,” Chiara said. She brought coffee and muffins.

Alessandro yawned and
stretched in his chair. His neck hurt from the odd position he
slept in. He stood and walked a few steps, rotated his shoulders
and stretched again.

“
What a night,” he said,
taking the cup of coffee from Chiara’s hand. “I fell asleep and
then I heard this horrible scream. She had a nightmare. A nurse
gave her a sedative to calm her and help her fall back
asleep.”

Tessa lay in her bed,
awake, but with her eyes closed. She heard them talking.
Alessandro’s voice made her stomach flutter. Her pulse raced and
her mouth felt dry. How she wished she could let him hold her. How
she wished she could touch his face. How she wished she could brush
her hand through his hair.

But she
couldn’t.

She wasn’t worthy of his
love. She didn’t deserve him. She didn’t deserve happiness. She was
a bad person. She wanted to kill her own baby and God had punished
her for the evil thoughts. Nothing would ever be the same
again.

Tessa stirred under the
covers. She opened her eyes. She saw Chiara and Alessandro staring
at her. Both rushed to her bed. Chiara arranged her pillows so she
could sit rather than lay in bed.

“
Here, better now?” Chiara
said. “Are you hungry? The doctor said you could start eating
something light, maybe some broth or yogurt, anything you want. I
brought muffins and coffee. Would you like some?” In her eagerness
to make Tessa feel good, Chiara kept talking, babbling on, until
she realized Tessa wasn’t listening. She stared at the covers,
clutching them to her chest, eyebrows raised and chin
trembling.

Alessandro sat next to
Tessa and lifted his palm to caress her cheek. She flinched and
turned her head away. His palm froze in the air then dropped in his
lap.

“
Sorry…I didn’t mean to
scare you,” he said. He cradled his palms and swallowed hard. “I’m
sorry I wasn’t there to…to save you…”

She drew her knees to her
chest and circled them with her arms. Her ribs felt sore and
breathing hurt. A knot formed in her throat and tears rolled down
her cheeks. She swallowed hard a few times, then looked at Chiara
and whispered, “I don’t wanna be awake, can you help me
sleep?”

Chiara looked back and
forth between Alessandro and Tessa and opened her mouth to say
something. The door opened and a doctor and two nurses came
in.

“
Good morning,” the doctor
said. “Time for the morning round.”

Chiara and Alessandro
waited for the doctor outside Tessa’s door. When he came out he
shook his head. “It’s going to be a difficult recovery. I’ll give
her a sedative, but I don’t want her sleeping all the time. She’ll
develop bedsores if she doesn’t get out of bed, especially after
losing so much weight. I’ll have a psychiatrist evaluate her and
she’ll start on physical therapy today,” the doctor said, and
patted Alessandro on his shoulder as he left.

When they returned to her
room Tessa lay motionless on her side, her back to the door. A
nurse brought a tray with food. Tessa didn’t touch it. Her stomach
growled, but she refused to eat.

“
Tessa, honey, I know you
hurt, but life doesn’t stop here,” Chiara pleaded.

“
Go away…both of you…”
Tessa said.

Chiara exchanged looks with
Alessandro. She blinked back her tears and said in a cheerful
voice, “Come on, how about you get out of the bed? We can take a
few steps if you want, then we’ll let you rest.”

Mechanically Tessa lifted
the bed sheets. She put her feet on the floor, and tried to stand.
Her knees buckled, her eyes blurred, but Chiara and Alessandro
caught her in time to stop her from falling. She felt her skin
crawling when Alessandro touched her. She threw her arms around
Chiara’s neck and between shallow breaths she managed to say,
“Don’t…touch…me!”

Alessandro stepped back as
if her words burned him.

“
I have you,” Chiara said,
holding strong on her sister’s skeletal body. She shifted Tessa
slightly so she could hold onto her shoulder on one side and grip
the bed’s edge with the other hand. She walked a few wobbly and
slow steps; she tired quickly. She sat, her breath
worn-out.

“
That’s enough, now go,”
Tessa said. With trembling hands she pulled the bed sheets and
crawled back in bed.

“
I promise we’ll go if you
eat.” Chiara took a spoon and the cup of yogurt and sat next to
Tessa. “Here, just a few spoons.”

Tessa snapped the yogurt
and the spoon away and said, “I can feed myself; I’m not a baby.”
She ate half of the cup. “Happy now?” She pretended not to see the
pain on Chiara’s face. She pretended not to see Alessandro’s
shoulders hunched where he stood by the window.

She just wanted them gone.
She wanted to be left alone. With no one around to comfort or care
for her. Bad people like her didn’t deserve to be loved and happy.
Criminals like her didn’t deserve to live.

Daniel.

He scarred her body. He
wounded her soul. He should’ve killed her.

She’d welcome death over
the pain.

***

“
I don’t know what to tell
you, Octavia. She refuses to eat, she refuses to do physical
therapy, she refuses to talk. I helped her take a bath the other
day and I was shocked to see her naked; she’s just skin and bones.
I have to promise her I’ll leave her alone if she does get out of
bed or eats; otherwise she just sits and stares at nothing. She
doesn’t want anyone around her and when she sees Alessandro it’s
like she’s out of her mind. The doctor said that because a man had
caused her trauma, it’ll take a long time for her to feel secure
around another man or let one touch her. She even told the doctor
that I am not her sister and Alessandro is not her fiancé and they
should ban us from visiting her. Can you believe it?”

Chiara stopped her tirade
only to blow her nose and wipe her face.

“
What’s your impression of
Alessandro?” Octavia asked during the brief pause.

“
Oh, honey, I don’t know
what I would do without him. Poor guy, he never complains about
anything. He drives me around and makes sure I eat. He is so
wonderful and he is crazy about Tessa. I feel sorry for the way she
treats him; when she lashes out at him, he just leaves her room and
waits outside, like a dog waiting for some crumbs from his
owner.”

“
I’ll be there tomorrow
afternoon,” Octavia said. “My plane arrives at four-thirty. You
don’t have to pick me up; I’ll take a cab and come straight to the
hospital. Maybe if she sees me, she’ll feel better.”

“
Yes, maybe. The doctor
thinks that if we take her home, she’ll be more cooperative. We
have to figure out what to do with her. I met with the psychiatrist
they have in the hospital. What a moron! Nothing’s changed in this
country, sis. They have no means and their therapy methods are
outdated. Everyone has a hand out to get more money. I’m so glad I
no longer live here.”

“
Well then, I’ll see you
tomorrow. Try to hold on until then.”

***

Tessa sat in a chair in
front of the large windows of her hospital room.

It hurt to
breath.

It hurt to be.

It hurt to live.

Pills. The only thing she
looked forward to—getting pills. Three times a day. The double dose
she’d receive before night. She’d feel the numbness take over her
senses; she’d fall asleep faster, pain free. Same ritual the next
day. Nothing had changed since she first woke up almost a month
ago. Her memory of the assault tormented her ravaged soul with the
same persistence as the air that entered her lungs. Sometimes
Daniel visited her while she slept. He’d hit her again and his
laughter resonated in her ears long after she’d wake up.

She heard the door open and
close.

“
Honey, guess what? Octavia
is here,” Chiara said, stopping next to Tessa’s chair.

Octavia drew close, on her
other side, squatted and took her hand, then bent to kiss her
cheek.