Line of Time

His name?

Due to the hospital's small working space, the recovery wing and psychiatric ward were on the same floor, just in different hallways. 

It was late into the afternoon now, evening had come and Gunnar's sedative had worn off. But the drugs that were in his IV were working just fine, making him somewhat relaxed but mostly unaware of what was going on around him. Meanwhile on the other side of the hospital floor, Tino was with a nurse. She helped him out of bed and was in the process of helping get up and into a wheelchair. She was taking him to shower, it was right down the hall. 

After that he was clean he asked the nurse if they could go for a walk, she agreed and added that she understood how much those rooms were boring. They went up and down the hallways for a while. 

Little conversations to pass the time was all what filled the quiet hallways and as they went down the opposing wing, Gunnar looked up from his bed. He heard a voice he missed far too much, one that seemed to be a ghost haunting him now. It couldn't be him, it had to be a dream, something or someone that just sounded like him... He was about to avert his eyes from the window in the door when he saw him... He saw someone who looked a lot like Tino, maybe a little to much because for a moment he wished it was him but then he remembered that Tino was in a coma. One event doctors weren't too sure if he'd come out of.

But in that same moment, Tino had caught sight of Gunner. It took the boy a moment of high hopes and star filled eyes to realize and then come back crashing down to earth. His family had said that Gunner wasn't real here, he was something that Tino had dreamed up so many times while in his coma. All those different lives of happiness and sadness and the one thing that always came back around in all of them... He wasn't real, even as much as Tino hated to think about it that way, it must be the truth.

That man in the hospital bed must have just been an illusion or someone who just so happened to have glasses and blond hair. It wasn't that man that he had dreamed about. That was just another patient who was here for treatment. In all his life Tino could never be that lucky, he'd already used it all as he came out of a coma while they pulled the plug on life support. His luck was gone now, he had to live with that fact. Gunner was only real in his dreams and that might have been for the best.

"What's wrong, you went quiet on me all of a sudden." The nurse said in a motherly tone.

"Oh... I'm sorry, I just thought I saw someone I knew but it's not him." Tino replied his voice now without that happy beat the nurse had noticed before. Now she recognized the sound of heartache and heartbreak, the two things that start the road to giving up when it came to recovery and healing all together. She stopped pushing the wheelchair and walked around to the front of it, kneeling down in front of it.

"Who did you think it was?" She asked as he tried to avoid her eyes. "You don't have to be shy to me, I'm a nurse part of my job is to listen so that every part of you gets better."

"You promise not to judge me?..." Tino asked his voice uneasy.

"I don't have a gavel so why would I? Go on sweetheart." She said as he gave a reluctant smile.

"I thought that guy I saw in that room was someone I knew... I thought he was my boyfriend but my family told me I didnt have a boyfriend and since I was in coma for so long I forgot a lot of stuff." Tino explained.

"Oh come on now, you didnt forget that much stuff, you know your name, I heard you said everyones name when they came to see when you woke up, so why wouldnt you remember somethibg like that." There was a pause between them. "Tell you what, I can go ask one of my friends that works in this wing who that gentlemen is. Do you remember his name?" She asked as Tino smiled.

"His name is Gunner." He said as the nurse got up and resumed her post behind the wheelchair, starting to push it down the halls again. This time she brought him back to his room and helped him back into his bed, replacing wires and tucking him in. She told him to get some rest, she would have the gentleman's name tomorrow morning for sure, until then she had other patients to take care of and she wished him a good rest of the afternoon. Tino thanked her and hoped she had a good day, when she left he went to sleep or at least tried to for a while.

Being asleep for eight months made him a little uneasy about actually going to bed, an odd fear that he would wake up in the next year or not wake up at all stocked him and worried him greatly. But at the same time a semi dark thought entered his mind. If he fell asleep he might see Gunner again and if he didn't wake up, he would see him forever. . . Tino didn't like the dark road his mind that taken him too but for now it helped him sleep.

In the opposite side of the floor Gunner was replaying every memory he had over and over again in his mind. The doctor told him to stop, that it wasn't healthy. But he ignored him, he was simply wishing for better days, days of when he was allowed to see his sweetheart and hold his hand. Now in this moment he was left hoping with everything that he would wake up and that he could see him again. That maybe he wouldn't have forgotten him like everyone hoped. No one had really ever approved of their relationship, except a few here and there but the majority didn't like to see Gunner with Tino. The car accident didn't help that fact. For some reason they blamed Gunner because it had been his idea to go to the party that night and if he hadn't it would have saved the boys and their families from all this.

Gunner finally gave up and rolled onto his side, putting his glasses aside on the bedside table he drifted off to sleep. A sad though hanging over his head hoped he wouldn't wake up, if Tino was asleep for the rest of his life, he'd half to join him. Tears streamed down his silent face long after he had found sleep.