Volitare

Resurrection

All I could think of was my family. My mom’s smiling face, my dad’s strong nose, my brother’s taunting laugh. I would see moments of us; for lunch at the table, somewhere on a beach, in the living room laughing at a recent incident or at my brother’s clumsiness…flashes, so many happy moments. So much love. What would it be like if I was truly gone? I wouldn’t want them to mourn me for long, or at all. What would happen to Omar? We never actually spoke before this, we never had our closure. Omar didn’t deserve much, but every person deserves closure. What happened to Alex? Was he okay? Will I see him? Were we even in the same place? I kept thinking of everyone and ignored this feeling; peace.
I was at peace. I was free. Boundless.
Was I?
The smell of antiseptics invaded my nasal canal, I breathed heavily. I’m breathing? My eyelids were so heavy, so heavy, I can’t coax them to open. I kept breathing. I can’t move, my mind tried to force my extremities to bend or lift. Sadly to no avail. I was pulled back to unconsciousness again, and again. It felt like that Evanescence where I can’t wake up, I might start begging to be either admonished to heaven or hell or even worse; to life.
“Please wake up, I am so sorry. I regret it! Please wake up” I heard that voice and knew it instantly. I could feel two hands enveloping my own hand, a water-like substance dampening my hand. I want to wake up, so bad. I used all my will, whatever was left, and tried to open my eyes. The sting that resulted from the neon lights almost blinded me, I squinted my eyes trying to adjust to this blunt visual invasion. Breathe, breathe. I kept mentally telling myself. I was numb for a couple of minutes, trying to process where I was exactly. I looked towards the grip I felt, and saw him. He looked so forlorn, kneeling his head on my hand and sobbing. I tried to speak, but didn’t dare to challenge my body any further. One step at a time. I decided to move my index finger to gain his attention. It did not faze him, so I tried to use my index and middle finger. It jolted him to raise his head and then look at me. He hasn’t shaved for a few days, the bags under his eyes suggested he hasn’t slept in a while, and his relieved shocked expression revealed his joy. Tender eyes glazed as he tried to compose a coherent thought. “Hey” was his opening phrase. Leave it up to Omar to open with a bang. I couldn’t talk so I just smiled, my lips peeling away exposing the dehydrated state I was it, so I licked my lips in order to modify the situation and realized I had a dry mouth. “I am going to get the nurse honey, I’ll be right back.” And he went out the door down the hall, and I’ll stay right here I mentally remarked. The nurse came rushing in with the same relieved expression as Omar’s. “Well missy you gave us quite a scare. It was touch and go for a while.” She said as she started to take my pulse, she looked towards Omar. “He hasn’t left your side. Not once.” And smiled affectionately. It must be the guilt. “I’ll go page the doctor” she gave me a sweet smile, turning to leave. I grabbed her hand and eyed the pitcher of water nearby, “yes of course you can” she allowed. Omar raced to fetch me a glass, and adjusted the bed with the remote, and helped tilt the cup to my mouth. The water ran cool and fast along the contours of my inner anatomy, sleek and moistening the dried tissue in its wake, as if I was in a desert for days and found this oasis.
“I was so worried. I thought…I thought…” he drifted off, he was sitting next to me. I wanted to comfort him, I really did. How can I? He hurt me. I preferred him not being here. Now. All I could manage was a smile, that’s all I could offer. I spared him of the thoughts running through my head. “It was awful. They wouldn’t tell us anything. Body after body, they wouldn’t…and your parents, they were ballistic! I am so sorry. So sorry I lied, I don’t know how many times I could say it but I am. I should’ve told you that I went to see her. She wanted to talk, just talk. You saw us and it all went to hell! I wanted to tell you, but you wouldn’t answer your phone, let alone see me”, He held my hand, “talk. That’s all we did. She is already engaged, why would she want to get back together?” can I believe that? Am I one of those people that lets things go?
He held my gaze. If he was lying, he perfected the art with the look he was giving me; this sincere look trying to convince me of the truth. “I thought you were gone. I couldn’t live with it knowing you didn’t know, that we ended things over a misunderstanding. I love you Mia. I would never cheat.”
He wouldn’t? People tend to justify or elude their true notions, ‘we didn’t do it’, or ‘we didn’t mean to’, or even ‘it meant nothing’. Was he faking sincerity? Can a person fake sincerity? I turned my head and looked out the window, this feeling of desolation followed by impassiveness overcame me. I was a shell of a person. I woke up in a hospital, not knowing how I got here and what happened, and here I am arguing with my boyfriend about whether he was cheating or not. This chunk of events and memories had dissolved and disappeared from my head and here he is trying to absolve himself from the accusation of being a cheater. I turned my head towards this insensitive prick and felt the coldness of my words, with all the strength I could muster, “Omar I couldn’t care less”, it exhausted me to say those few words, and the next phrase exhausted me even more. His stunned expression left him with his mouth agape, “I am here on a hospital bed, feeling as if I have been resurrected from the dead, and you’re trying to explain yourself?!” I felt the heat of my anger, my blood boiling, and feeling my body shiver as if it was the middle of December, “I don’t know what happened to me! I am trying to remember! I can’t. Where are my parents? I need them right now, not you. Please see yourself out.” Then I moved the only part of my anatomy that I am allowed to move; I turned my head and stared off the window waiting for him to vacate the room. He gave an exaggerated sigh, and headed towards the door, “you can’t use the fact that I am temporarily invalid to confront me!” I spat as he left the room. I felt like sobbing, I felt this relationship needed to be mourned, but the reservoir of exhaustible fluids was running low. I just stared out that window, seeing what little I could see of the world around me. The blue sky and the sun’s radiance, a couple of trees here and there constituting the hospital’s background, I could hear the shuffling of carts and orders being issued among nurses, doors opening and closing with family members leaving and entering rooms, the beeping and humming of nearby medical machines trying to sustain or monitor life. I looked around my room and saw arrangements, beautiful arrangements, colorful and cheerful as spring itself. I wondered who took the time to send me such beautiful bouquets, and took note to send thank you(s).
This room had an eerie loneliness to it, despite occasional visits from the nurses to empty the bag attached to my catheter (disgusting I know) and check my vital signs, I haven’t seen the doctor assigned to me yet. Did my parents speak to him while I was unconscious? I kept staring at my door willing for someone I knew to come and visit me. I felt as if I was forgotten, a floating ghost, an entity neglected and forgotten. As soon as I let out an exasperated exhale, my parents came dashing into the room and to my side. Apparently they just informed them that I regained consciousness. They both looked forlorn. My mother’s hair was disheveled, her face distraught and itched with worry and anxiousness. My father, a strong man who kept his feeling to himself rather than share them, held my hand and looked deep into my eyes. He was so strong, he dropped to my side and heaved a sob. My mother dropped to the other side, and together they synchronized fits of expressive sadness and relief. I was beguiled.

