It’s been a month since I woke up.
I’ve been stuck in a white plain room, waiting for each day to end along other patients, who patiently wait, some hoping for their life to change, others stare at the doors for something to magically happen.
I am still here, feeling my surroundings overwhelm me, not knowing which feelings are my own.
In the last couple of days I’ve come to slowly learn what is happening around me, or at least starting to comprehend why they happen, but it doesn’t help the pain in my chest go away.
Being stuck in a room for an unending amount of time has been nothing less than dreadful, and all I can do is stare at the screen in front of me.
In the TV, there a woman with a serious tone gives information of events I could only assume are recent. there in the screen, the light from the pixels shine like stars being absorbed by my eyes.
There in the screen, I read ‘space’ keeping my gaze glued to its every word each time it appears.
Right there in the screen, photos of dozens of machines flying like birds,with their metal wings spreading open, gliding in the darkness, their path towards the star filled void.
In the screen!, the figures of countless large comets bathed in shiny metals, going on about their own business, innocently dancing around like ballerinas not realizing soon they will be victims.
But my thoughts elsewhere not on the metal birds, somewhere not on the thoughtless rocks, everywhere but in the daunting lady.
My vision can only focus in the darkness of space, my heart starts skips a beat, and I can only feel my chest ache.
Even now, I don’t know for certain, that this pain is my own, yet, this time I don’t want this feeling to go. I am woken up by one of the many doors opening, my gaze attached to the screen, but my heartache is slowly disappearing, again, leaving me alone with nothing that is my own. Only tears come out and I find myself not daring to look into the screen anymore. My gaze moves to the clean white floor, I know who has come, it could not be anyone else, It’s Karlin.
Karlin has been helping me get around this place, but here there is nothing to do here. Everyday I wake up, come to this big room, before going back to another empty room. as Karlin gets close I start to notice with my wet blurry eyes a figure behind her, she hasn’t come alone.
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[Nurse Kerlin of anchorage General Hospital]
“He has been here for the last month and the progress has been limited to what we can do here, he has accustomed himself to this place and knows how to take care of himself. His daily routine, consisting of waking up, making his bed, restroom use, getting breakfast, using the entertainment game area until dawn, use of the showers, and going to his room to rest until the next day.”, I report all this to Dr.Park as we both walk down the long corridors, his pace matching mine.
He seems pleased to know that his task was going easier than expected, I was surprised too.
Knowing that a young man could recover from knowing they lost the last 10 years of their life was no easy tragedy to take in.
Things seem to be going too well, something that is not usually expected, but is welcomed.
“what do you think our next steps should be?”, I ask nervously, there was no right answer, only theories for what could be best.
“summer is around the corner, don’t you think it would be nice to go out Karlin?”, Dr.park asks, as if inviting me somewhere.
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I sigh and could only spit out words to clarify myself.
“Sorry I should have clarified, what should our next steps be to help the patient be?”, I ask calmly.
Dr.Park laughs and responds smoothly with no panic.
“You obviously misunderstood me. If you had woken up after being in a coma for 7 years, wouldn’t it make sense to wanna see outside ?, however, our patient Hanniel Lennon who is 21 has no urgent need to know about his surroundings, isn’t that weird?. Usually patients who find themselves many years in the future find it hard to cope and start running through those doors”
What he says makes sense.
So far Hanniel has only stayed inside the hospital, but in these times of most economy unrest, who in their right mind would wanna go out into the world?.
“Are you suggesting we bring him out into the city?”, this was a bold idea, but probably the best one, after all he has been here for almost a month ,progress seems to be at a standstill, and we do not run charity work.
We both slow down with the door in front of us, I open the door like usual and walk in, I see the many patients around the room going on about their business. In the back of the room sits Hanniel, crying to himself yet again.
I look at the clock and it is around the time this would happen, this cycle has been going on every day since then. I am no longer surprised, but I would lie if I said I wast worried, maybe what Dr.Park said earlier made sense.
Slowly I approach Hanniel, the annoying sound of static coming from the TV is now clear in my ears, I did not know some TVs in the hospital needed replacement until now, but I guess equipment is now starting to get old. Hanniel’s gaze now chained to the floor like a part of him was afraid from looking anywhere near the TV’s screen, my chest tightens from seeing a man in such a pathetic state.
I turn off the screen.
—————————————————————————————————-
Hanniel now in front of the Nurse Kerlin and Dr.Park remain unmoved, staring at the floor like a hallow husk, with an expression of pathetic fear.
Witnessing this, Dr.Park came to the realization that he needed to approach this situation far more carefully then he had thought, in this era people deciding to move on to the next life was not uncommon. Dr.Park had been a witness to it far too many times, each time not any easier than the last, and seeing Hanniel like this reminded him of his brother.
Dr.Park got on one knee to meet eyes with Hanniel, now a glint of passion is shown and a small crack appeared within the doctor’s long lived facade revealing a glimpse of his true self, a person who had the title of a ‘caring brother’ ripped away from him long ago.
A sting of pain is felt within Park’s chest as he met the eyes of Hanniel, his eyes the same of his late younger brother, and for the first time in 6 long lived years, true worry had truck him.
Kerlin quickly noticed the sudden change in Park’ expression, Dr.Park kept staring into Hanniel’s eyes, hypnotized by them, an she grabbed onto park’ shoulder, waking him up, but it was too late, he has begun to remember, he is starting to remember the last time he saw such miserable pairs of eyes, and he began to remember that person.
Dr.Park tries to clear his throat but there is something stuck, he is now realizing his eyes have begun to get itchy and his vision starts to fill with blurs, he scratches his eyes, carrying the tears away in his fingers, trying to piece together the mask of his usual composed facade, yet his wet nervous hands are shacking.
The memories of the doctor’s dead brother had begun to resurface.
Dr.Park tells Karlin to take the patient Hanniel away to his room, and before she leaves he informs her that he will be more aggressive in his future plans to help Hanniel get better.
Information on the patient was scarce but just today he was able to find information on him, rarely there were cases when a patients had no family members, and even more rarely were there patients who were in a coma for 10 years, lady luck must have a personal vendetta against this patient because he is both in one.
The meeting today was meant to finally set things straight with Hanniel and to begin talks about how to best approach the idea of finding housing outside the hospital, testing his intellect to see what kind of job fits him best, and to plan therapy sessions, Dr.Park had a stack of papers that needed to be filled and was going to fill every last one in today’s meeting. But this plan was all thrown out the window when he met eyes with him, how could he possibly tell him that Hanniel has no family members?, how was it possible for him to look into the eyes of Hanniel and tell him to get ready to leave?.
Just as he started to relax he began to walk down the white halls, wondering how he was going to solve this problem he had made himself. He is planning on getting Hanniel out of those doors as soon as he can, and if he has to go with him then he would.
Suddenly he stops in the middle of his pondering, a call came in, but it wasn’t from anyone he is expecting, instead it was one of his very few senior doctors calling him, for him to call unexpectedly, it could not just be to exchange greetings and plan for dinner, he answer and starts to exchange a few words, his face contorts inwards at each passing second, and soon after the call finishes he dashes out the doors and ran towards the emergency patients facility, as he run down the halls, he began to yell to all the nurses to gather, and to call any doctors or nurses that were off shifts, because a tragedy had occurred, and he would not be able to handle it himself, nor could the entire hospital itself, and all he could do was help as much as he could, this is his job.