Excerpt: A Terrible Case Of Mistaken Identity

(Taken from Part 1: Waking Up)

Everything was painfully white, including the bed I’d woken up in. The bedding was cleaner than I’d ever seen anything before in my lifetime. Large structures surrounded me, displaying pictures and lines that moved and danced as I watched them. I could only speculate that they produced the noises that had filled my ears since my waking. But all of this shot from my attention when my eyes fell on the woman asleep at my bedside. It was not my nursemaid, nor any of the women from the palace. She was pretty, I suppose, with a delicate nose and strong mouth. She was solidly built, with dirty blonde hair cut close to her head, barely brushing the top of her neck. She looked like any working woman from the city, but . . . I knew her. I reached out with one trembling hand and brushed the hair away from her face. I had to know her. Ellen. Ellen Afton. I had not a clue as to how I was suddenly so sure I knew her name, but I knew without a doubt that was who she was. She went by the name Ellen Afton, and she was . . . the realization hit me hard, like a physical force colliding with my chest, stopping my breath for a moment.

My mother, I thought shakily, staring at the woman with wide eyes. But no, this couldn’t be right. My mother was nothing more than a fond recollection of nursery songs long forgotten and blurry images constructed from my memories of paintings that used to hang in the palace. She was not this live, breathing woman beside me . . . but yet she was. What was going on? Vestiges of panic gripped at me while my memories chased each other about, darting and twirling, running figure eights around the two identities I now found myself possessing. Goddess, what is this?