Chapter 9
Elijah
My head hurt, and my ears rang, I opened my eyes and could just see white. I looked around the room and realized I was in a hospital. I desperately tried to remember why I was here, but everything was blank. Shit, had I been ill? I asked myself.
I could see a man in the chair next to the bed, and he looked familiar, but I couldn’t put a name to his face. I watched as he opened his eyes and looked at me. He grabbed my hand and gently squeezed it in genuine compassion.
“Elijah, thank God. You’re so lucky. I nearly lost you,” the man said as he squeezed harder still.
“Who are you? What am I doing here?” I replied as I tried to pull my hand from his firm grasp. He had brown hair and deep brown eyes. He looked in his mid-thirties.
Pain shot through my shoulder and I realized I must have broken something, but how? And why the fuck was my mind blank?
“I’m Peter, your older brother. Don’t you remember me?” he said as he leaned toward me with a look of concern that aged his face.
“Not really, you look familiar, but that’s it. Why am I here?” I looked at him confused with the whole predicament. My body ached everywhere.
“You were on your bike and had a bad accident, Elijah. You had a blackout and broke your shoulder. Your bike is a total wreck. Thank the Lord you’re alright,” he said with a half-smile plastered on his face.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re not making sense. How do I know I’m this Elijah?” I questioned as I felt the pain push me like a boxer after a fight.
Peter reached into a leather jacket and took out a driver's license and handed it to me. I looked at it for a few moments. There was a picture of a man. He had brown styled hair and light blue, wide eyes.
“Get me a mirror. I want to look at my face,” I said as I wondered about everything.
Peter passed me a mirror, and I held it level with my face. It seemed he had told the truth; I was Elijah Hanson, but that was just a name. Who am I though? Who is that person behind the name? The harder I tried to remember, the more my head hurt.
Peter exited the room, and I looked around for more clues, but I could see nothing. All I had was this license with me on it.
I stared back into the mirror. I could see my face as it looked back at me, my light blue eyes showed me no recognition of who I was or what had brought me in here. Nothing filtered at all.
I closed my eyes and laid my head down on the firm pillow. Had I lost my memory permanently, or would it come back? I started to feel a bit apprehensive and scared... should I be scared? Would I have been scared before the accident?
I looked toward the door as Peter returned with the doctor.
“Good morning, Elijah. How are you feeling?” the doctor asked as he placed his fingers on my wrist and mentally counted as he took my pulse.
“I feel confused for sure, I don’t know who I am,” I replied feeling lost.
The doctor explained that they would run some tests and that for trauma like this it was normal for the mind to shut off temporarily.
“Thanks, Doc,” I said as he walked out of the room and started to talk to one of the nurses in the busy hall.
I felt a little relieved to be told it could just be temporary, but I still had a nagging doubt about it all.
The doctor returned, and then the nurse wheeled in a small machine. She connected some electrodes to my head and turned the machine on, and it beeped. The doctor studied the electronic machine as it churned out reams of paper with a chart on it. I could see a line that had dips and spikes at varying points. I assumed the spikes were good, and the dips were bad, but what they meant, I didn't know.
“So, what’s the conclusion?” I asked as the nurse removed the electrodes from my head.
“It appears you may have some long-term memory loss. As to the extent of it, we are unable to definitively tell until you start to remember something, then we can tell if there is damage or it’s trauma inflicted,” the doctor explained as he smiled.
“You mean he could have brain damage?” Peter asked as he used his puzzled look again.
“The cat scans revealed no signs, but that is not to say there is no neural damage somewhere else. The best thing you can do is to be with Elijah to help him, and try to help him remember,” the doctor said as he checked the wall clock.
“There is no time like the present,” I said to Peter. “Pull up a chair and tell me who I am.
Peter spent hours with me that day. He had explained we lost our parents a few years ago, and that we inherited our father's logistics company, which just happened to be a fortune 250 company.
He also explained that I had a love affair with extreme sports, fast cars, and fast motorcycles. It appeared it was the latter which led me to be in a hospital. I was shocked at how bad I had been. How stupid I acted.
“The doctor told me you had traces of alcohol in your system. Had you been drinking?” Peter asked concerned with the news.
“I don’t even remember my name. How can I remember if I like to drink?” I replied as I groaned in pain from my shoulder.
“Good point. It was a bit dumb for me to ask,” Peter had a slightly ashamed look on his face.
“I need to rest. I’m tired,” I said to Peter as my eyes began to close.
“No problem. I’ll go home and have a shower and come back later,” he said as he squeezed my hand and left me alone.
My mind drifted as I slipped toward sleep. The nurses spoke in the distance, as if down the hallway a bit. The voice of a doctor rose, his words painful. He informed someone that their loved one had passed unexpectedly.
I laid there and listened as the family wailed out in the hall. When it finally relented, I heard a voice that sounded familiar. "Mark my words."
As I opened my eyes and looked toward the corridor, I saw the shape of a man as it disappeared into the distance. Like a warning that rang as I drifted to deep sleep.
