The Old Woman
The light didn’t leave my line of sight. Unsure if this was a light or daylight I didn’t care so much at the moment. I heard what I thought were movements. Feet shuffling, just general puttering around and I knew I had to have someone near me and I knew it was not Steve. Someone, something is helping me for some reason. We have been found and saved, was my best guess.
In the course of the next few minutes, I saw the blurry shadow come and go and feed me more and more of whatever it was that I was ingesting. Either way, I felt a little better and while still unable to move, my eyesight seemed to have gotten better. The person taking care of me was obviously not going to harm me. Otherwise, why would they be taking care of me? I felt a sigh of relief and I drifted off to sleep. Upon coming to once more, I opened my eyes and the light I realized was not heaven’s gates or the tunnel of light at the point of death. This was a door, an open door to the outside. This was a cabin, a dark wooden cabin and I was alive.
At the moment no one was around. I still couldn’t utter a word. I was damn thirsty, a little hungry but I knew I was getting stronger. Try as I might I couldn’t move, but at least I could see. In a moment of enlightenment, I was able to think of the future and live instead of dying.
When I noticed her… Yes, it was she, an old frail woman who entered the cabin holding more of the strange liquid I assumed. She didn’t have any expression on her face. She came in and fed me more of the liquid with a spoon.
Finally, I was able to say, “Thank you”. She continued to spoon feed me and I took in as much of the liquid as I could. She then went off and closed the door a little. That is when I saw that Steve was on the other side of the small room. At that moment a thought crossed my head. She was certainly tending to me. But not tending to Steve at all.
