Forget Me Not
The roses are in bloom, and she can tell this without the effort of opening her eyes.
She can smell their fragrance from where she lies propped up by pillows in her hospital bed. She remembers she likes roses, even she can remember very little else about herself. Lately she has divided her time between intervals of waking and sleeping. The doctors and nurses hover around her like attentive bees in a flower garden. They call her Jane Doe. That is not her name, but she can't summon the energy to correct their oversight. She feels an urgent need to be somewhere else and be doing something else, but she cannot explain why she feels this so strongly.
People who faces she finds familiar, the nurses tell her its her family come to visit, that they love and care, and worry about her, drift in and out of her consciousness. They are the one who left the roses. She wishes she could summon more memories, but it's hard. She can't say why but she has dreams of people and sequences of events that don't involve her family, the features are movements are different, not wrong just very different. Somehow, she feels she should be frightened, but she is not scared, just overwhelmed.
Her dreams of are falling from high places, and she feels her pulse racing faster, breath coming in short gasp, there's water in her dream, a roaring fills her ears, and she's submerged suddenly. At the last minute, when she thinks she can not keep her head above water instant longer, strong arms enfold her, and she feels safe. The dark haired woman smiles in her sleep and drifts further into the dream.
Outside the seventh floor hospital room, Goliath, the leader of the Manhattan Clan of Gargoyles, perches on the wrought iron balcony. He should be out patrolling the city, but right now his attention is on Elisa Maza. He wishes he had been a fraction of a second faster when she feel off the dam and into the river below. He knows he can't be everywhere at once, but somehow he feels guilty for her condition. He overheard the doctors tell her parents that she has amnesia. He tells himself it is only temporary, that she will make a full recovery. He has known Elisa for a long time, as a cop, as a friend, he knows she will fight to the very end, so why is he here woolgathering then?
Maybe this is the way Elisa's mind is deals with the fallout of their battle with the Hunters.
The Hunters, he never trusted Jason Canmore, despite the fact that Elisa had when he wormed his way into her good graces, only to use her to find and get to his real objective, hunting Demona and the other gargoyles in order to kill them. Goliath tells himself that it was not jealousy that prompted his innate distrust of Jason. He knows he he's brooding on what might have beens, and quietly mutters under his breath, "Stop it!"
It useless to dwell on what cannot be changed at this late date. Goliath wonders how much is lost when a person has amnesia. It's not something he can recall a gargoyle ever dealing with before, so he cannot say how it will affect her or how long it will be until she regains her memory. Until he knows for certain he debates whether or not to tell the other members of the clan.
He is confident that she will and it is only a matter of time until Elisa is back on her feet and as good as new.
The morning sun is edging its way over the horizon and the night is coming to an end. It is time to leave and he cannot afford to be caught by the sun on this exposed place. Goliath spreads his wings, pivots around and launches himself into the air; wings spreading to catch the shifting wind currents, and glides home.