He cleared his throat and tried to wet his dry, sticky mouth as she approached him again.
“Where’s my mom?” he croaked.
“Everything is just fine, Gabriel. You need to stay calm and relaxed so that you can get better, okay?”
“But I want to know.” He looked at his body for signs of injury. Had he been in a car accident? Maybe Keisha had been hurt too. Maybe she was also in hospital, in a bed somewhere close by. Maybe she was badly hurt. “Please tell me why I’m here.”
“You’re here to get better. You need to listen to what we tell you so that you can get better.”
“But where is my mom?” Gabriel raised his voice insistently.
“You need to calm down. Just stay relaxed, everything will be all right.”
“It’s not all right!” Gabriel looked at the untouched visitor’s chair. “I want my mom!”
The nurse shook her head, frowning in disapproval. She injected another syringe into his IV.
“Don’t do that!” Gabriel shouted. “I want to talk to the doctor! I want to know what’s going on!”
“Go back to sleep. Everything is fine.”
Gabriel didn’t know how long he cycled between sleeping and waking. Whenever he was awake, he felt nauseated, and muscle cramps racked his limbs. He was confused, sometimes not able to remember what was going on, and sometimes remembering the nurses and being put back to sleep again. He was exhausted just from lying in bed, unable to get up or to think straight. He stopped asking questions about why he was there or where his mother was. Whenever a nurse came in, he just closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep.
A doctor and a nurse came in and talked at his bedside. He knew that one was a doctor, not because he was a man, but because of the authority in his voice and the nurse’s subservience to him.
“How’s our young Mr. Tate coming along?”
“He seems to be calming down. He’s less agitated when he wakes up. Not so confrontational.”
“Good. How are his vitals?”
The nurse made a tsk sound. “Up and down. His body is still adjusting to the withdrawal of all the medications he has been on. I’m afraid it’s going to be a while before we have any kind of baseline.”
“Well, continue with the demedicalization protocol. There’s no way of telling what he really needs until we can see how his body behaves without any intervention. His system has been poisoned for too many years.”
“It would be easier if we could get his cooperation.”
“You know that’s not likely. Just continue with what you’ve been doing.”
“Yes, doctor.”
They walked back out of the room, rustling papers and talking in low voices. Gabriel opened his eyes a crack to watch them go.
He wanted to stay awake, but a headache throbbed in the back of his neck. Even the painful cramps in his legs were not enough to keep the darkness from closing in again.
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Mito, Medical Kidnap Files #1 by P.D. Workman is coming soon!
About the Author
FOR AS LONG AS P.D. Workman can remember, the blank page has held an incredible allure. After a number of false starts, she finally wrote her first complete novel at the age of twelve. It was full of fantastic ideas. It was the spring board for many stories over the next few years. Then, forty-some novels later, P.D. Workman finally decided to start publishing. Lots more are on the way!
P.D. Workman is a devout wife and a mother of one, born and raised in Alberta, Canada. She is a homeschooler and an Executive Assistant. She has a passion for art and nature, creative cooking for special diets, and running. She loves to read, to listen to audio books, and to share books out loud with her family. She is a technology geek with a love for all kinds of gadgets and tools to make her writing and work easier and more fun. In person, she is far less well-spoken than on the written page and tends to be shy and reserved with all but those closest to her.
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Please visit P.D. Workman at pdworkman.com to see what else she is working on, to join her mailing list, and to link to her social networks.
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Loose the Dogs Page 17