Chapter Forty

Taylor Hanson

I don't really remember much about waking up that day, er, uh, night. I remember my looking around the room and seeing all the white and wondering if I was dead and then seeing Parker sitting in a chair beside the bed I realized I was laying in, his eyes transfixed on something across the room, a look of consternation on his face. Apparently he was too lost in thought to have seen me wake up.

I cleared my throat and shifted a little uncomfortably, feeling the pressure on my chest for the first time, wondering absurdly if they had put a rock onto my chest to keep me from rolling out of the bed or something (not that I could have, seeing the railing). My movements called Parker's attention to me.

"You're awake," he said, the corners of his mouth stretching it into a grin. I had the same odd sensation I had had the first couple of times I had seen him. The sensation of looking in a mirror that wasn't really there. The way it boggled my mind to suddenly discover that there was two of me.

"Where am I?" I croaked, trying to clear my throat again. I was so thirsty.

"The hospital," he said gently.

I felt my heart leap into my throat and my eyes grow wide.

"Don't worry," he said quickly, "they said that you were going to be all right."

"What happened?" I asked.

"I was hoping you could tell me," he said, a look of disappointment passing over his face.

I let my eyes wander from his as I searched my memory for what had happened to get me into the hospital. I shuddered when it finally came to me. No, I couldn't tell him.

"What's wrong?" he asked quickly, noticing me shudder.

"It's, uh, cold," I lied, not wanting to tell him anything. I didn't know how he'd react if I said something. Disbelief? Ashamed of me?

"Yeah, it kind of is cold in here," he agreed, not because it was true. "I should probably go get a doctor or something."

"Not yet," I said.

"Okay," he said, sitting back down in his chair. "Uh, your family is coming up. They're taking the really late flight. Gina and I were going to leave pretty soon to go pick them up."

I nodded as best as I could in my position.

"Parker?"

"Yeah?"

I swallowed. "Why is there a rock on my chest?"

At first, he looked at me quizzically and then he looked to my chest. He smiled a little when he saw what I meant.

"That's not a rock," he said. "That's your arm. They had to bandage it up and everything."

"Oh," I said. "Where's Gina?"

"She's out in the waiting room with Lyle. The doctor said that you could only have one visitor at a time," he told me.

Lyle. Again, I felt that sense of nausea wash over me. So they really didn't know what had happened to me. I debated over wheter or to be happy about that or be angry about it. I wasn't sure if I wanted anybody to know what had happened to me. But it did make me wonder what they thought had happened. I chose not to ask about it yet. I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

"What were you thinking about before?" I asked carefully.

"Oh, nothing," he said, looking down at his hands so I wouldn't be able to see in his eyes that he was lying. I was strangely comforted to know that I wasn't the only one keeping secrets.

I opened my mouth to ask another question, but quickly closed it when a doctor entered the room, his eyes glued to a clipboard he was carrying. When he lokoed up after a minute, he smiled.

"So you're awake," he said.

"Yeah," I said, coughing a little bit. Why was my throat so dry? Had it been that long since I had had something to drink? It suddenly struck me to ask the question how long I had been unconscious, but I didn't chance to ask because the doctor kept talking.

"Good," he said, going over to the various machines around the bed that I was hooked up to. "You gave us quite a scare, Mr. Hanson."

Mr. Hanson. No too many people had called me that before. It seemed so inappropriate all of a sudden.

"Oh?" I said, not really interested.

"Yup," he said. "How does your arm feel?"

"I don't know," I said truthfully. He smiled at me like I was an infant who couldn't be expected to know a sufficient amount of adjectives to really say how their arm felt. I wasn't too sure if he would have wanted to hear some of the adjectives I could have used had I actually known.

"Well, llok, I'm going to give you some pain killers," he said. "And something to help you go back to sleep. You need your rest. I think it's best if your brother leaves for a little while."

It was obviously directed more to Parker than it was to me.

"Okay," Parker said, getting up. "We have to go and pick up your family anyway. I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"Yeah," I said absently. Apparently I didn't really need any pain killers to put me to sleep. My eyelids were already sliding down. Parker smiled when he saw this and waved good-bye before finally leaving. I don't remember anything after that.

Do you love me? Hate me?
Index
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty-One