It's a cloud, she realizes, when she finally opens her eyes. But how does one even sit on a cloud? And why is it nothing like she imagined it to be?
Her hands leave her lap, and she touches the cloud she's sitting on, smiling afterward at the warm, velvety feel of it underneath her fingers. Lost in a moment of fascination, she doesn't notice a figure nearby, watching her.
"Hello . . ."
She turns her head, sees a boy with a face that she thinks is too kind and timid to belong in the military garb he's got on. His face has a number of scratches though—like checkmarks of varying lengths lining his cheekbones. "—Hey."
He looks at her with eyes that seem concerned, and she isn't sure why. She looks past him and recognizes the fact that he's standing on a cloud not unlike hers. The only difference is that his has somehow managed to grow a tree. There is even a tire swing hanging from the largest branch of that tree, and on its other side she spies a peculiar object—some sort of sculpture made of paper? Looks like it.
"My name is Skylar," he declares, and his cloud just smoothly glides toward her. As he holds out his hand to her, his dog tag swings out of his unbuttoned uniform. She sees Levin Skylar engraved on it, and there is only one tag attached to his necklace.
Instead of taking his hand, she panics. "Where am I?"
"I'm not sure either."
Her eyes begin to brim with tears. "Am I...am I dead?"
Skylar sighs and cranes his neck when he hears a familiar sound, a collective swishing in the air. She hears it too, and her eyes widen when she turns and sees a multitude of white paper airplanes flying overhead. Both of them are silent as they watch the paper airplanes circling them, and there's a tinge of disappointment on Skylar's face when each and every single one of the airplanes land on the brunette's cloud.
"What—what are these?" She picks one of them up.
"Thoughts."
Her brows furrow. "Thoughts?"
"Thoughts of people who care, who remember."
She looks at him questioningly, and he nods, as if telling her to unfold the paper airplane in her hand.
On it is a handwriting she remembers.
Please. Please don't leave me.
* * *
"No family?"
Nurse Kerstein tucks a lock of her brown hair behind her ear as she looks at the patient's chart. She then shakes her head. "Not that we know of. It's kind of strange, actually. I keep thinking he must be an orphan or something . . . enlisted in the mili—"
"There must at least be something we can learn from his personal effects," Nurse Jensen, one of the head nurses of the night shift, supposes. "Didn't North Memorial send them over when they transferred the patient?"
"Yeah, they did."
"Will you be okay taking care of that, Anna?" Nurse Jensen's tone turns concerned, and so does her eyes. It has been over a year since Nurse Kerstein's fiancé, a soldier, passed away while serving his country, and though she has returned to her usual, cheerful disposition, the senior nurse worries that some kind of relapse might happen should she take this case. It is too close to home, after all.
As though she has already anticipated the head nurse's thoughts, Nurse Kerstein clutches the patient's chart— labeled Levin, Skylar A—to her chest and smiles. "I'll be fine, Monica. Thanks."
The head nurse nods. "Go check on 1126 as well before you clock out later. Linda just called. She isn't coming in tonight."
"1126, got it."
* * *
The door to 1126 opens, startling a man who had dozed off on a seat pulled close to the patient's bed. It's almost half-past midnight, and Anna cringes at the thought of disturbing a person's slumber. "I'm sorry..." she whispers, closing the door quietly behind her. "I'm just...going to—" She points at the patient's chart hanging by the foot of the bed.
"Yeah, it's fine." The voice comes out hoarse, exhausted.
She catches a glimpse of a weary smile before he turns to look at the patient's face. Han, Gianna. 25. Car accident, head and spinal injury. Had been in surgery the day before. A sigh escapes her. Comatose.
Pacing to the monitors, Anna makes a quick check on the patient's vitals and examines the IV bags to make sure they'll still last the night. A glance at the back of the patient's left hand, and she almost chokes at the sight of an engagement ring.
"I'll come back in the morning," she tells the man quietly, returning the patient's board where it had previously been.
He nods, squints his eyes a bit to catch the name on her ID badge. "Thanks...Nurse Kerstein."
YOU ARE READING
Paper Planes Back Home
General Fiction"What do you think of when you hear the word home?" When Gianna wakes up on a cloud, she is disoriented yet fascinated. She thinks she's only dreaming until she gets a storm of paper planes - "They're thoughts of people who remember," a man on anoth...
