Phoenix and the Bag Man

Chapter 5: Revelation

When I first came round my mouth felt like it was stuffed full of cotton wool. It was so dry. I needed water. I opened my eyes and the lights were too bright. I was hot. I was in hospital.

I sort of remembered the inside of an ambulance, being bumped around, faces sliding in and out of view above me. One time it was Phoenix's face with her skinny little girl arms stretching down towards me. There was a fairground carousel floating in a sky of duck egg blue behind her. I remember being man-handled, a needle going into my arm, bright lights, a transparent tube full of blood leading up to a bag full of blood. Barcodes and the letters AB printed in big black letters. I remember trying to point to this bag, but never quite being able to do so like a nightmare before I slipped into unconsciousness again. I don't recall any sound.

They told me that I had been stabbed. I never saw the knife. The nurse said that apparently my brother had been momentarily concussed when thrown off the back of the giant he'd attacked trying to defend me, and he couldn't remember who it was except 'they was very big'.

"My brother? I don't have a brother."

"The little blonde boy, I heard you were brothers." That made the little ferret sound almost cute.

"No, he's not my brother. Just someone I sort of know."

"But ... Never mind, I must have heard wrong. Now, you lost a lot of blood so you must drink plenty of water and take it easy for a bit. They had a bit of trouble finding blood to match your AB group, it's got some rare antibodies in it."

"But my blood group is O, like my parents. When I was little they took me with them when they gave blood. O for ordinary the nurse said. She gave me milk and biscuits."

"Is that a hint?"

She plumped up my pillows.

The doctor came on his rounds, looked at my chart, had a word with the nurse who was with him, and said:

"You are doing fine, any questions?" He seemed in a hurry, and preoccupied.

"In Biology they say two O group parents can only have O group kids, right?"

"Yes," he began hanging the notes back on the end of my bed.

"Then how come I've got AB blood?" he glanced again at the notes. Just for a second he looked puzzled, creasing his brow. He looked uncomfortable.

"Best ask your teacher when you get back to school," he smiled, "Good work," and he started to move away. He turned back briefly "Or ask your parents," he said. Then he was gone.

I knew the answer. I was quite good at biology. My mind seemed to do a couple of backflips trying to get around the one and only conclusion. I suddenly began to feel like I was falling. I got gripped by a kind of panic.

I didn't want to speak to anyone, anyone at all.

I don't know why.

Yes, I do know why.

Because I didn't know what to say. Could not get a grip on what I'd found out. I mean, where to start? I am ... not who I am?

I remember when I was quite small, seven or eight, something like that, thinking, "Are people treating me differently? Are people just pretending I am normal? Am I really odd?" You ever had that feeling like maybe it is all a pretence and that you are not normal, that they are just fooling you into thinking that you are. Have you ever had that feeling?

I remember thinking, "Well, I wonder what my name is."

I remember thinking, "Well, if Mum and Dad aren't Mum and Dad, who are they?"