American Roundup (ongoing Story)

He Carried Me

This morning was a blur. I woke up sick to my stomach and my head was spinning around silver speckles that were danicing in my room. I felt weak but thought I needed to eat. I got up and staggered to put my clothes on. The walls began to close up around me. My chest became tight and I felt like someone was smothering me with a pillow. Then everything around me became dark.

I woke up in a hospital bed. It was cold and the lights were dim. There was IV in my arm and a white bracelet on my wrist. It didn't have my name printed on it only a black barcode. I knew that I was not in a regular hospital.

I felt like I had been hit with a baseball bat. I felt swollen but on the plus side my foot was numb. I tried to lift the thin sheet up to see my feet but I didn't have the strength.

I could see the military boots under the crack in the door and I could hear the men getting scolded by another man's voice. At first I thought it was a doctor but when the door opened up I panicked and closed my eyes as if I hadn't awoke yet.

That's when I seen Dalton standing at the smallest window I had ever seen. I looked at him in intervals so he would not sense me starring at him. The first glimpse was only a side view of him. I knew he was white like me but I could tell that the sun kissed him often. The second glimpse was still only a side view still but this time I noticed his chin was a little pointy and he had a button nose but his jawline made it hard to pay attention to anything else.

He started to turn around and I closed my eyes. I felt him moving closer to me, but I tried my best not to flinch. I felt him ruffle the sheet on top of my body and my only thought was he was checking on my foot. I could feel my face turning a few shades brighter as I was embarrassed and this was the closest a guy had ever been to my feet. It was actually the worse time for a strange guy be looking at them. I knew that it was infected and probably looked disgusting.

I turned a little in my bed and made a grunting sound making it seem believable that I was still asleep. Dalton must have caught on to my fakeness because he nudged my arm asking me if I was awake.

I layed there still for a moment wishing my face had been covered up. I was trying to remember what had happened and who seen me before this moment. I was also wondering why Dalton of all people was worried about me.

I opened my eyes to his blaring at me. It wasn't the look of love or your usual this girl is beautiful look but a look of concern. He raised his eyebrows waiting for me to speak.

"What happened?" I asked him slowly. I'm sure I looked like death.

He didn't tell me at first what had happened to me and thats when I noticed his pearly whites smiling at me. I didn't smile back at him I felt I had no reason to and besides I knew my teeth were not as white as his. My hygiene had not been the best since the financial crisis. So I sealed my lips closed and looked in the other direction.

" How do you feel right now?" He asked walking around to the same side of the room I turned too hoping to avoid eye contact with him.

I had not been myself since the first day all of this had happened. My parents were gone, I lost Lori and I had witnessed people being shot and killed. I knew he was talking about my foot, but that wasn't the first answer that came to my mind.

" I feel like crap," I said shutting my eyes.

" Im surprised your awake," He said sitting down on the wooden chair that was across the room from my bed.

" You hit your head pretty hard."

My head I thought to myself no wonder it felt like a cender block was sitting ontop of it. I sat there still quiet wondering who all witnessed my fall. I wondered how off balance I looked in the midst of falling obviously face first. In school falling down was one of things you prayed didnt happen around your high-school friends. I guess the good thing was that I didn't remember.

Dalton crossed his knees still in the chair. He wasn't wearing his uniform that I had seen him wearing before instead he had gym shorts and a plain t-shirt that looked too small for his body.

"Where did I fall at this morning?" I asked.

"This morning, he said, you have been out cold for a whole week."

"A week," I said even more confused than what I was when I woke up.

" You were in the line to get breakfast, he said, and you just passed out hitting your head on the metal corner of the table."

I listened to him as he spoke. He told me that he ran over to me and I wasn't breathing. He preformed CPR on me and when he got a small response from me he carried me to the hospital building. He told me that he hadn't left my side since. The infection I had in my foot had caused an infection in my bloodstream and the fall made me unconscious.

It was strange to me that I had been asleep for a week because I felt as though I could sleep for another one. I could tell the concern he had for me in his voice was sincere. I didn't know why though and thats what I was afraid of. I imagined death to be painful but the only thing that I remembered that morning was that I felt drunk. I didn't remember falling or hitting my head. I didn't remember Dalton preforming CPR or him carrying me in his arms but I wish I could have.