Chapter 2 Wake up

Where I am?

It's the first thing I think of when I open my eyes. I am in a white room and the light coming through the windows damages my eyesight. I have something on my nose that makes me hear my breath harder and something that pricks my arm. It is a dropper. I try to move but my muscles don't respond, I can't even lift my head from the pillow on the table.

I'm in a hospital. But what am I doing here?

At that, a nurse enters the room with a bag of transparent liquid in her hand, but when she sees me, she makes a surprised face and runs away.

How weird.

I focus all my attention on moving the fingers of my right hand, one by one, but voices interrupt the room. They are my mother and her new husband.

My mother sobs when she sees me and hugs me, drenching me with her tears. Jim is crying too, I can see it, but he immediately wipes his tear with the sleeve of his shirt and smiles at me. It could be said that Jim was not to my liking at first, I remember that I just wanted my father to come back, and now my mother was going to have another man in her life. She was going to replace dad. Then I realized that they were in love, so I accepted their relationship.

But seeing them cry in front of me makes me even more confused.

I do not understand anything.

"What ..." I am interrupted by myself when I am forced to cough, my throat is too dry and my voice comes out hoarse "What am I doing here?"

"I can't believe you woke up" My mother takes a handkerchief out of her pocket and sucks her nose. She has huge dark circles and red and puffy eyes, I guess she has been crying. She looks ten years older than the last time I saw her. The last time ... What was the last thing I remember? I feel my mother's hand caress mine. "You do not remember anything?"

I take a while to answer but I'm still too confused. My mind seems to be in a trance.

What I woken up? How long have I been asleep?

"Do not" I shake my head and lick my lips with the tip of my tongue. Jim watches the scene sadly from behind my mother. I don't think she dares to say anything. "I want to know mom"

"Oh honey ..." she caresses my face and then gives me a motherly kiss. "Everything will be fine, you'll see" but I feel that she is lying to me, I have a bad feeling inside me, a huge void that tells me that something is not right.

They've been testing me and giving me recovery medication all day and I'm feeling too tired so I decide to go to sleep.

I insisted that my mother and Jim go home to sleep now that they could be calm. Nobody has wanted to tell me anything about what happened all day, everyone tells me that first I should get enough rest, but I am beginning to get impatient and my head does not stop spinning thinking about everything that has happened to me.

I sigh and turn off the light bulb that illuminates the room.

I'm about to fall asleep when suddenly I start hearing noises. I slowly open my eyes and see the silhouette of a man, standing with his back to me, walking towards the door of my room. He has a very broad back and is tall. My heart begins to beat stronger.

"Who are you?" I mumble, squinting to capture more details. My voice seems to surprise him and he turns. I don't have time to see his face because he immediately runs out and jumps out the bedroom window.

I gasp and try to get to my feet as quickly as possible, but my legs don't respond well. I have them rigid and I can hardly move them.

I finally manage to get them off the stretcher and with some effort, I stand up, but they weaken me and I feel tremendous dizziness. I hadn't gotten up from the table yet, which explains my inability to walk, but I still do it as fast as I can to the window, dragging the dropper and then leaning out.

Then I realize that I am on the second floor. I look around the outside of the hospital hoping to see who it is, but there is no one there anymore.

I go back to the stretcher and lie down, hoping to fall asleep again, but it's impossible. I can't stop thinking about who that boy who had jumped out of the window was and what he was doing here, adding to the fact that I am gnawing the desire to know what happened to me.

So I remember some of the typical words used by my mother:

"The hospital is poorly organized. There are too many employees during the day, some of them spend their day doing nothing and still get paid. And then on the night shift, there is no one to watch and they always call me up in case there is some emergency"

I remember her complaining every time she got the night shift, as she is a nurse and happens to work here at Middleton Hospital. I always felt unhappy because I was the only person who had to put up with Mom's complaints, but I see that she has finally served me well.