What happened to me?
***

After they were done crying, they sat down, on either side of my hospital bed, and started to explain what happened.
My dad’s Adam apple rose and fell as he swallowed a bit of his own saliva, trying to come up with phrases to explain the condition in which they found me. “There was an accident.” What accident? Where? I asked, “On your way to work, we don’t know what happened exactly but the bus crossed the railing of the highway overlooking the shore and dove deep into the water.” He cradled his head between his hands and supported his elbows on his knees, “they couldn’t find you, and we were there at the crash site. Your mom got the notification on her iPad and knew it was your way to work and that-at that time-you might be there. We called and called…she knew. We knew. They kept looking, and they found you, on the rocks, waves crashing, and…” he renewed his sobbing, “y-you were barely breathing. They rushed you to the nearest hospital, and took you right to surgery. You stayed for hours in there, ruptured spleen, internal bleeding, collapsed lung, a concussion and hair line fracture. Your shoulder blade and collar bone were broken, the femur bone was…protruding from your thigh” He flinched at the memory, “they had to induce a coma due to the swelling in your brain. You have been in one for a week.”
“w-why”, a dry cough escaped me, then my mom helped me sip a bit of water, “why can’t I remember anything?”
“It must be the swelling or something. They say it probably be temporary.” My dad answered me assertively. What happened to the rest of the passengers?
“Dad”, he turned his attention to me, “what happened to the rest? They found them right?”
He looked at my mother, she nodded as if to give permission, “maybe we should talk about that some other time, you must be…” he tried to avert the issue at hand, “Dad, please.” I pleaded.
He bent his head up at the ceiling, and sighed. “You were the only one. They didn’t find the rest. They found only you.”