***
The intercom was busy calling doctor this and doctor that. I didn't know how anyone was supposed to rest in a place when the incessant noise carried on? All I wanted to do was sleep, but it was like everyone tried their hardest to keep me awake. The doctors checked in on me, and nurses pampered me, and most of all Peter questioned me to see if I remembered anything about my crash. The worst part was, the more I racked my brain, the harder it was to get anything at all.
I tried very hard to think about what happened, yet my mind was still blank, and nothing had come to me except for apart the strange voice I heard in the hallway. And, “Mark my words” was the only comment that sounded familiar.
I finished eating my gooey hospital breakfast, and Peter poked his head around the door. “Hiya sport, how you are feeling?” he crowed in excitement.
“Pretty much the same as last night. I’m, unfortunately, still drawing a blank,” I replied as I knocked back my medication the nurse had so kindly included on my breakfast tray.
“The doctor says, we can take you home later today once he has given you the all clear,” Peter said with a smile as he dragged the chair closer to the bed.
“Where is home? Do we live close to each other?” I asked.
“No, I live in a quiet community. And the houses are well, you know, ordinary, with white picket fences and all that, but you live in a home of opulence closer to the city,” he uttered.
“I feel nervous about going home. It will be foreign to me,” I said as I adjusted my favorite pillow out of the two I had been given.
“So, you have no recollection of where you live at all Elijah?” Peter flicked through the channels on the ceiling-mounted TV.
“None at all, and why is it a point of interest of where I live?” I said quizzing him.
I waited for Peter’s reply. I laid there confused because he had asked questions that left many blanks as my mind. What was wrong with where I lived? Or even the place I worked? And was he ashamed of my situation for some reason? I said nothing and felt lost again.
“It’s nothing. It’s just your home. You will see it soon enough,” he replied as he gestured with his hand to forget what he said. “You can stay with me tonight, and then tomorrow we’ll get you settled at your place Mr. Forgetful.” I hated that new pet name.
The doctor came and gave me the final all clear. Apparently, it was hospital policy that I had to leave in a wheelchair, so Peter pushed me from the hospital toward where he had parked his car. I smelled the perfume of the flowers and heard birds as they sang. I had only been in the hospital for a week or so, yet it seemed I had been gone for years.
We arrived at Peter’s car. He had a silver Subaru station wagon, a good family car I thought, as he helped me struggle into the passenger seat.
“Do I have a car?” I asked Peter as he exited the hospital car park like a grandmother. Cautious and slower than a snail.
He coughed as he answered, “Yes, you do. You don't remember that either?" I was annoyed by his question.
“I told you, I don’t remember anything!” I replied as I gazed at the surroundings. It all looked very strange, none of it looked familiar at all.
“You have a fondness for cars, and for motorcycles,” he said as we hit the freeway. “Maybe when you get home, you will remember something more.”
We eventually passed the tree-lined avenue where Peter lived. Children were running and playing ball; they stood and waved at Peter as we passed by in caution.
“You know those, children?” I asked Peter as we slowly turned into his driveway. His house stood before us, with teal colored sidings and bright white window frames. It looked like a poster home for the American dream.
“Yes, everyone knows everyone in this street, they are all really friendly,” he replied in concentration.
“Cool, it sounds nice,” I added as the car finally halted, and I clambered out of the car. God, I was stiff.
Peter made a pot of coffee in his shaker-styled kitchen, the aroma filled the air, and it tasted even better than it smelled. Peter started to tell me stories of us growing up, and how Dad used to take us to the office where we played hide and seek on the weekends.
“You remember you always hid in the same place, and I pretended not to find you?” Peter commented as he picked a picture from the fireplace and handed it to me.
“Nothing comes to mind of when we were kids. Is this Dad?” I asked looking at the old photo.
“Yeah, that’s him,” he teared up. “He always had a soft spot for you.” He removed a photo album from the cupboard shelf.
I flicked my way through the album. The photos went back to when we were toddlers. And we looked close, but, I could see Dad always held me up if we were in the picture together. I wondered why this was, and how it had affected our lives.
“Ah, that photo was taken on vacation just before mom and dad died, it was our last family vacation, and it was when everything changed,” Peter said looking at the photo as he wiped his eyes.
“We looked happy,” I said as I closed the album. I didn't like to see him sad.
“They were happy times, and times that have been missed.” He bowed his head a little and sipped his aromatic coffee.
“I think I have had too much excitement for one, day. I’m feeling a little tired, can I lie down for a while please Peter?” I asked as I hugged him hard.
Peter looked at me surprised by my affection and showed me to my room. It looked quaint and was neutrally decorated in case guests stayed over I supposed.
Peter helped me to the bed and removed my shoes. Then he placed the photo album on the side table before he closed the curtains to shade the light out for me.
“I’ll leave the album there for you, but for now, get some rest, because you have a lot to take in,” he said as he closed the door behind him. I loved him so much and was thankful for his help.
I laid on the bed and closed my eyes. My mind ached from all the images, the photos, and all the endless questions. It was like a sensory overload, and it drained me completely.
I closed my eyes and tried to let my mind relaxed. It frustrated me that I had to ask about everything, and I was sure it would get worse before it got better. I slowly drifted into an exhausted sleep.