Mona Lisa Awakening
Monère, book 1
Sunny
To my extraordinary editor,
Cindy Hwang.
My superagent,
Roberta Brown.
And my gifted husband.
Da,
who inspired it all.
Chapter One
Sickness and death was in the air—women crying, men cursing, unwashed bodies. The stink of suffering and anguish. It was a dwelling I'd deliberately chosen and placed myself within. A dwelling of desperate need that lured me to its bosom with the stench of fear and pain.
I was an ER nurse on the lonely island of Manhattan. Sickness called to me. Darkness and light lay within me. I'd always known it, sensed it… a dormant force that lay quiescent along with the latent ability to heal, untapped as yet—to my relief, to my despair. Waiting. Until then, sickness called to me and lured me with its invisible tendrils of aches and pain.
Around me in the emergency room of St. Vincent's Hospital, in the heart of Greenwich Village, the hustle and bustle had already begun. In bed one, a young woman's face was covered with blood, lacerated from temple to chin—a dear price for a fragile whore to pay walking the dark alleys of the street. Strapped down in bed two was a disheveled man stinking of alcohol, thrashing in delirium and withdrawal. In bed three, a child screeched with pain, tugging the tender cords of my heart. It was a cry I could not ignore.
I rushed over to bed three, to find Dr. Peter Thompson there. He was one of the good interns just starting his ER rotation, humble and grateful for help, unlike those jerk know-it-alls. Even better, he had a girlfriend and was faithful, not one of the grabbers.
"Oh, good. You're here, Lisa," Peter said, flashing me a smile of relief. "You're great with kids. Can you help me with this?"
"What have we here?" I asked.
A young boy of about six with soft brown hair and lots of freckles was curled up into a tight ball, his thin arms holding his belly, tears wetting his face and shirt as he wailed with pain. His mother, a young brunette, gripped the stretcher rails with white knuckles and chewed her lower lip helplessly.
"Kurt was fine until an hour ago when he said his stomach hurt," the mother said, sizing me up, uncertainty in her brown eyes.
I knew that look. Why am I talking to you and not the doctor? it said.
It was entirely my fault. I've always looked younger than my age of twenty-one. No complaint here, but this was the medical profession. Credentials on the wall and silver in your hair went a long way with patients. But one thing I've learned: Don't judge their judgment. Just do what you have to do.
"Kurt," I said, stroking the child's damp forehead. "Is that your name, honey?"
At my touch, Kurt opened his eyes. His big, brown, trusting eyes studied mine, unknowingly opening the window of his soul to me. Our souls bonded and he was mine. Calmness came over the boy's face and his crying stopped.
"Now can you show me where it hurts, Kurt?"
His eyes fixed on me with wonderment and curiosity, Kurt uncurled his arms and pointed to a spot above his belly button. "It hurts here," he said in a clear, high voice.
I touched the spot.
Kurt tensed, but didn't resist. "It hurts when you touch it," he said, tears spiking his long lashes.
"I'll be very gentle," I promised, and placed the heart of my palm over his abdomen.
The power within me stirred, coming to the fore from the depths within, taking over me entirely as if I was merely a vehicle through which it channeled itself into the world. When the boy opened the window of his soul, it was really the eye of my power that gazed through my lenses and reached out to the child. It came forward at the call of pain, not at the urging of my will—a cycle of energy that stirred from its root within me but could only be completed by the beckoning of another.
My hand tingled with warmth as I sensed the radiation of heat rising from my core.
Kurt's eyes widened. "Awesome. It doesn't hurt anymore, Mommy!"
"I'm going to leave you to Dr. Peter. He's a very good doctor and he'll make sure your tummyache doesn't come back again." I winked at Kurt and he winked back.
I made my way to the staff bathroom and locked myself inside, resting on the toilet lid. That power of mine was a curse and a blessing all in one. One would think that to be equipped with such a thing would double, if not triple, my own energy. But no, it always left me feeling drained and exhausted afterward. And I used it to merely diagnose ailment. The power to heal hadn't come to me yet. I wondered if it ever would.
Minutes later, recovered, my composure regained, I shuffled back to the madhouse. Peter dropped down beside me as I made a pretense of charting down some notes. A fine tremor shook my hands. I set the pen down carefully.
"Thanks, Lisa," Peter said as he took off his glasses and cleaned them with a coat corner. "I couldn't have examined that kid without you. The mother was useless." He peered sharply at me. "What's with that touch of yours? That moment? I sensed something. Are you one of those?"
"Those what?" I gave him a look.
"Those secret healers?" he whispered.
"I wish. That moment that you sensed has a name."
"What is it?"
"It's called compassion, doctor."
Peter laughed. "Right. Well, I'm going to order a CBC, Chem-20, urinalysis, and a quick strep. What do you think?"
"Don't forget abdominal X ray, flat and upright." That would pick up the stuck quarter that was troubling little Kurt.
"You know, you have incredible instincts. You picked up that appendicitis last week that I almost missed and there was that other thing you…"
"That also has a name. Experience."
He snorted. "Yeah, eleven long months of experience, you old hag, you."
At this point, a grabber would have reached out his paw, going for one of the usual localities, but not this one. "You'd make a great doctor, I bet."
"Are you trying to get rid of me?"
"Do I sound like it? You should think about going to medical school. Really." He walked away, flagging the orders in the chart.
He did have a nice butt, now that I was looking at it. Too bad there wasn't any desire in me to do more than appreciate the view.
Medical school. Ha! Not for me, not in this life. Couldn't afford it. The two years of nursing school had been a miracle already, the full scholarship and living stipend a true blessing. It had brought to fruition my childhood dream, a calling almost, to be near the sick and infirmed, the pained, the suffering.
The money also freed me from the confinement of my foster home, memories that I'd rather leave behind, buried and untouched. I still remember those first heady days of independence, free like a young bird just untangled from its nest, testing its wings, breathing fresh air. An exhale after a long, long inhale.
My thoughts of the past were suddenly disturbed by a tangible force. A force ringing in the air, penetrating through the throngs crowding the wards, through the chatter, the shouts, the din. Dense in the space, filtering past the generic furnishings, the white partitioning curtains. Reaching for me like an invisible arrow seeking its targeted prey.
I looked up into the path of that oncoming force and saw the air ripple like an invisible tidal wave rolling over all obstacles, big or small, pushing forward and burying me in its deluge.
I stood, stunned and dazzled by the invasion, trembling as I was hit by the seeking force. It was as if I had been electrocuted, my whole body tingling. The fine hair all over my body stood on end. I shivered, feeling weakened and dizzy, and leaned on my desk.