The Wylie Diaries : Where The Flowers Bloom

Chapter Fourteen : As Real As You And Me

*This chapter is not told from any character's perspective.* 

Grief can be a destroyer, or something which focuses you. It can make you decide whether a relationship was all for nothing when it ended in death and loneliness or it can help you realise that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognise at the time. The relationship meant so much that it scared you, so you just lived each day as they come, taking for granted the love and laughter of each day. You didn't consider the sacredness of the relationship, what it really meant to you as a person. But when it's over and you're alone, you begin to see what the relationship was really about. It wasn't just a movie and dinner together, not just watching the sunset and sunrise as you lay under the stars near the lake. It wasn't just scrubbing the floor or washing dishes together or worrying over bills and debt which had to be paid. It was everything. It was the why of life, every moment and precious event of it. The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly. The ultimate loss of life is the destruction of that imperfect love.

The beginning of love can be difficult. The battle inside to let those we love be perfectly themselves or to twist them to fit our own wanted imagine.  If in loving them we do not love who they are but instead love their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them. We only love the reflection of ourselves that we find in them. 

What happens when you loved them perfectly because they were themselves?. What if they awoke from some slumber unable to remember who they were?. The possibility that everything you had loved about that person had vanished and they were simply a shell of their original self?. What do you do if the person you have lost is yourself? how can you grieve something that you no longer remember but its existence is so clearly detailed in everything that you do?. How does one recover from the loss of the memories from an entire life?. These questions seemed so unimportant last week, it's funny how things change so suddenly.

"Are you ready to switch it off?" a doctor asks Tyler, moving over to the machine that had been keeping Wylie alive.

Tyler takes Wylie's hand, slowly rubbing it tenderly.

"I'm ready" he says, raising Wylie's hand up to his cheek, gently rubbing it against the facial hair that Wylie loved so much.

The doctor moves over to the life support machine, inputting a code when prompted. He presses a red button and the clunk of machinery can be heard as the cogs stop spinning and the breathing machine no longer supports Wylie's lungs. 

"He will continue breathing and his heart will keep beating for another thirty minutes or so, just until everything stops. Once that happens someone will come in and take his body away" the doctor says chillingly, showing very little remorse about the situation.

Tyler doesn't respond, instead he continues to gaze upon the lifeless body that lay in front of him. The minutes seem to tick by, Tyler still grasping Wylie's hand tightly. Tyler looks up at the clock, noticing that twenty five minutes had passed since the doctor had turned off the life support machine.

"I miss you already, Wylie" Tyler says.

Wylie's hand seems to tighten around Tyler's. His eyes beginning to move around inside his head as he tries to muster the energy to open them.

"Doctor, Doctor! Something is happening!" Tyler exclaims, trying to shout loud enough for someone to hear.

As if by magic summoning, three doctors run into the room and begin to examine Wylie.

"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to step outside" the doctor says to Tyler, motioning to the corridor outside.

Tyler walks outside, the doctors close the doors behind him. He attempts to peek through the window but the doctors close the blind, allowing no vision into the room inside. He paces up and down the corridor for fifteen minutes, listening to the machines beeping and the doctors discussing things inside the room where Wylie laid lifeless a short time before.

A doctor emerges from the room, making his way over to a now anxious Tyler.

"We don't know how but he's awake" the doctor suggests.

"How?" Tyler asks, stunned that minutes earlier he was facing life without his true love.

"We honestly don't know, Tyler. It's some sort of miracle" he says,  rubbing the sweat off his forehead that had accumulated, probably from the temperature of the room he had been in for the last fifteen minutes.

"Can I see him?" Tyler asks.

"You can go in but just to warn you, patients with this level of injury and who have been in a coma for extended periods of time may not be themselves at first". 

"I just want my Wylie back" Tyler replies.

*The next part of the chapter is now told from Wylie's perspective*

My mind is foggy and every bone in my body aches and yet i have no idea why. My head seems tight and broken, like a puzzle missing many of its pieces. My eyes were heavy but with enough force I was able to open them.

"Wylie? Are you okay?" a man asks.

"Huh? Where am I?" I ask.

"You're at the hospital Wylie. You were in an accident, i'm just happy you're okay" the man responds.

"Accident? What? How? Who are you?" I ask the man.

"Wylie? I'm Tyler.. your husband" he responds.

"I.. I.. don't remember you" I respond, confused at why this man was telling me he is my husband and yet i can't remember anything he is telling me.

The mans face becomes frozen, he looks at me in shock at what I have just said. I look down at my hands, all bruised. A ring lay on my marriage finger, grasping the finger like it had laid there for many years.

"It's common that you experience some memory loss after a traumatic event. It shouldn't be too long before you start to regain your memories again" the doctor says.

"How long until I remember?" I ask.

"It's hard to say. Just be thankful that you are actually here, it was touch and go for a while" he responds.

I guess I should be grateful. I would never want to die this young, even if I don't remember now, i'm sure it will all come back to me eventually. I was interested in my life, I wanted to know all about it and hoped that asking questions would jog my memory.

"So, we are married?" .

"Yes and we have a daughter, Ruby" .

"A daughter?". 

It was hard to take in everything that this man was saying. I was married and had a child yet I couldn't remember any of it. It was painful for me to hear these things and be unable to return the love that this man clearly felt for me.

"I think you need to give him some time to rest, maybe come back tomorrow and try then" the doctor suggests to Tyler.

"I'll come back tomorrow then" he responds, walking over to my bedside and kissing me gently on the forehead. "I'll come and see you tomorrow, Wylie".

"I'll see you then, Tyler" I respond, nervous what would happen tomorrow when he returned and started telling me about our lives together.

I wiggle around in the bed, suddenly aware of how uncomfortable hospital beds are. I lay on my side, tired after trying to remember my life before the accident. My eyes begin to get heavy and I allow them to take me away, hopefully to dream a better day.