If we never met

Chapter 1 - there's a million different reasons

Some days,
I feel everything at once.
Other days,
I feel nothing at all.
I don’t know what’s worse:
Drowning beneath the waves
Or dying from the thirst.

•••

 The first thing Camila notices is how dry her throat feels, then her ears hear the light noise of machines as she tries to open her eyes. It takes her a few minutes to finally complete the task, trying to adjust her sensitive eyes to the blinding lights of the room she’s in. She feels the mattress under her body and the machines attached to her as she notices the hospital room around her. There’s a man sitting on a chair next to her, his head tilted back as he soundly sleeps holding one of her hands. She looks at the way he’s holding her hand, like his whole life depends on it, but she’s quickly distracted by the iv catheter inserted into her vein at the top of her hand. She starts feeling anxious at the sight, she had always been afraid of needles and hospitals, so she involuntarily tries to take her hand out of the man’s grasp to remove the tube from it. She starts getting frustrated and tears escape her eyes because she can’t remove the iv and she also has no idea where she is or how she got there.

 “ Hey, baby. It’s okay.” She hears a soothing voice and notices the man is now awake sitting on the edge of the bed trying to stop her from removing the tubes from her hands. “ Shhh, you’re okay.”

 His hands go to her face after she stops fighting with the tubes and wipes away her tears, placing a kiss on top of her head when a doctor and a nurse enter the room and start examining her, taking the tube she had down her throat. The man keeps holding one of her hands the whole time as the doctor asks her a few questions, which she responds by nodding or shaking her head. When she tries to say anything out loud, her voice comes out very weak, so the man takes a glass of water from the nightstand and helps her take a few sips. She has no idea who he is, but he seems to care a lot about her.

 “ What do you remember, Camila?” His voice is calm and warm, comforting her as he repeats the doctor's question.

 “ I don’t know.” She says quietly, her voice still weak as a confused look overtakes her face. “ Where am I?”

 “ You’re in the hospital, honey.” He looks at her with a sad smile and she can see he’s holding back his own tears. “ You got into an accident. We’ve been waiting for you to wake up.”

 “ I don’t… who are you?” Camila says, feeling pretty overwhelmed by the three strangers looking at her.

 “ You don’t remember me?” His voice is calm, but she can tell he’s hurt by her confession. She shakes her head, feeling bad for hurting this kind stranger.

 He squeezes her hand as the doctor and the nurse finish examining her, the words lost of memory and amnesia leaving the doctor’s mouth before she’s finally alone in the room. She can see the man talking with the doctor outside through the glass, but her mind starts going blank and her eyes shut down as an effect from the medicine they injected in her.

 She wakes up again feeling a lot better, her throat no longer hurts like before and she has a better idea where she is this time. She doesn’t know how long she’s been out though, it could have been hours or days, and she still has no idea who that man smiling at her from the chair is either.

 “ Do you want some water?” He asks softly.

 Camila nods her head and he helps her sit up a little bit and get comfortable against the pillows before handing her a glass of water. She drinks the whole thing and keeps eyeing him with curiosity the whole time. His hair looks a mess of curls, like he hasn’t looked in the mirror for days and his eyes have black circles under them for what she assumed to be lack of sleeping.

 “ You’ve been out for almost two days.” He says, somehow knowing she was wondering about that.

 “ You didn’t tell me who you are.” She whispers, thinking he might be someone important to her if he was still here.

 “ I’m Shawn.” He sounds hurt by having to tell her his name. “ I’m your husband.”

 Camila feels frozen and stares at him in shock. That can be possible. She doesn’t remember ever getting married and definitely not to this handsome stranger.

 “ Humm… I...” She tries to say anything but she’s feeling so confused by the situation. “ Are you sure?”

 “ I know this is a lot to take in, but the doctor said you have a case of amnesia. Your memories might come back with time... or not all.” His voice comes out as a whisper, like he’s scared of overwhelming her again. She tries to wrap her mind around what he said, but it all gets more complicated in her head because she has no idea what she’s supposed to remember.

 “ How long have I’ve been here since the accident?” She asks, trying to at least get some answers.

 “ You’ve been in a coma for two weeks.” Shawn says, reaching to take her hand. When he realizes what he’s doing, he stops and clears his throat. She can tell he doesn’t know exactly how to act around her. How is she so good at reading this guy? Oh, right. They’re married. She still can’t believe she has a husband. She notices he started telling her some other details from the time she was in the hospital, but she’s having a hard time focusing. “ Sorry. Am I talking too much? I don’t want to upset you.”

 “ No, it’s fine. I’m just having a hard time understanding this.” Camila smiles at him, thinking that even if she doesn’t remember him, his eyes are still somewhat comforting. “ I can’t believe we’re married. Can you tell me more about that? Are we happy together?”

 “ Sure. We’re happy together, I mean, we were. We’ve been together for two years, married for almost one.”

 “ Do we have kids?” She asks cautiously.

 “ No, but we have a puppy. His name is Tarzan.” Shawn shows her a few pictures of a cute golden retriever in his phone. “ Our friend Brian is taking care of him right now.”

 “ I’ve always wanted to have a golden retriever since I was a kid.” Camila says with a smile as she looks at a picture in which she’s holding a puppy that is almost her own size.

 “ I know.” Shawn says with a smile. “ So you remember your childhood?”

 “ I do.” He looks at her like he’s too scared to ask what he really wants to know. “ I remember about my parents too.” Her parents had died five years ago before she moved to LA and she still remembers every little detail of it. “ We’re in LA, right?”

 Shawn nods his head the exact moment the doctor walks in, smiling when seeing she’s finally awake.

 “ How are we doing?” He asks, trying to make her at ease as he checks her vitals.

 “ Better.” Camila says quietly. “ When can I go home?”

 She suddenly realizes her home is probably Shawn’s home, which makes her wonder if she’ll be staying with him even though she doesn’t remember him. She doesn’t have anywhere else to go that she can think of, though.

 “ We’ll need you to stay the night so we can run a few more tests, but if everything looks good in the results you’re free to go home tomorrow.” She finds herself smiling at Shawn when the doctor tells her the news. “ I also have some other news to tell you, if you don’t mind.”

 “ Sure.” Camila says, feeling a little uneasy and worried by his tone of voice.

 “ What is it?” Shawn asks with concern.

 “ Because it was too early on, we only found it out now…” Camila looks down when she feels Shawn’s hand in hers, but she doesn't pull away. Something about his skin on her has her feeling less nervous about what the doctor might say. “ You’re pregnant.”

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A/N: I'm sorry if there's anything wrong with medical terms and that kind of stuff... just pretend and you're all good lol
Hope you like this! 💓