Day 3

No one sleeps well. It doesn't matter if it's your first night, your second night, or your last night. You spend the night scratching your unwashed head, showers are permitted once every 7 days. You spend the night gently untangling your limbs from the cords glued to your head hoping they don't get detached. You spend the night listening to the other people around you having seizures, waiting for the nurses to shuffle to their beds.

You spend the night waiting for yourself to have a seizure. If you're lucky, you will.

"How'd you sleep?" I ask Brandon. It's a formality. I know the answer he'll give. The nurses had just given us our medicine and checked to make sure we weren't too banged up from the night.

"Fine," his shoulders lift as he looks away. His words slur and there's still blood in his morning stubble. Our beds are beside each other, so close that if we reach out we could touch each other. I heard everything. He makes a gurgling sound when it happens. His legs kick violently while the top half of his body pushes into the mattress. It's like someone is straddling his chest strangling him and he's fighting to get them off. Do I sound like that?

"I had a seizure last night." he speaks slowly. His jaw moving at an odd angle to avoid his tongue. This is his third stay. He's been here for almost two weeks now. The first two times they didn't record any data on him.

"Hey, at least you had one, right?"

The more seizures you have, the more data they collect, and the faster you leave. Hillary, another girl in the unit, hasn't had any; she's also on her third stay. about 2 weeks in.

"How about you?"

"Fine."

It wasn't fine. No one sleeps.

Where am I again. There's Brandon, what were we talking about? I'm nauseous. Why is the male nurse here. I'm still looking at Brandon, we must have been having a conversation.

"Hi," I say to the nurse. He's writing in his notebook.

"Hi, how are you feeling?"

"Fine." Formality. I'm dizzy. I don't know what's happening. The epilepsy unit is regimented: 8:30 am medicine and vitals, 9:00 am breakfast, 11:30 am lunch, 8:30pm medicine and vitals, 10:00 pm lights off. So why is he here? I look at the time its after 8:30 am we've had our medicine he isn't here for that.

"You had a seizure. Congratulations. "

That explains it.

"I'm going to ask you a few questions."

Brandon's seizures and the woman down the hall seizures are violent in nature. The woman down the hall dislocated her shoulder. She medically has to be brought out of her seizures- she's awake throughout them all, screaming, and begging for them to stop - that is, after they've watched and collected a sufficient amount of data on her. I, however, mainly have absence seizures. Coming through confused, dazed, nauseous; I never know when I'm having a seizure.

"Do you remember anything?

"Nope."

I wring my hands together, scratching my cuticles.

"Remember the number 23 for me, okay? I'm going to check your vitals again."

He smells like bleach.

"I can never remember the number," Brandon pipes up from the bed beside me. We're confined to them. Our cords only let us walk about 5 meters from the bed so there isn't much of a point leaving. We're provided very little privacy.

"I'm competitive."

I mentally repeat. 23. 23. 23.

"Look straight ahead for me please."

He flashes his light in both of my eyes.

23. 23. 23.

"Follow my finger with your eyes while touching your nose"

23. 23. 23.

"Push on my hands"

23. 23. 23.

"What number did I say at the beginning?"

"23."

"Good job."

Brandon doesn't look at me when I look at him, he misses the smug look on my face. The nurse flips through his papers.

"You had 8 seizures yesterday, about 60 spikes."

My fists clench. I go back to picking my cuticles. My foot taps silently in my slippered feet on the tilled, waxed, sterile floor. I scratch my head.

"8?"

I remember nothing.

"Yup. The doctor will be up to see you around 12. Looks like you'll be going home today."

Brandon's head is turned toward the door. He still isn't looking at me. It's only my third day. It's only my first visit.

"Brandon, The doctor is going to come up to talk to you to. He wants to talk further options."

Brandon has already gone through med after med after med, he has the epileptic version of a pacemaker. We both know the next step for him. The same step the lady in bed 8 had, now she can't talk. Or the guy in bed number 10 who's had 2 and now drools.

I pity him. I pity Hillary who hasn't had any seizures, I pity the woman who injured herself, I pity the lady in bed 8 and the man in bed 10. I pity myself which is okay because you can't always compare yourself to others suffering.

I don't wallow.

Rather, I weakly smile at Brandon.

Authors note.

Thank you for reading.