I get up from the gurney again and look at the clock on the wall: four thirty in the morning. I have an hour and a half to go get my file, read it, and go back to the room without anyone seeing me dragging the damn dropper with me.

I leave the room and check the dark corridor, there is light on both sides, but when I see a nurse pass through the back on the right side, I decide to go the opposite. I go barefoot and I feel the cold that the ground gives off contrasting with my feet, but it comforts me to feel something new, I have the feeling that I have slept forever.

Once I get to the bottom, I see to my right the reception on the second floor with the receptionist in her position. I can't cross without her seeing me.

I wait against the corridor wall without making the slightest noise while I think. I wish I had my best friends here, when we were little we always played spy and sneaked into the house of Mr. Benson, my neighbor, and although in the end we were always caught, we had a good time.

I have a somewhat risky idea but it could work. I go back a bit down the hall and enter the room where the cleaning supplies are kept, sneak inside and grab three cans of cleaning products with my free hand, then go back to the end of the hall dragging the dropper and leaning out again.

The receptionist is going through some papers, her head bowed, and her eyes are closing. I take the opportunity to pick up one of the products and throw it with all my might towards the opposite side of the corridor where I have to cross. It causes a great noise and the poor receptionist jumps on her place with a scared face. Right now I want to laugh out loud but I can't. I see that she is bending down to get something and I take the opportunity to launch another of the boats. The poor woman gasps in fright and leaves her workplace.

"Who's there?" I hear she ask as she walks away, I'm sure she going to check what the hell is going on.

She lifted the dropper from the floor and entered the front desk to find the keys to the filing room. Once I find them, I run through the corridor until I reach the other end and bend down to put my spare cleaning can on the floor.

I keep walking until I reach the end and then I turn right again and just outside the front door is the file room. I put the key in the lock and turn it as slowly as possible so as not to make noise, and once inside I close the door and turn on the light.

I type my name on the computer and my medical history appears immediately. I open it without thinking more and start reading.

Lailah Gazt...

There are several mentions of some allergies and the arm that I broke as a child, I keep reading below until I get to where I wanted to go.

Multiple bony bills, including the left arm and two ribs; several muscle tears, and severe stroke from a severe blow to the skull caused by an unknown object ...

I swallow hard. Has all this happened to me? I don't know if I want to continue reading.

... caused by a car accident, along with two other subjects, which caused a three-month coma.

I blink several times and check if I have read it correctly or if I have the wrong history. But I see that it's me.

I've been in a coma for three months.

I close all the tabs, turn off the light, and leave the filing room, locking the door. I go back the way I came and once I am at the reception, I go to talk to the woman.

"Excuse me" My voice makes him shudder "Doesn't have a calendar around here?"

She looks at me with the face of a few friends, surely she is wondering why I need a calendar at this time of the morning. While she looks for it, I leaves the keys to the files behind a flowerpot on the counter and without saying anything hands it to me. I look at the date that indicates.

September 3.

The tears threaten to come out but I hold them back. So I go back to three months earlier, the accident must have been in June.

I remember little by little and day by day my last moments in high school. Until I find the key.

The end-of-year dance.

"Are you all right dear?" the lady asks me from the counter, I must have a horrible aspect for her to look at me with that face of compassion.

I shake my head.

"Can I make a call, please?" She nods and hands me the landline of the hospital. I dial Alison's mobile number, but no one answers.

I decide not to call again so as not to wake her up, she always gets in a bad mood when someone wakes her up. So I decided to call Jason. I wait a few seconds until the fifth ring picks it up, confused.

"Who calls me at this time?" he asks with an annoyed tone.

"Jason, it's me Lailah"

Nothing is heard on the other line.

"Is this a joke? Is not funny" he says, almost offended.

"It's no joke, I'm calling you from the hospital" A few seconds later, he answers him, releasing a big sigh.

"Oh my God, Lailah" I can see relief in his voice, maybe some disbelief.