Not Yet Gone for Good

Waking up in a haze, noise erupts all around. To the left, a beeping keeps getting louder, and beyond that the sound of someone snoring. To the right there is the muted sound of rushing water. When you try to move there is a feeling of stiffness as if you’ve been asleep for years. Opening your eyes is a huge mistake. Light seeps in everywhere, it’s so overwhelming that you have to blink feverishly to become used to the illuminating white room. White; only hospitals have white rooms. That explains the beeping and now your stiffness becomes more understandable. Yet, what is the reason for you being here?  Nothing you remember proves to yourself to have been in any sort of accident. The important question to ask now is why. Why are you here?

            Looking around, dad is sleeping on the couch near the window. His snoring has stopped for the time being. A nurse walks into the room. You make a little grumble from the back of your throat, which for some reason is sore and dry. The nurse swivels in your direction with bulging eyes that seem to be telling you that the impossible just happened. She quickly runs out of the room, leaving you all alone. Then, out of your sore, dry throat, comes the most excruciating sound you have ever heard. You welcome this noise, since it the first sound you have heard yourself make in what seems to be a long time.

            For the last couple of days, or what you think were days, in pitch blackness, you  have been trying to see, speak, hear anything in the deafening silence of what you believe to be your mind. There are tricks of your mind that can’t be understood, but to believe you are trapped in your mind is better than dreading that you are dead. 

            The nurse is coming back now, but she is not alone. She has brought a friend, no not a friend, a doctor! No! Not just any doctor, YOUR doctor! The panic that has been rising inside of you, ready to explode again, is calming down. There is finally someone here to help. At this point, when the doctor is checking your vitals, mom comes out of the bathroom. She stops dead in her tracks, and you realize there is a noticeable difference in her features, and looking back at dad, you see changes as well. Dad is awake and alert now, staring at you as if a miracle just happened right here in this very room. What are they seeing that you don’t? But the important question is still Why. The panic is starting to rise again, not for the unknown this time, but for the last feeling washed upon you as a fleeting memory goes by. You let go another excruciating scream that swallows the whole room up as you fall into unconsciousness again.

            There is a cuckoo clock behind Dr. Sanchez’s head. It reads 1:59. That means in one minute the dancing Swedish couple will come out and do their weird little dance to the song Feeling Right. It also means that your meeting will beover, and it will be time to leave the hospital and try and live your new life.

            For three years you have been lying on your back in the same position. It’s been 1 week since you woke up and after hearing multiple stories about what you missed, there is still a gaping hole in your life. You never completed college, you don’t know if your relationships with your friends have lasted, and the world you used to live in is completely gone. The only visitors you have been allowed to see are your parents, and a special therapist who is supposed to help you cope with being in a coma for the last three years. Talking about the therapist, here she is.

“Good morning, how are you feeling?”

“Hello Ms. Hanal. I guess I feel as good as anyone in my situation can.” You can’t talk to her. She is a stranger, well so is everyone else, but this is different. You’re supposed to tell her your deepest darkest secrets, the fears you have, and the ambitions you want to follow through on. You can’t though; she is a stranger that is unwelcomed in your already messed up life.

“Please, I told you to call me Karen.”

“Sorry. Karen.” Calling Ms. Hanal by her first name doesn’t feel right. As a child you were always told not do that with adults.