Death of a Daredevil

Just Hell

I didn't die.

Matty died. He died hard and fast. His neck snapped. But I didn't die, because I landed on top of Matty, and that was just enough to keep me from dying.

It's a couple months later now, and I'm still in the hospital, because I broke a few bones. Well, really, I'm in 'rehab' they call it, though it looks a lot like the hospital I was in until last week, only all the beeping has stopped. Most of it.

Do you know how much beeping there is in a hospital? Have you ever been in one for awhile? And there's different kinds of beeps, some that just go on and on, over and over, and no one does anything about them, but other ones sometimes when you hear people moving quick. Real emergency beeps I guess. They sound more like little sirens from those European cop cars.

I always wanted my door open, even at night, because it was so lonely, and I liked to hear voices in the hall and people moving. I had a button to push if I wanted someone, but somehow I always felt like I shouldn't want someone. ...Like maybe it was too good for me. ...Maybe because Matty was dead, and it wasn't his fault, so it had to be my fault. Sort of.

I had six different roommates while I was in the hospital. I got my first after I'd been in for two days, and it kind of scared me. I had one surgery the night I came in, but I hadn't had any others yet, and I was hurting real bad, except that I was also on a lot of drugs, so nothing really hurt. It's the weirdest feeling -- I could feel that I hurt, but I couldn't feel the hurt. But then this roommate comes in and he gets a ton of attention. People in and out all the time, and his parents I guess. I'm not sure. People were nervous and moving fast, and they wheeled in extra machines. It was all mostly behind the curtain, though.

There's two beds in hospital rooms -- at least the kind I was in. On the ceiling, you can see these tracks, almost like upside down train tracks, and these curtains run along them pretty much anywhere you need 'em. But with this first roommate, it was pretty much closed between us almost always.

It wasn't Matty. I kind of hoped at first, but I knew he was dead. I heard it somewhere. Maybe a cop or an EMT or something, or someone telling about it in my room. But I knew -- I knew it the second he died -- knew it body to body. My body hits his body, and I felt the whole thing, and heard it, and even smelled it, even though none of that was in my mind. I just think my body knew that his body was done the instant I hit.

I wasn't knocked out! I was awake the whole time. First, there was this... I don't know. Shock I guess. Shock. Like if lightning struck a few feet away and you were just... shocked. And it lasts, the shock, but you're not sure how long. I wasn't sure, but not long enough, because, then, pain. Holy fucking god it hurt so much! So so so much, I had never ever imagined how much something could hurt. The pain sort of made me blind. Not like I couldn't see, but like everything I could see was burning and flaring these super bright colors that barely made pictures.

So here's what happened. Matty was almost diving when he hit, so he landed mostly on his head and his neck snapped, dead. I was trying to stay legs down, but I was kind of turning to my side -- it's really hard to aim yourself when you're falling! Anyway, my right foot hit somewhere next to Matty and that leg basically crumpled up and broke in a bunch of places. I got all these pins, some forever, some to come out later. And plates, they call 'em. Plates. But then my butt hits about on Matty's knee, and my butt breaks in half -- my pelvis. And Matty's arm -- his left arm -- got wedged. They called it 'wedged.' So basically his arm is like a stick pointing up, and my back hits it and breaks his hand, but his arm bones -- there's two called radius and ulna -- snap and break through his skin and stick into me, through my ribs in my back and into my right lung, or two lobes of my lung, because you have three on that side. His arm bones are in me like spears!

But my head... See, here's why I'm not dead. My head mostly landed on Matty's belly. Like hitting a pillow. And I got lucky with my backbone they said, because it kind of got padded by his thigh, so I'm not paralyzed. I'm lucky.

Lucky.

They said.

Anyway, that first roommate? He died. They didn't say so, but I know. I asked, but they wouldn't tell me. It just got quiet, and they closed all the curtains around me all the way, tight, no gaps. Voices got really quiet, with hardly any words. Things rolled out of the room, not too fast. When I woke up next, the curtains were open and the bed next to mine looked like no one had ever been there, for even a minute. No machines. No trash. Clean sheets. Roommate? ...Gone.

I had other roommates after that. Once even a girl. She was my fourth, and she was my age. Talia. We were both surprised that they would put a girl in with a boy. I mean, it is supposed to be a floor with only kids. I'm 16 now. She was 15. She asked why, and they said the hospital was completely full, and that's the way it worked out, but it wouldn't be for long. Maybe two nights, they said. It was two nights.

Yeah, and there's reasons why you'd think I wouldn't want a girl roommate and she wouldn't want me. In the hospital -- I mean, not everyone -- but a lot of people like me don't have any privacy like you would at home. Talia had surgery on her heart, but she could sit up to eat, and mostly feed herself, and most important, she could get up to go to the bathroom. She'd buzz and the nurse would walk her to the bathroom and help her I guess. But me? I could barely move when Talia was my roommate. I had to piss into a plastic thing when I was laying there, and you can hear it really clear. Just imagine pissing into a plastic jug -- I mean, if you're a guy. You hear it. Talia's about five feet away behind this thin curtain, a nurse is helping hold this jug agains my crotch, and I'm peeing, and Talia hears it and knows it. But she doesn't say anything, and doesn't care I guess. She was nice. ...I had to poop once too when she was there, but that happened early in the morning, and I don't think she was awake. The nurse seemed to guess that I'd want it quiet as could be, so that was okay.

Oh hell, and you get used to that crap real quick! For five weeks, I've got nurses all over me with absolutely zero privacy, turning me, wiping and washing me, changing bandages, massaging parts of me so my muscles get some action, sticking needles in me for this and that. ...And a couple times... A few times... Well I would give up and buzz them, and I'd ask them to just hold me a little, and I cried. I cried a lot. Because it hurt. Because I was lonely. ...Because I am a complete fucking wreck and I don't know how I'm ever going to get back to being me.

I'm hating things, too. Hate. Hating people. Hating people who made my life go wrong. I was even fantasizing about killing people, or at least of them dying in horrible ways. In horrible pain -- not like Matty. Like me. Oh but I didn't die, right? Oh yeah? Didn't I? Well sometimes I think I did die, because what's left doesn't seem like me anymore, so how would you say it?

Well anyway, I'm out of the hospital now. I'm in rehab, and right now I have physical therapy. This guy is at the door with a wheelchair. He'll mostly lift me and set me in the chair -- this pathetic broken kid, wearing old pajamas (not even mine), wearing a diaper (just in case), all weak and pale, with bandages still. They aren't trying to walk me yet, even though my right arm bones are healed enough, because my right shoulder still needs surgery (the next one), but he'll have these toys and exercises ready. I just do what I'm told, but it is always fucking hard, and it hurts, and I cry sometimes, but he just keeps smiling and making me, forcing me to do it, over and over, until my time is up. He's one of the ones I wish was dead.

Oh, so maybe you're wondering about my family? Like, why haven't I said nice things about my dad sitting and reading to me or my mom sneaking me candy bars, like all of my roommates had. ...Except the first one. Yeah, well, first of all, what dad would that be? Because I've never had a dad. And mom? Well, she tried, a couple times. And she called, a few times. But, see, she's weak. It's like me getting hurt really happened to her. I get it. I do. She's always been like that. She always sort of ignores anything bad, and this was real bad, so she's hiding big time, hoping it will all just get better. Or go away.

...I saw her nine days ago.

...She's supposed to call tonight.

Whatever.

Oh! But, hey, there is one very very good thing I like about rehab. There's this nurse who works the night shift, and she's barely older than me, I think. Maybe 20 or 22. Well... Well I'll tell you about her next time.