The Heart Of The Lonely

CHAPTER 4

20 years.

Her words echoed in his head, shaking him to the core. Suddenly, he was back in his comatose state after he'd gotten shot all those years ago.

The painful realization ricocheted like a bullet, going straight to his chest, shattering the tissues surrounding his heart. He'd be lying if he said it didn't feel like he had been hit again.

His bottom lip quivered and almost as if it was done in synchronization, his eyes began to fill with tears. He bit the inside of his mouth, hoping to stop the inevitable.

He then moved his head so it could lay back in the middle of the pillow, no longer inclined towards the nurse. His eyes were facing the ceiling now, a lump forming in his throat. He wanted to close his eyes but knew that at least one tear would fall if he did that.

Instead, he let out a small sigh and gathered the strength to speak.

"A mirror." His voice broke into a soft plead. "Please."

The nurse nodded her head before he had time to finish his first word, complying to his request right away.

She knew that he needed to look at himself in order to believe what she had told him and she understood his desire to know what he looked like, if 20 years had really gone by.

She couldn't fathom what he was going through. She had not seen herself age through the years but that was different. He had fallen asleep as a thirty-something-year-old and was now a middle-aged man, his infant daughter herself was now an adult.

She moved towards the cart, grabbing a red-colored and round-shaped mirror, one side was plain while the other was magnified, allowing more details to be visible to the human eye.

She quickly turned back around, opening it for him as she was greeted by the heartbreaking sight of a man crying over the loss of half of his life.

He had not been able to contain the tears any longer and they fell, freely, each one rolling down his cheeks faster than the last.

His face had reddened and the misery was written all over his features. The corners of his mouth were down, forming some sort of a bent line.

As he took a deep shaky breath, the woman held the mirror in front of him. She patiently waited for him to turn his head back to the side so he could look at himself.

She was letting him take all the time he needed.

Silence filled the room, all the other patients still peacefully asleep. He mentally prepared himself for what he was going to be greeted by and turned his head, his eyes catching his reflection for the first time.

There, he could see his fully grown dark beard, the wrinkles around his eyes and forehead that had never been there before. He couldn't believe that he happened to be the man in front of him.

To him, it was like looking at a stranger, somebody who had familiar features, that he was supposed to know but that he didn't quite recognize.

He no longer felt like Brandon Hart, the FBI agent, husband and father of one. His own identity was a mystery to him and although he had only been awake for a couple of minutes, he was feeling more like he was being born again and that the first 34 years of his life had never existed.

He knew now that the accident would define him forever.

He had registered too many informations, too soon and acknowledged that he'd be better looking away but he simply couldn't. His eyes kept fixing his reflection and he broke down.

Eventually, he closed his eyes tightly, the wrinkles around them even more apparent.

All he could think about at this moment was Ariel and his daughter.