Angie slowly regained consciousness…

She was in a hospital bed! What was going on…?

Still feeling fuzzy, she looked around.

“Stacey, she’s awake!”, came a shout.

She looked round, to see an oriental woman sitting next to her.

“Easy, love, you’ve been in an accident”, she said.

“What…where’s my mum? She was in the car with me…?”

Angie was still confused. Then she looked down the bed. The sheets looked terribly flat…

“What’s wrong with my legs…? I can’t feel my legs…? What’s wrong with them?”

Starting to hyperventilate, struggling to move, Angie managed to throw the sheets back. She just screamed…

Her legs were gone, just short stumps remaining, neatly wrapped in dressings.

“No… no..!”, she wailed, then she slumped back on the bed in a dead faint…

Next time she awoke, she felt a little stronger, but terrified about what had happened to her. Turning to the oriental lady still sitting next to her, she asked, “Where’s my mum…?” in a quiet and shaky voice…

“I’m sorry, sweetie”, the woman, Shan, said sadly, “she didn’t make it…”

Angie cried into her pillow, Shan hugging her…

Angie wasn’t able to go to the funeral she was still too weak. The police had visited to see how she was, and to try and get her side of what had happened, but Angie couldn’t help them at all as she couldn’t remember anything. She and her mother were just coming back from a shopping trip, but she couldn’t remember anything after they turned into the road down from the farm where they lived.

“It’s always the last mile home…”, she mused, sadly.

A week later, Angie was allowed to use a wheelchair for the first time. Apart from a few comical scenes when she kept sliding out the first time she tried to get in it (both she and Shan ended up roaring their heads off), she soon got the hang of it.

Shan took her on a tour of Samoto; she had been staying in their medical bay.

As they went round, Shan asked Angie what she was going to do now.

“Honestly, I don’t know”, was her sad reply. “Mum was the ‘breadwinner’, as such, and our farm is only leased. I can’t do the work now, as I am, so we’ll probably lose the farm.”

“I have an idea about that”, said Shan. “How about Samoto taking the farm on? It will make an amazing place for us to offer therapy in the open air, and you will be able to run it and stay there.”

Angie was quite pleased about that, and said that sounded like a really good idea…

I wonder if Angie would have been as pleased if she could have seen into the private room at the end of the corridor…

In that room, another ‘patient’ struggled to move, but it was way too late for that…

Angie’s mother lay there; both her arms and legs were missing, and her mouth had been sealed shut, the skin healed over so no signs of it were left.

A collar round her neck had a fitting where she was being fed water an liquid nutrients and water as needed.

All you could see in the dim light was her wide eyes frantically searching for some way to escape…

Stroking her head, Hannah said “It’s ok, love. We’ll take good care of your daughter for you. The police found enough DNA evidence in the car wreck to show you had died in it, so they’ve stopped looking for you. Amazing how your daughter was thrown clear, wasn’t it? Shame she’s lost her legs, though…”

The woman hummed loudly, which was the nearest she could get to a scream.

“That reminds me. Your new job starts tomorrow. You’re the sex therapy training doll now. You might find it a bit rough to start with…”

Hannah showed her the translucent latex suit that she was going to be sealed into.

“Once you’re inside this, no-one will see you for real ever again. All they will have to do is bring you back here once a day to be ‘recharged’. Isn’t it sweet? You’ll actually be doing something very useful and therapeutic…”

The woman hummed with terror as Hannah gently lifted her, after disconnecting all the hoses from her collar, and fed her into the suit…

Angie never found out her mother was still alive. She even saw the ‘sex therapy pillow’ a few times as she came into Samoto for her checkups, but never realised what it was…

She never knew her mother saw her, but was totally unable to communicate with her, or anyone. The suit was so thick it held her body rigidly, unable to move a muscle…

There also had been nothing wrong with Angie’s legs, but she never knew that, either…