Beat Of My Heart

Chapter Twenty One: Operations

 "Are you ready?" The doctor asked, peeking through the frame of the doorway. 

The question flowed throughout my mind. Did it really matter what my answer would be? Of course, I didn't want the surgery, but I needed it and my life was depending on it. 

 I was ready for the surgery but I wasn't exactly ready to leave the hospital that I had practically called home for three months of my life. I would never be ready to leave Nate. I wasn't ready to leave any of that behind. 

"I'm ready," I replied, only because I had to. I could delay the surgery as long as I wanted to, but everything good has to come to an end at some point. 

 Doctor Reynold's smiled at me, and walked out of the room. He summoned the anesthegiologist needed to put me to sleep and  numb the area of the surgery. I had met him yesterday. His name was Dr. Menatome. He was comforting, and provided any explanation I wanted.

Of course I had spent the previous day preparing for the anesthesia. We had taken a few tests to ensure of my safety with the medicine. I had endured a chest x-ray, electrocardiogram, and some terrible blood work.

 Everything came out better then expected, which turned on the green light for the surgery, that was now hours from taking place.

Now that the time had finally come, I was a little nervous. I didn't know what to expect at all. I watched as Dr. Melatome entered the room, smiling. He said hello to me before immediately getting to work. 

 He didn't make any more conversation before saying the usual, "You will only feel a slight pinch," and injected the needle right above my elbow. I was never one to be frightened by needles. They had no effect on me. I watched as the clear liquid vanished from the tube, and was now probably roaming in my blood stream.

 I had been moved in to a different room on a gurney. The door read "The Operating Room." My attire of choice for the day was a  hospital gown.  I was waiting for fatique to engulf me as the anesthesia made its way in to my body.

 It wasn't long until I began feeling drowsy. I had been left alone for about five minutes, just after the shot was injected in to my arm.

 My eyes were inching closer to closure. I didn't struggle against keeping them open. My eyelids had slowly become weighted.

 I heard a few more footsteps around me, and opening and closing of the door, but my vision was now black and my mind was becoming foggy.

 I felt someone next to me, their hand enclosed around mine. I was still, waiting for more movement to come.

 I tried to open my eyes to reveal who was sitting next to me, but my eyelids didn't move. Any moment now I would be knocked completely unconcious. It was a matter of seconds. All I was doing was waiting.

 The hand was gone, freeing mine from its grasp.

 I heard four simple words leave the mouth of the person in the room with me. My vision was completely blocked from who said them. 

 I had suspected it was Nate, his hand around mine. But now, I was sure it wasn't his hand. The voice was nothing like his was. 

 "I love you, Charlie," the feminime voice said in to my ear.

 I hadn't the slightest clue of who the voice belonged to and I realized I would probably never be able to find out. 

 That was the last thing I remembered.

The feeling was like a coma all over again. The blackness, the confinement, the restriction. It was peaceful though, just like the first time. 

I was now dreaming. Dreaming about that cold, fateful day driving the car along the icy slicked mountainside. But this dream was different from the actual reality. This time, Jaden didn't look down vulnerably at a text message. She kept her eyes straight ahead on the road like a good, safe driver would have done.