It’s really really scary when you don’t know where you are and have no recollection of how you got there.
And even scarier when you wake up that way.

My heart beats like the drum in some rock song as my back presses into an unfamiliar bed. My eyes squint open, examining my surroundings. My vision’s cloudy; all I can see is a foggy blankness around me. The air smells sterile and metallic, overwhelming. There are voices that sound far away and faint beeps and clicks and clacks that I figure are coming from some sort of machine.

I feel like I haven’t moved in ages. My hands are sprawled across my chest, my arms curled up at my side, head tossed, hair messy. My body feels like I’ve got some sort of filmy second skin, which is probably dirt and grime built up and my black inky locks are greasy on my scalp, clumping up against the cushiony pillow below me. My bones are all locked up like someone’s holding me down, not letting me move, but I assume they’re simply stuck from lack of movement.

My eyelids un-stick from my face as I blink. My throat feels dry and scratchy, my tongue like the Sahara Desert, sticking to the roof of my mouth like glue. For a moment I feel like I can’t breathe. With a long sucking panicky breath I bring in all the oxygen my lungs can fit, and then let it all out in a gust of sour tasting wind.

“Gerard?”

I blink furiously, ridding myself of the blur over my eyes to get a good look at the person speaking. Squinting up at the figure, I mumble a short and muffled “Huh?”

I definitely don’t know who this woman is. She’s tall, thin, and very pretty. Her hair is a light toffee color that frames her face in a wispy fashion. Her nose perks up at the end and her eyes are a bright grey. She looks at me, her eyebrows knitting together with relief as she jumps up from the chair she had been sitting in to clutch the sides of the hospital bed I currently occupy. “Gerard! I was so worried! Thank goodness you’re okay!” And the woman envelopes me in a hug, pressing light fluttery kisses all over my face.

What in the blue hell is going on?

I stare at the crazy lady in confusion. She pulls away slowly, her look of relief crashing and burning, turning into a second confused look.

“Sweetie, do you feel okay?” She presses her hand to my forehead. “You look white as a ghost.”

“Who are you lady and why do you keep touching my face?” Suddenly I find my voice, letting out a spew of husky words that sound like I haven’t spoken in months. “And why do you keep calling me Gerard?”

The woman’s already worry-lined face falls even deeper into despair, but she laughs desperately. “Don’t be silly, Gee.”

“Who’s Gee?”

“You, sweetheart. Stop scaring me,” her eyes darken in worry as she finally comes to the conclusion that I really don’t know who she is. Or who this Gerard person is. Or what the hell is even going on.

“I’m not Gee. Or Gerald-”

“Gerard.”

“Gerard, Gerald, whatever. That’s not my name, I’m...” I think for a second, wondering how in the world I forgot my own name. But the confusion lasts longer than a second. I try to dig through my memories, skimming through everything, but I find nothing.

She stares at me with teary eyes, her expression worn and broken.

“I... I don’t remember.”

o-o-o-o-o

The lady with the toffee hair is apparently my mother. She broke into blubbering hysterical tears when I told her I didn’t remember my name. A nurse noticed and quickly got the doctor.

The doctor told her this was expected.

Apparently I had gotten shot in the head. Well, shot myself in the head. (I had to get the doctor to tell me that part. My mom wouldn’t admit to it.)

Apparently only around 5% of the people who endure gunshots to the head survive.

Apparently I’d been asleep for 3 months now.

Apparently they didn’t even expect me to come out of my coma.

Apparently I’m very lucky.

But I don’t feel lucky.

All I feel is depressed. And scared. And confused. And terribly horrified that I may never get my memory back. Seventeen years (apparently) gone down the drain. Goddamn.

After consulting with the doctor, my ‘mother’ left me, claiming she was calling my father (who knew I had one of those too?). I’m now currently left alone in the hospital bed, staring at the blank ceiling, wondering where all my memories have gone.

Being alone gives me a good opportunity to take a look around. The room is small, outfitted with two windows, a bathroom, and a small cabinet. Machinery and medical tools are strewn about, the light of the fluorescent bulb shining off their metal surfaces. The walls are a shocking white, the floor tiled and scuffed. Past the pale blue curtains the clouds in the sky clump together in great big mashes of puffy gray. Raindrops fleck the windows, dripping, and leaving water tracks behind them. The rain intrigues me. It’s simply droplets of water on a window, but it seems so beautiful compared to the rest of the room. I suddenly wish I were a raindrop, free and careless, endlessly traveling, constantly moving.

If I were a raindrop I wouldn’t have to feel so confused. None of this would be happening. I wouldn’t have had a head to get shot in, or a memory to have erased. I wouldn’t feel so alone.

“Well finally!”

Well apparently I’m not that alone. The world’s just full of surprises, ain’t it?

I turn my head in the direction of a cheery female voice. My eyes meet a girl skipping over to my bed. I hadn’t seen her walk in and I’m pretty sure the windows are locked. Unless she had been hiding somewhere, there is no possible way she could have gotten into my room.

“Hi Mr. Sleepyhead. Long time no see, huh?”

