Chapter 32 Chapter 32

Chapter 32 Chapter 32
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Dimitri's POV 

It felt like I was floating in darkness.

There were no sounds, no light, no pain.

Just darkness.

Was I dead? Was I still alive? I had no idea.

Sometimes I heard distant and muffled voices. It sounded like people were talking from under the water.

"...so much blood..."

"...might not survive..."

"...do what we can..."

I tried to open my eyes but they were too heavy.

I tried to move but my body would not respond.

So I floated in the darkness and waited.

Time passed. I did not know how much. Hours? Days? Weeks?

Then slowly, things began to change.

The darkness became lighter. It became greyish instead of black.

The voices became clearer, and closer.

"His fever is breaking," a woman's voice said. "That is a good sign."

"Will he wake up?" Another voice asked. A young girl.

"I do not know, child," the first voice said. "We have done everything we can. The rest is up to him."

I tried to speak but my throat was too dry. I tried to open my eyes but they were still too heavy.

"Look!" The younger voice said. "His fingers moved! I saw them move!"

"Step back," the older voice said. "Give him space."

I felt something cool touch my lips. It felt like water. I drank it greedily.

"Easy," the woman said. "Slow sips. You have been unconscious for days."

Days? I had been unconscious for days?

My eyes were still closed so I forced them open slowly. It was very painful.

The light was blinding. I blinked several times until my vision cleared.

Strange faces stared down at me. Surprise and relief was written on them.

An old woman with gray hair and kind eyes. And a younger girl with dark hair and a worried expression.

Who are these people?

I do not know them.

I tried to remember how I got here. Where I was. What happened.

But there was nothing. Just emptiness.

"Where am I?" I tried to say, but my voice came out as a croak.

"You are safe," the woman said gently. "You are at my farm. My name is Maria. This is my daughter, Luna."

Farm? I was at a farm?

But I did not remember any farm. I did not remember anything.

"What happened?" I asked. My head was pounding. I reached up and felt bandages wrapped around my head.

"We found you on the side of the road," Maria said. "You were bleeding. There was so much blood. Nobody came to save you. We thought you were dead."

"You were badly hurt," Luna added softly. "We brought you here."

I tried to remember the road. Tried to remember being hurt, but I got nothing.

I tried to sit up, pain exploded through my head and I fell back against the pillow with a groan.

"Do not move," Maria said firmly. "Your head injury is severe. You need to rest."

"I do not understand," I said. My voice was weak. "I do not... I do not remember anything."

Maria and Luna exchanged worried glances.

"What do you remember?" Maria asked gently.

I closed my eyes and tried to think. Tried to find something. Anything.

But there was only darkness. My head was empty and blank.

"Nothing," I whispered. "I don't remember anything."

"Nothing at all?" Luna asked. Her eyes were wide.

"No," I said. The word felt like a confession. "I do not know how I got here. I do not know what happened to me. I do not even know..."

I stopped. The realization hit me like a physical blow.

"I do not know who I am," I said. My voice cracked.

Luna’s hand covered her mouth. "Oh no."

"We could not take you to a hospital," Maria explained quickly. "We do not have money for that. So I called the village healer. He stitched your wound and treated you with herbs."

I touched the bandages again. I could feel the stitches beneath. It was rough and uneven.

"The healer said this might happen," Maria continued. "Memory loss from head trauma. He said it could be temporary or..."

"Or permanent," I finished.

Maria nodded sadly. "Yes."

I lay there staring at the ceiling, trying to process all this.

I have no memory, no past, no identity.

I was nobody.

"You have been unconscious for five days," Maria said. "We were not sure you would wake up."

"Do I have anything?" I asked desperately. "A wallet? Papers? Anything that might tell me who I am?"

Maria shook her head. "Your pockets were empty. Someone must have taken everything."

So I had nothing. No clues. No answers.

"Why did you help me?" I asked quietly, my breath was shaking. This feeling was terrifying.

"Because you needed help," Maria said simply. "That is what decent people do."

I looked at her. At this stranger who had saved my life.

"Thank you," I whispered.

"Rest now," Maria said. "Do not try to force the memories. The healer said they might come back on their own. Or they might not. But pushing too hard could make things worse."

She and Luna left the room quietly, and I lay there in the silence, staring at the ceiling.

Who am I?

Where did I come from?

Did I have a family? Friends? A home?

I tried to remember but it was like reaching into fog.

Days passed. Maria and Luna took care of me. They brought me food. They changed my bandages. They helped me walk when I was strong enough to stand.

The village healer came to check on me. He was an old man with wrinkled skin and wise eyes.

"You are very lucky," he said as he examined my head. "The wound was deep. You could have died."

"Will my memory come back?" I asked.

The healer was quiet for a moment. "I do not know. Sometimes it does. Sometimes it does not. The brain is mysterious."

"How long?" I pressed.

"Days, weeks, months, maybe years." He shrugged. "Or never. There is no way to know."

After he left, I sat by the window, looking out at the farmland.

Who was I before this?

Was I a good person? Or a bad person?

Did anyone miss me? Was anyone looking for me?

The questions circled in my mind endlessly. But there were no answers.

"You look troubled," Luna said. She had brought me soup.

"I am trying to remember," I said. "But there is nothing. It is like I did not exist before I woke up in this room."

"Maybe that is not such a bad thing," she said softly.

I looked at her. "What do you mean?"

"Maybe you can start fresh," she said. "Build a new life and become whoever you want to be."

"But I want to know who I was," I said.

"Why?" Katya asked. "What if you were not a good person? What if you
r past was full of pain and regret? Would you still want it back?"

I did not have an answer for that.

That night, I lay in bed, staring at the darkness.

I tried to sleep but my mind would not rest.

Somewhere out there was my past, my life, my identity.

But here in this small farm, I was nobody.

A blank slate.

And I did not know which frightened me more. Never remembering who I was, or discovering that I was better off forgetting.