My Heart's in the Highlands by Angeline Fortin Read Free Book Online Page A

The hours would have been labeled "tame" by anyone’s standards, past or present.  Hero had read awhile, napped, taken tea, done some needlepoint—Mikah thought she might have mentally dozed off for a while there—then Mandy and Nancy had returned and prepared a bath for her in the attached dressing room before helping her to dress for the evening. 
    All Mikah knew was that she’d had more exciting moments sitting through Professor Hickman’s History 101 class in college.   Those quiet moments, however, had given her time to sort through all the new recollections that were gathering in her brain, examining the new memories.  If this truly was but a dream, it was certainly a vivid one, and already it was longer than any other she could recall. 
    It had become even more vibrant since she’d met Ian’s appreciative gaze while descending the stairs that evening.  Just the sight of him standing tall and proud, his bearing straight from years in the military had sent her heart racing.  The intensity she saw in his eyes held her focus, sharpened everything around her, making it all the more real.  Mikah almost felt as if she might live Hero’s life with her with happy acceptance if Ian were part of her future.  A pleasurable thought … if a tad voyeuristic.
    Such a bizarre dream!
    A more sobering thought struck her then and Mikah was surprised that she hadn’t considered it before.  What if it weren’t a dream at all?  Perhaps, when that car in front of the museum had smacked her, she had been seriously injured.  Even now, she could be in the hospital, unconscious, or even in a coma!  Perhaps that was why all of this was so different from what she had previously experienced and why it was lasting so long. 
    She was comatose.
    She had heard that people in comas would sometimes awaken describing different experiences during their unconscious periods.
    Other notions popped into her head then, one after another.  Perhaps she was dead and this was some sort of life-transference thing.  Or perhaps this was a step on the road to Nirvana and some Dharman traffic controller had mistakenly put her into a life already in progress.  Or a past life perhaps.  Mikah wasn’t much for the paranormal, but she knew that many people and religions believed in such things, including Hinduism.  Given the similarity in their appearances, perhaps Mikah was a reincarnation of Hero and had slipped back into this life when she was injured.  It was plausible, if illogical.
    All she knew now was that she knew nothing for certain.  
    Mikah was Hero now, with her and in her.  What had happened or was happening to Mikah’s own body was a mystery.
     
    “You look very serious all of a sudden,” Ian said, his whiskey-smooth brogue breaking through her woolgathering, and Mikah shook her head, forcing the ghostly thoughts away.
    “ Not at all,” Hero denied smoothly.  “I suppose I’ve not quite recovered from the accident.  It may take a few more days before I’m back to normal.”
    “ You seem to have survived well enough,” he assured her.  “Nary a scratch to be seen.  Though I understand head injuries often carry unseen consequences.  Should we have another doctor called in for you?”
    Thinking of all the things a doctor in the mid-nineteenth century might do to her, Mikah just shook her head.  Rather than face another encounter with an outdated doctor, she thought it might best if she took her chances playing a wait-and-see game.
    Mikah faded into the background , lured by dread and worry, while Hero chatted with Ian.  ‘What ifs’ abounded in Mikah’s mind.  What if she was seriously injured?  How long would this go on?  What if she was dead and she’d been thrown into a past life?  What if this was her life now?  Should she hang on to her old life or seize the moments before her?  Should she fret and worry or relax, letting life take its course?  Would it help or change anything?
    Probably