DIE TONIGHT 》 Ryden

10:48 am

RYAN'S POV

There's a lot of things wrong with me.

Apparently, I have a collapsed lung; like they mentioned earlier. A ruptured spleen, internal bleeding of unknown origin, broken ribs, sprained wrist, which they said was caused by me trying to defend myself from flying debris. A rolled ankle; I already know how that was caused. Stupid Brendon. Abrasions on my left leg, which will require skin grafts. And the most serious, contusions in my brain.

Right now, in surgery, the doctors have to remove my spleen, insert a tube to drain my flooded lung, and figure out what's causing the internal  bleeding. There isn't much they can do for my brain.

"We'll just wait and see," one of the surgeons says, looking at the CT scan of my brain, "In the meantime, call down to the blood bank. I need two units of O neg, and to keep two units ahead.."

O negative. My blood type. I had no idea. Mostly because its something I never had to think about before. The last time I ever went to a hospital was when I went to visit dad for the last time with Brendon. The smell was sickening, and stuck with me forever. I still remember how Brendon held my hand as I fought back tears.

In the OR, the doctors are debating what music to play.  One guy wants jazz. Another wants rock. The anesthesiologist, who sits by my head, requests classical. I don't mind what they play, I just want the music to take me to another place. Somebody pops in The Doors 'Waiting for the Sun' CD.

It's not what I had in mind, but I hum along to the melodies. The operating room is small and crowded, full of blindingly bright lights, which highlight how grubby this place is. It's nothing like it is on TV, where the operating rooms are like theaters and could accommodate an opera singer and audience. The floor, though buffed shiny, has scuff marks and rust streaks, which I take to be old blood of previous patients.

Blood. It's everywhere. It doesn't faze the doctors one bit. They slice, sew, and suction through a river of it, like they are washing dishes in a sink filled with bubbles. Meanwhile, they pump an ever-replenishing stock into my veins.

The surgeon who requested rock sweats a lot. One of the scrub nurses has to periodically dab him with gauze that she holds between cold tongs. At one point he sweats through his mask, and has to replace it. The anesthesiologist strokes my temples through her latex gloves. Brendon used to do that whenever I got sick, or got one of those bad headaches that I would consider cutting open a vein in my temple just to relieve pressure.

The Doors CD has repeated twice now, and the doctors decide it's time for a new genre. Jazz wins. I don't know what CD they've put on, but I suddenly I get hit with nostalgia for when we recorded 'Fever'. The jazz/cabaret vibe that we put into it. We wanted to create a different sound for music back then. I remember Brendon was so excited to be apart of the band, and it all came crumbling down in 2009..

The operation goes on and on. I'm exhausted by it, I don't even know how the doctors have to stamina to keep up. They're standing still , but it seems harder than running a marathon. I start to zone out, and then I start to wonder about this state that I'm in. If I'm not dead-and the heart monitor is beeping along, so I assume I'm not- but I'm not in my body either- can I go anywhere? Am I a ghost? Could I go anywhere? Could I transport myself to a beach? Can I pop myself over to Chicago? Denver? Just for the sake of experiment, I snap my fingers. Click my heels together. I'm still here. I decide to try a simpler maneuver. I walk into a wall, imagining I'd float right through the other side. except when that happens, when I walk into a wall, is that I hit a wall.

A nurse barges in with a bag of blood, and before the door shuts, I slip through it. Now I'm in the hospital corridor. There are lot's of doctors and nurses in blue and green scrubs hustling around. There's a woman on a gurney, her hair in a gauzy blue shower cap, an IV in her arm, she calls out, "Adam, Adam," I walk a little further. There are now rows of operating rooms, all full of sleeping people. If the patients inside these rooms are like me, why can't I see them outside their bodies? Is everyone out loitering like me? I'd really like to meet someone in my condition. I have some questions, like, what is this state I'm in exactly, and how do I get out of it? How do I get back to my body? Do I have to wait for the doctors to wake me up? But there's no one else like me around.