Sheila Bailey: Hello Bird

[Haukea-Willow]

OOC- Maybe not my best work but I wrote this a week or two ago and felt it was time to post it without much looking over, mostly before I forgot, lol. Enjoy. 

Sheila Bailey had come back to a place of rest after a stressful day treating patients. It hadn’t been her worst day ever but not her best either. She was running on empty by the end of it, her muscles aching. The best cure would have been to rest in the optional low gravity her living quarters provided, however she didn’t seem to have the energy once flopped onto the couch. Instead she had ended up scrolling through the files on her personal data PADD. 

The scrolling was lazy, without meaning until a small piece of information from her medical file came into view. Sheila had kept copies of her medical file for personal reasons but hardly ever looked at them. This time however it brought her back. 

The memory as a whole was fragmented. The tropical palms, pink flowers on Elaysia wet with rain. The outside temperature was warm despite the rain. It was a time of year when most of the general population stayed inside due to the heavy rains and humid temperature. However her two sisters had run out of the house. 

Sheila didn’t remember much else of the event. Maybe that was a good thing. However she remembered the smashed plates and bowls in the family home, done by her uncle. Her sisters had run off in order to get away. In the end so had she. 

Being out in the rain was not an enjoyable experience. On Elaysia she had been able to run. Each step carrying her several feet. It was freeing yet her vision was and subsequently her memory clouded in red and grey. After running off the only thing she remembered was sitting in the back of some vehicle, a harsh itchy wool blanket wrapped around her. 

The older woman shook her head, clearing it of the memory. She had broken free of her Uncle’s grasp. No use dwelling in the past. Or was there?

Bailey spoke, or at least she thought it was her own voice, into the empty room to no one but herself. “I forgive you.” The statement held no emotion, not at first anyway. After a few minutes she realized it was her voice but it sounded older, wiser. 

Beep. A chime alerts her to her PADD. A voice recording, however it’s dated from several years in the future. She wasn’t sure how such things could be possible but shrugged it off pressing play anyway. A voice starts speaking. It’s a middle toned voice, with what sounds like years of life as well as wisdom coming from it’s user. 

“Hello Bird. It might seem strange that this recording is from the future but I’m glad you are listening to it. Yes you, the same you speaking is the same one listening, just from different points in time but hear me out. I know how much you’ve struggled with your past. How much you will continue to struggle. Yes you. I will forgive him one day. Forgive yourself. Forgive myself. Don’t ever give up. Never. It’s as simple as that really. The greatest lesson I ever learned was that he didn’t define me. That I could think for myself. You Bird are smart, kind, a healer, friend, and family to many. The best advice I was ever given was actually given to me by me. No woman should suffer at the hands of men. Ta-er al-Safar Bird.”

With that the recording ended leaving Bailey to sit in silence.