The girl looks... odd to say the least. On her slender body she wears a long black gown, ruffly on the bottom with a red underskirt and matching sash. Her feet are accompanied with a pair of silky black ballet flats that lace up her calves. Her skin is a pale ivory and her eyes are big and crystal blue, rimmed with coal black eyeliner. Her hair is long and curly, black as night (much like my own) and pushed back behind her ears. Her face is almost sunken, the dark bags under her eyes thick and ghostly. She looks... dead honestly. And much out of place.

“Geraaaard. Are you going to acknowledge me? Cause I’m gonna keep bugging you ‘till you stop ignoring me.”

My gaze flicks to meet her eyes and I smile sheepishly. “Oh uh... hi? Who are you again?”

The girl rolls her eyes, scooping up her skirt and giving me a curtsy. “Helena Way at your service.” She says, giving me a sweet smile. “I figured you’d remember me of all people, but that’s okay.”

“I know you from somewhere?”

“Of course silly! I’m you’re dead grandmother!”

What?

“Did you just say... dead grandmother?”

She grins, giggling and nodding her head. I stare at her, dumbfounded.

“But how-?”

“I’m a ghost, stupid.” She rolls her eyes again, perching herself on the bed beside me, swinging her long ivory legs back and forth.

“And how is that at all possible?”

“Who are you talking to, Gerard?” My mother says, catching the last bit of my sentence as she walks in. I see the worried look on her face just before it disappears, masked by a bubbly smile. I glance at Helena, who merely smirks, shrugging.

“Uh, no one. Just... myself.” I glare at my ghostly friend, wanting answers but unable to receive them. Obviously my mother couldn’t see her, and if I were to talk to Helena, I’d look completely insane.

If I wasn’t insane already for seeing my dead grandmother as a ghost in the first place.

My mother nods, brushing it aside. She smiles. “The doctor said he’d send a nurse to give you some pills. They’ll help you sleep-” Like I need too. I’ve been sleeping for three months. “- a little before your father gets here. He’ll be a while; the drive from here to his work is a long one.”

I nod. Helena stares. My mother smiles.

“You need anything else?”

Her smile’s getting at me. It’s plastered to her face and she won’t stop. She’s trying to hide something and I can’t tell what. Her lips show happiness, but her eyes are full of something different... sadness maybe? Worry? Anger? It’s impossible to tell and looking at her smile like that is eating away at me. I can’t help but think I caused that. I don’t remember her at all, but she’s still my mother and I feel overly guilty.

“No.” I shake my head waiting patiently for her to just leave already.

And then the nurse with the pills walks in. What the hell. I need peace not company.

“Dr. Leto sent me to give you these.” The chipper red head in navy blue scrubs says, smiling at me. Her smile is fake as well, but I can easily tell why. She’s at work as a nurse. People die every day in hospitals, children too. I feel sort of sorry for her, actually.

My mother doesn’t say thank you, she just nods, preoccupied by her cell phone. The nurse hands me a small paper cup full of water and two red and white pills. I nod, thanking her and lifting one pill to my mouth.

“GERARD! WAIT! NO!”

I jump right out of my skin, spilling half the water all over myself.

The nurse and my mom stare at me, the redhead with concern, my mother with mere confusion. Helena has jumped on my lap, gripping my wrist with her long ivory fingers. I notice that we have the same pale, piano player hands. Maybe she is my grandmother.

“Are you alright, Gerard?” My mother asks, her plastic smile gone for a moment.

“Uh... yes. Yes I am,” I say in a hard voice, staring straight at Helena who’s blabbering on about not taking the pills. “-can’t take those! You can’t! Those aren’t sleeping pills, those are bad. Bad bad bad Gerard!” She shrieks at me. I shrug her off, ripping my wrist from her grasp and tossing both pills in my mouth. Her jaw falls in disbelief as I swallow them with a gulp of water. “Oh man, Gerard. You’re so stupid sometimes. I don’t even know why I expect you to be smart-” but she’s already fading away, and I watch in amazement as her skin becomes transparent and her voice starts to sound like she’s far away. Soon she’s gone, her complaints nothing but an echo in my ears.

“Gerard.” I look up to see the nurse, her hands on my wrists, which I realize are shaking. She calmly pries the cup from my fingers as I stare up at her with wide eyes. She tosses the cup into the small plastic garbage can in the corner and places her hands on my chest, leaning me back into the pillows gently. Smoothing the hair out of my face, she smiles softly. A genuine, comforting smile. A sad smile, but a real one, and I smile back, happy that she isn’t secretly lying to me. She pulls the blankets up around me and pats my shoulder. “Go to sleep. It’s been a stressful couple of hours. We’ll wake you when your father gets here.”

“Mmmm, okay.” I mumble groggily as my eyelids begin to get heavy and my body relaxes into the bed. I watch tiredly as the nurse takes my unwilling mother out of the room and I’m left alone.

Helena was wrong, those were sleeping pills, I think as I drift off into a comforting dream about raindrops and genuine, carefree smiles.

Notes

Laaaaaaa Enjoy <3

-Roach