I know the iron bands strapped around me are warm and breath smelling of whisky bathes my face.
I look up, and eyes pierce mine. “Sssshhhh. You’ll be okay. I’ll get you help.” The voice is the texture of a blacked-out room, smooth as velvet, powerful and deep.
I am falling. I fight against gravity, because that way lies darkness, and in the darkness lurks obscurity. I don’t know what that thought means, but I know I must fight.
I lose.
I fall.
Through depthless dark, I fall.
? ? ?
I wake with a start. My voice is hoarse. My throat hurts.
You brush away a flyaway strand of hair. Shush me.
I taste the dream, still.
I push you away. Your touch holds no comfort, your voice no respite from the images haunting my brain. “Get away.”
“It’s me, it’s Caleb.”
“I know.” I struggle for a single deep breath. “Don’t—don’t touch me.”
I sit up, curl the blanket tighter around my shoulders, hunch in on myself, eyes clenched shut so hard I see stars and my eyes hurt. I do not want to share this with you, but I must speak it out into the world so it doesn’t die the death of dreams, lost somewhere between brain and tongue.
“I remember how wet it was,” I whisper. “I remember the darkness. I remember hurting. I remember being so cold. I remember being on the sidewalk and seeing this patch of light and wishing I could just make it to the light, because maybe it would be warmer there. And then you . . . and flames. I feel like—I feel like there was more in the dream, but I can’t remember it. I can’t see it now.”
“But you’re safe now. You’re okay.”
I shake my head. “No. I’m not safe. Not with you. You do not tell me all of the truth. There is no truth. And I’m not okay. I’m a splintered ghost of a person. And I don’t know how to put the pieces together. I don’t even have all the pieces.”
“Isabel—” you begin.
I chop out with my hand to silence you, and make contact with your leg. “No. Shut up. You are an incubus. You lie.”
A moment of silence. And then your voice, cold and distant as you stand up. “Dr. Frankel is here. There’s a clinic a few floors down. He’s setting up there.”
I stand up, let the blanket fall to the floor at my feet. “I’m ready. Let’s go.”
“Do you want anything to eat?” you ask.
“Do not suddenly begin pretending as if you care, Caleb.” I breeze past you.
You seize me in a vise grip. Spun around. Fingers pinch my jaw, as if to pry the mandibles apart. “You will never comprehend how deeply I care.” You release me.
“No, I will not.” I stare up at you. Your eyes are blazing, hot, open, wild, glinting with fury and agony. “Nor do I wish to.” This is a lie.
You stare down at me, jaw muscles clenching and pulsing, eyes darting, seeking something in my gaze. Not finding it, I do not think. “I do not know how—I don’t know how to make you understand. I am not that man.”
“You have not tried.”
“I have. For so long, for—”
“How long, Caleb? How long?” My understanding of my own life’s time frame doesn’t make sense.
The years, the dates, how long I was in a coma, how many years of memory I have, how reliable the memories I do have are . . . all of this is in doubt. Nothing I know, nothing I think I know, is necessarily true.
“How old am I?” I ask.
“They weren’t sure exactly how old you were when the accident happened,” you say.
“And what year did the accident happen in?”
“In 2009,” you say, immediately.
“And I was in a coma for how long?”
“Six months.”
I push past you. “I think you are a liar.”
“Isabel—”
“Take me to Dr. Frankel.”
Your teeth click together, your head tilts back, your eyes narrow. “Very well, Ms. de la Vega. As you wish.”
We wait for the elevator in tense silence. As the doors open, I turn to you. “Tell me the truth, Caleb.”
“About what?”
“About me. About what happened. About everything.”
You twist the key. “Dr. Frankel is waiting.”
Not another word is spoken. We transfer elevators one floor down, and go from there to the thirty-second floor. Bare hallways, featureless, identical doors differentiated by alphanumeric designations. A sparse white room, a bed with white paper laid over hard, plasticky leather. Dr. Frankel is a short, pudgy man at the unforgiving end of middle age, a man to whom time and gravity have not been kind. Jowls hang and sway, a pendulous belly covers a belt buckle, khaki pants are tight around thighs and loose around calves. Brown eyes reflect a quick mind, with hands that are small and quick and nimble and gentle and sure.
“Ah. The patient. Very good.” A pat of a hand invites me to sit on the paper, which crinkles and shifts under my weight. “Yes, yes. I remember you. A rather remarkable work I did, if I say so myself. Not a trace of your old injuries remains. Very good, very good. This will be quick and easy. A local anesthetic, a quick incision, and it’ll be done. No pain, no mess.”