The Price of Silence

      Avery slowly opened his eyes and was immediately blinded by the bright fluorescent lights above him. He squinted his eyes shut and tried to lift a hand up to block the shining bulbs, but couldn’t. Where the hell am I, he thought groggily, trying to remember what had happened just before he passed out, and what the hell happened? He looked down to see what was keeping his hands from moving and instantly felt his heart rate jump. Leather straps were wrapped around his wrists, securing him to what appeared to be a dentist’s chair so tightly that he could barely move. He quickly scanned the empty white room around him, trying to find something that would help him remember how he got here.

               The last thing I can remember was I had just walked out of the coffee shop… and then, something… he couldn’t seem to recall what had happened next. He remembered getting ready for work and leaving the house that morning, then walking down to the street corner for a cappuccino, but when he walked out of the little shop, something bad happened and he couldn’t remember anything else. Avery’s eyes finished adjusting the intense light and he looked down at the chair he was strapped in to. His ankles had the same wide, leather, straps securing him, and there was another that went across his chest. What the hell was going on?

                The room he was in looked like a 15x15 that was painted solid white, and a large steel door was closed several feet in front of him. To the right of the chair were two IV stands and several monitors. His eyes followed the wiry-cords on them and they ended with round white pads stuck to his chest, upper arm, and temples. Am I in some sort of hospital, he thought to himself, glancing over his arms and chest for bandages. He took a deep breath through his nose and coughed at the heavy smell of disinfectant. Ok, I definitely might be in a hospital. Jesus, that smell is terrible. Why am I here, though, and why would they need to strap me to a chair like this? Was I in a car accident or something…?

                The door in front of him suddenly clicked and Avery felt his heartbeat start to race. The monitor next to him beeped loudly in response, and the door opened just enough to let in a small old man in a white apron. His hair was the color of snow-covered asphalt and he wore tiny spectacles that rested precariously on the end of his long nose, magnifying his already large eyes. He was thin and wiry looking with a slightly hunched back, and Avery was sure that a strong gust of wind was all it would take to blow the man over for good.

“Ah, Mr. Moore! You’re finally awake, I see.” The old man said, shuffling forwards and offering him a genuine smile. “I was starting to wonder if you would ever come to.”

                The man clipped his consonants in such a way that Avery was sure English wasn’t his first language. He sounded German, or perhaps Norwegian. He had never been very good with accents, but he was fairly sure that it didn’t matter where the man had come from originally, as long as he was here to help. “Where am I and how did I get here?” he said quickly, eyeing the old man as he slowly walked around behind him. “And why am I strapped to this damn chair?” After a few moments, the old man shuffled back around into Avery’s line of vision carrying a small wooden chair that he set on the floor next to his legs.

                “So many questions,” the old man said, sitting down heavily and taking a labored breath. “First let’s get you hooked up to the machine, and then we will go about answering your questions, dobrze?”

                “Can you at least tell me your name then?” Avery asked, watching the man lean forward and untangle the cords of the IVs with thin, nimble, fingers. The doctor flicked his eyes up to meet Avery’s, and for the first time he could see that they were a cold, gunmetal-gray. “You may call me Dr. Kalinowski. Now hush while I do this, młody człowiek.”