Post by Rusty McConaughey on Jan 19, 2013 22:19:07 GMT -5
"Rusty?" There was a voice. "Rusty, are you awake?" And there it was again. My eyelids were heavy, though, and I couldn't open them to see where the voice was. It was definitely female, I was sure of that. And I was also sure that I had no idea who it was.. the voice was so unfamiliar. Then it touched me. Cold hands against my left arm. Made me twitch. She laughed. "Rusty, can you open your eyes?" it tried again, quieter this time. Sweeter, gentler. I felt like I could at least try to look at her. She seemed to care enough about me. I wasn't sure why, but she definitely knew me some how.
It took a moment, but I got my eyes open. I must've looked so stoned, the way my eyes just barely fluttered open. And I couldn't see straight, everything was blurry, so I probably wasn't even looking at her. But I could see her in shapes. She was blonde, and her head was tilted slightly to the side as she looked down at me. I was laying down. How had I not realized that until now?
"Rusty, my name is Jenna," Jenna. Jenna.. I didn't know a Jenna. "I'm your nurse." Nurse? Then it hit me. That blur of lights. The piercing pain. My split open shin and Carol falling onto me. But.. what had happened after? "Where's Carol?" My voice sounded so weird. I didn't sound like me. At all. It was unusually low and scratchy.. even more so than what it usually sounded like. But Jenna didn't answer me. "Where the fuck is Carol. Is she okay? What's going on.." I started rambling. Spit balling questions that I knew she probably wouldn't answer. My vision was coming back slowly, the blurred spots were becoming clear and I was seeing more than shapes now. I could see Jenna's face, I could see the bed I was laying in and I could see the my arms were strapped down. Strapped down. Like, with big leather braces and silvery buckles. Like you see in all those asylum horror movies. For some reason, I couldn't lift or turn my head to get a better look at where I was, but I knew wherever it was, something was wrong. "Where am I?" was the first question Jenna answered.
"You're at the St. Francis Medical Center, Rusty," she said. Her tone had changed. She didn't seem nearly as sweet anymore. Her voice was cold, almost as cold as her hands against my arm had been. And she wasn't looking at me. Her gaze had turned to the straps over my wrists, and her fingers were working at the undoing the buckle. I was thankful for that, but still confused. Horribly confused. Confused about Carol, about why I was in the hospital, about what had happened and most recently about why I couldn't feel my body. I could feel things touching me.. I could feel the straps, Jenna's hands, a strange cold pinching in my right arm and there was something soft on my chest. But I couldn't physically feel any part of me. "Jenna please.. what's going on?" I tried again. She sighed heavily and finished with the straps on my wrists. Once done, she gave me a sad look then turned to walk away. I didn't try to call her back. And getting up to go after her was out of the question.
It was about ten minutes before anyone else came into the room. I hadn't thought about trying to get up because my brain told me that if I was numb, I'd just fall over. Plus I still couldn't move my head. But my vision had come back completely. Which honestly, I almost wish it hadn't. Because I wouldn't have had to see that I really was in the hospital, that I really was laying on a hospital bed, that something really was wrong. The first person to come back in those ten minutes was a doctor. His obnoxiously white overcoat told me so.
"How yeh feeling, Russ?" was the first thing he said. He sounded just like Jenna: overly happy, cheery, glad to see me. But if he was anything like she had been, it was a false gladness. He's fall cold like she had. So I wasn't going to try and warm up to him.
"I'm fine," I muttered. It was an accidental mutter, though, as my mouth was suddenly numb.
"Not feeling any pain?" he asked, taking a seat beside my bed and scooting the stool towards me. I could feel him as he pressed a finger against my shoulder, then against my forearm, then across my chest in various places.
"No.." I answered him slowly. It was true.. there was no pain.
"That's good, that's good," he was nodding and there was suddenly a clipboard in his hands. It was good he was pretty tall, because I could just barely see what he was doing without trying to move my head.
"What's happening?" I asked. It sounded kinda pathetic, the way I almost whimpered. But I was still so confused. That's when he sighed.
"Rusty, you've been in a horrible car accident."
There it was. The lights, the pain, Carol.. it was making sense now.
"Four days ago, the night you were out with the young lady Carol Maree driving home, a drunk driver jumped the median and hit your Jeep, causing it to flip over and off the side of the road. Having asked Carol, we know that you hit your head against the dashboard and broke your neck which caused you to black out and go into a minor coma."
Broken neck? I could feel it now. The tightness, the grip around my neck.
"Lucky for you, you're not at all paralyzed. Or at least, permanently paralyzed. You might have trouble with your legs for a couple days, but there's only slight nerve damage. Nothing fatal," he smiled after saying that.
I couldn't believe any of it. None of it. Not even the tight, squeezing brace around my neck could make me believe that I'd been in a car accident. Sure I saw the lights, I saw Carol falling towards me. But we'd made it, hadn't we? I had no memory of being hit, of rolling, of any of that. So it couldn't be true. Could it?
"In about three days, you'll be able to go home, Rusty. We've just got to make sure you can stay awake. And by tomorrow, we can have you on your feet walking again. Or, working on walking again. We've got these great crutches for you to try out and get used to. You'll need those for a couple months.." his words were fading. He kept talking, but I wasn't listening. Crutches? A broken neck?
That was just fucking great.
