Alexander sat, swathed in bandages around his legs, right arm, and head, staring out the window pensively. Shirtless, wearing a pair of thin gym shorts, he was medium sized with hints of an Italian decent, flecked with little cuts still healing on his face and chest, he looked around morosely at what had become the known universe.
To Alexander, the known universe was roughly three rooms and a hallway on the fourth floor of the county hospital. He was told there had been an accident. He couldn't remember it. They said he needed neurosurgery to keep him alive. He didn't remember that. They said he was in a coma for a month. He didn't remember that, either. The doctor said amnesia, and it might be temporary. He remembered that. He remembered the doctor saying it evenly, casually, like he had contracted the flu, instead of losing everything.
The damnable thing is, he could remember his childhood, barely: three childhood friends, a fort in the back yard, playing in the creek and getting muddy, being yelled at for trailing a line of muddy foot prints thought the kitchen, of ineffectually blaming it on the dog -- but afterwards, it became maddingly vague or non-existent, like trying to grab a hold of a tendril of cigarette smoke.
He didn't think he was a smoker, or an alcoholic, or a drug user, there hadn't been any cravings over the past week he could remember. He occasionally felt weird impulses at times, like sudden sadness he couldn't explain, or an almost child-like glee at looking a swimming pool. He had no visitors, and he didn't know he had any living family. There was a ring of pale skin around his ring finger, was he married? Gay? Bi? He didn't know. Sometimes he thought that the sum total of what he knew could barely fill a pamphlet; a very small pamphlet.
So he sat, his legs in a cast, his arm in a cast, and his hair shaved off from the neurosurgery they had to perform. The few times he looked in a mirror, he thought he resembled a hairless chihuahua. So he sat, as the spring rains came boiling off the ocean, sitting by the window in his room, staring blankly outside, trying to remember who he was.
The squeak of the opening door shook Alexander out of his fretful reverie with a start. He looked questioningly as a young woman wheeled in the food cart with a blinding smile.
Ah
, he thought without enthusiasm,
the remarkable food like substance they laughingly call lunch here.
"All that brooding must have made you hungry, right?" She said brightly. Alexander smiled politely, but quailed inside, something about her unnatural perkiness made him queasy.
Dressed in pale pink smocks, 'Amber', the nurse's nametag said as she pulled an a tray out. Short and zaftig, her brown hair drawn up into a tight professional bob at the base of her neck, the most noticeable part of her, other than her annoyingly sparkling personality at all hours of the day or night, were her massive breasts tenting out the front of her shirt. Perhaps it was perspective, Alexander mused, they could possibly only be a B-cup, and her small stature would seem to inflate them to amazing proportions.
"Looks like beef stew." She said, sniffing at the tray delicately as she brought it over to the rolling table next to the chair.
Do I like beef stew?
Alexander wondered, but other than a childhood aversion to lima beans and cabbage, he couldn't remember.
Then again
, he thought wryly,
hospital food is not known for its savory taste.
The table squeaked a little as she brought it closer, "Feeling hungry at all?"
"No, not really."
"You have to eat something, you've hardly eaten anything this last week." She said, filling his plastic tumbler with cold water from a Styrofoam carafe.
"Perhaps I just want some company." Alexander blurted, surprising himself, "The only people I see are either here to ply me with something, or take it away -- usually with something sharp. Needles and the like. I don't feel like a person, I feel like a talking medical mannequin for people to practice on."
Amber froze for a moment, looking at him strangely, before she finished filling the cup, and walked away quietly. Alexander felt awful for blurting that out.
These people work hard and have many to care for, what should I care if I'm a little lonely? They save people's lives, like mine.
The locks on the cart's wheels clicked off noisily, Amber hesitated a moment, then blurted, "I'll be done in a few minutes, wait for me?" And before the stunned Alexander could respond, she smiled shyly and fled.
Her company immediately overshadowed the barely edible meal, once she dropped the perpetually over-perky personality, and started talking about herself. Alexander found out she has an older brother in the Navy that wants to study to become an electrical engineer when gets out. A father dead from cirrhosis, and a mother still teaching at the local community college, like she has for the past half century, and was first year student studying hard to become an RN while working in food service to pay the bills. Not that she went home a lot, as she was almost always here paying off school bills.
Over the next few weeks, it became a routine that Alexander looked forward to and to his surprise, he discovered a desire to talk that he didn't even know he had. While he was unable to talk about much, she was able to fill the gaps, spinning stories and anecdotes from her life with enviable easiness. In return, Amber smiled at his quiet jokes, brought him flowers when she came on shift, ate with him, and bade him goodnight when she left for the night.
During the night, Alex had dreams of her that if not erotic, were embarrassingly sensual. He dreamed his legs and arm healed, lying with her on a grass-covered hill, the wind tugging at her hair as she smiles at something he said. One time, they were in bed together exploring each other's bodies playfully, with giggles and moans intermingling for hours.
The dreams embarrassed Alexander, and often he would wake with an erection he was unable to deal with. Amber was a good female friend who didn't have any desire to take it any further. And that was fine with him.
* * * * *
After the second week, the doctor made a visit some time in the afternoon. Tall dark and handsome, he looked like someone that stepped off a fashion magazine rather than a doctor, dressed in blue scrubs, he smiled as he shook Alex's hand warmly, "So, how do you feel?" he asked warmly.
"I'm pretty sure I've felt better." Alex responded dryly.
"I see that you've gotten some flowers." The doctor said, nodding at the small vase at his bedside sprouting a riot of color.
"I needed a little color. Look, I'm going to be blunt. Either you're here because I'm going to live, or because I'm going to die. I feel fine, so I think I'm going to live, which means that you're here about what happens next, right?"
"Ah, essentially, yes."
"So my legs, my arm, my head are okay?"
"Yes, quite well, in fact. You're going to need some physical therapy, and I'd recommend some psychological therapy to help you with the amnesia, but minus your legs, arms, head, and all your other injuries, you're as fit as a fiddle."
"Großartig." Alexander snorted sarcastically.
"What?"
"Wonderful." Alexander repeated.
"You didn't say that, you said 'grosstardish'."
"I did?"
"It sounded like German."
