Althea's eyes fluttered open, the world a blur of white and light. The brightness pressed against her lids, sharp and unwelcome, and she squinted against it. Her body felt alien—limbs heavy, unresponsive, and numb. The sheets, crisp and cold, brushed her skin through the hospital gown she wore, unfamiliar and scratchy. A beeping sound pulsed steadily somewhere nearby, echoing in her chest like a heartbeat that wasn't her own.
Her throat felt raw and dry. She tried to speak, but the sound that emerged was nothing more than a rough rasp. Her mind reached desperately for something—anything—that could anchor her. A name, a memory, a face. But all she found was emptiness.
Movement approached. A nurse, young and careful, leaned close, wearing a mask. "You're awake," she said gently. Her voice was soft, soothing, but it brought no comfort.
Althea tried to nod, to respond, but her head felt like it was filled with lead. The nurse helped her sip water from a straw. Each swallow was painful and foreign, like her throat belonged to someone else.
"You're in the hospital," the nurse continued, her tone professional but gentle. "You were in an accident."
The words floated through her mind. Accident. Hospital. She had no recollection of anything. No faces. No names. No past. She tried to sit up, but her body refused. She looked down at the hospital gown, feeling its rough texture against her skin.
Then something caught her eye—a student ID pinned to the gown. It had her photo, her name: Althea Vallejo. She stared at it, trying to recognize the face and the name. Nothing stirred inside her. It was a stranger staring back.
She blinked rapidly, her chest tightening. Her fingers traced the edges of the ID as if touching it could summon her memories. But nothing came.
The nurse asked questions, simple ones at first. "Do you know where you live?"
Althea shook her head. She didn't.
There was one listed on her records, a parent. But the nurse hesitated. "I'm sorry," she said softly. "It looks like your parent has passed away."
The words fell like stones in her chest. She swallowed hard. Nothing. No one.
She tried again. "Any family… anyone at all?"
The nurse looked down at her notes. "Your dorm address is on file, but it hasn't been updated for months. And without any other contacts…" Her voice trailed off, leaving Althea with a silence so vast it felt like it could swallow her whole.
Hours—or maybe days—passed. She had no sense of time. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead. Nurses and doctors came and went. Meals were brought to her bedside. Machines beeped relentlessly. And yet, none of it felt connected to her.
She lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, her mind a hollow echo. The world existed, but she did not know her place in it. The hospital gown clung to her as she tried to make sense of it all, every movement strange, every sound alien.
She tried small experiments. Moving her fingers, flexing her toes, lifting her arms. Each motion required effort, but the results were underwhelming—her body didn't feel like her own. She tried to speak, calling her name aloud, Althea Vallejo. The sound felt foreign, like someone else's voice echoing in her chest.
Days stretched like this, unbroken. She learned to recognize the rhythm of the hospital: the morning alarms, the rolling carts, the footsteps in the hall, the quiet murmur of nurses at night. It was a life reduced to patterns, motions, and the relentless beeping of machines.
She clung to the ID, turning it over and over. It was the only link she had to herself. Her parents were gone. Her dorm address outdated. She had no phone, no wallet, no notes, nothing. The world had moved on without her, and she could not follow.
She began to keep a mental journal, tracking each sensation, each interaction, each fleeting thought. She wrote nothing down because the nurses were busy, and her memory was unreliable. But inside, she recorded everything: the feel of the bedsheets, the sound of the distant elevators, the smell of antiseptic, the cold bite of air from the vent above her bed.
Althea realized that she was truly alone. Not just physically, but entirely. No one knew she was here, no one would come for her. Even the emergency contact was gone. The dorm address led nowhere. She had no ties left.
At night, when the hallway outside was quiet, she whispered to herself. "Who am I?" The words fell into the empty room and returned only in echoes. She tried again. "Am I… anyone?"
Sleep came fitfully. Dreams flickered in and out—faces she couldn't place, voices she couldn't recognize, fragments of lives that felt like hers, but weren't. She would wake, the hospital gown sticking to her skin, and the white walls closing in, pressing down like the void itself.
Each day was a struggle: to eat, to drink, to move, to remember. Each day was a reminder that she existed without connection, without history, without anyone to call her own. The ID still rested against her chest, the only affirmation of existence.
Time passed slowly. She began to notice changes: her strength returning in small increments, the muscles in her arms and legs waking up. But the emptiness inside remained, an unfillable void. She reached out, touching the empty space beside her in bed, longing for a hand she didn't remember, a voice she didn't know.
She started counting the days by the meals, the nurses' shifts, the beeping machines. Each day blended into the next. She wondered if she would ever feel like herself again—or if she was lost forever in this sterile, white world.
Even as she ate and moved and slept, the thought lingered: I am alive, but who am I really?
No one could answer. No one could reach her. The student ID was the only proof she had that she had ever belonged anywhere. And yet, she did not know the life it represented.
Althea closed her eyes, clutching the ID, and whispered the only thing she had left: her name. Althea Vallejo.
It felt strange and hollow. And still, it was all she had.