Chapter 3

            I'm crying. And not the nice kind of crying, either. The kind of crying you don't want other people to see, because it makes you look so ugly. For a woman, it's one of the worst things for someone to see her crying like that. My stomach is so tight that it's starting to hurt. I wonder if the nurse knows I want to be left alone, because he hasn't come back for a while.

            There are a lot of things worth crying over right now, but only one of them is really hurting me enough to make me weep like this. You would think that suddenly being in a new body, with a different gender, 40 years since you were last conscious would be pretty disturbing, but none of that compares to the last thing the nurse said before he walked out.

            "There is no city named Charlottesville in Georgia."

            That's what he said. That everything, my whole life that I remember had been nothing more than a figment of a dream. All of my loved ones: my parents, my husband, my children, all of my friends for years and years... they're not just gone, they never even were to begin with. Even if there were once real people like that in the world, I never knew them. The life I had lived as Lydia Carter is not simply over and done, having died a peaceful death on that bench in the park; it's a ghost of a life without any real place in history.

            The mere thought of this makes it impossible to stop the flow of tears down my face, and my entire body is shaking as I lie in this hospital bed, my only company being a bunch of strange looking machines making strange noises. Even after I start to calm down, the images of my family's faces pass through my mind, and it starts over again...

...

            How long has it been? It feels like I've been alone for quite some time, now. The sun is high in the sky, and it feels like my body is simply too tired to keep crying. I stand up and go to the sink to clean up my face, trying not to look in the mirror. I grab a towel and walk over to the window as I dry my eyes.

            My room is rather high off the ground, and even then the hospital is on the side of a hill. There are few other buildings close by, but you can see a rather large city in the distance. I'd only ever been to the big cities a few times, so it's quite a sight to see, especially from this viewpoint. What did the nurse say the name was?

            I hear the sound of the door, and I turn to see that the nurse has returned with a small cart.

            "How are you feeling? It's good to see that you're able to be up and about, but just remember to be careful. Your muscles may not be used to moving around so much, since you've been lying down for so long."

            As he says so, I realize my legs feel pretty tired, so I nod and go back over to the bed.

            "If you don't mind," he continues, "I'd like to do a quick check-up, just to see how your body is doing now that you're awake. Will that be fine?"

            I nod again. For some reason, I just don't feel like I can say much right now, especially with this new voice I have. Every word I spoke during the nurse's interview sent a chill down my spine. It's quite bothersome when you expect to hear your own voice and something entirely different comes out of your mouth.

            The nurse does a few simple tests, and he finishes up in a few minutes. He gets up and walks back to the cart, and he pulls something out which I wasn't quite expecting.

            "I'm not sure if this will be helpful for you at all, but... well, since you said you were fond of needlework, I had someone go out and pick this up for you.  It's entirely up to you if you would like me to leave it here or not, but I thought it might be a little therapeutic for you."

            In his hands, he's holding a wooden hoop and some cloth, and I also see some various types of thread on the cart. While I hadn't spoken very much up to this point because of my new voice, I truly feel at a loss for words now. I'm so moved, it makes me tear up a little again, though this time not from sadness.

            Finally, I manage to say, "My... you have no idea what this means to me. I don't know how I might be able to thank you for this."

            He smiles, as if relieved. "I can imagine how hard it must be for you right now, so please don't worry about it. I want to help you as much as I can, even though this is about all I can do."

            For the first time since I woke, I manage to smile.

...

            I spend much of the rest of the day embroidering. It's difficult with these new hands, far unlike the delicate fingers I'm used to using, but I manage to adapt to them after a short while. Putting aside the shocks I've had so far today, I suddenly feel myself returning finally. It may be a different body in a different place and time, but this atmosphere is so much like the pleasant days I remember from Georgia.

            The needle and cloth manage to keep me calm enough that I'm actually able to start wondering about what I'm going to do from now on. Where will I go? What will I do? Will I ever remember anything about the life of this young boy whose body I now have? What will happen if I do remember? Maybe I will be able to start a new life like this, though it will take some time to get used to all these new changes.

            The nurse comes in periodically to check on me, and before I know it, the sun is beginning to set. I eat a very light meal, and soon I'm starting to feel sleepy as the day ends. I have no idea what tomorrow might bring, but I feel a tiny flame of hope building inside me. I say my evening prayer and tuck myself into bed, closing my eyes as I feel sleep coming over me...

...

...

...

            The first thing I notice is my breathing. Breathing means I must be alive, right? I take a breath, and the air smells very clean. What happened exactly? But before that, where am I? I can feel cotton against my skin, so I think I'm lying in a bed rather than on the ground, which is not exactly what I was expecting.

            I open my eyes and try to sit up, but I feel stiff. I groan as I try to move, my body resisting my will to wake up. As I look around, I feel certain that I'm in a hospital. I look to my left to see all sorts of medical equipment, which further supports my conclusion. I lift the sheets and inspect my body. Surprisingly, I'm not in bad shape, unlike what I was anticipating. In fact, it looks like my body is just fine except for a small bandage on my head.

            I'm almost certain I've been out for a while. The easiest way to figure things out is probably to just have someone explain it to me. I look around until I find a red button labeled 'NURSE' and I press it. In less than a minute, a man comes to the door and walks in.

            "Ah, you're awake. How are you feeling?"

            "I feel fine, I guess. What's going on? I feel kinda out of it."

            The nurse holds up his clipboard and writes something. "You're doing just fine, you've just been asleep for a while. You're in Sunnyside Medical Center, just outside of Sacramento, California."

            I sigh in relief. "That's good to hear. I'm a little worried about the people I was with, though, do you know what happened to them?"

            "I'm sorry," the nurse replies, shaking his head, "but I'm not sure about that. If it's alright with you, I'd like to do some checks just to see how you're doing. After that, I'll try to answer your questions if I am able."

            "Sure, I suppose that's fine."

            After a few minutes of examining me, the nurse finishes up. "Alright, I just have a few more questions I'd like to ask you."

            "Go right ahead."

            The nurse looks down at his clipboard. "Well, you don't seem to be all that shocked by your current condition, so I take it that everything seems to appear normal about yourself, is that correct?"

            "Yes, actually I'm surprised I'm in as good of shape as I am, all things considered."

            The nurse writes as he continues, "So does the name Lydia Carter mean anything to you?"

            That's certainly not a question I was ready for. "...Yeah, actually, that's kind of a nostalgic name. I feel like I haven't heard that name in forever. She was... actually, how did I know her? Actually, what does that have to do with me being here in the first place?"

            "Sorry, it was just a question I needed to ask. We'll get to that more in a moment," he replies as he starts writing even faster. I was hoping this would help me understand, but now I'm even more confused. Before I can ask, however, he continues, "Are you aware of how you ended up here?"

            "Honestly, I couldn't really tell you. I'm surprised I'm even alive."

            The nurse looks at me curiously, and says, "I'm not sure if I understand what you mean. You were only treated for a minor head injury after you were brought here."

            I honestly don't know what to say to that. I was sure it was a lot worse than that. Is my memory of it that bad? Oh, or perhaps he means once I got here to this hospital, and I was treated for everything else before. He did say that I've been asleep for a while. I wonder how long 'a while' is, though...

            I break the silence by asking him, "Well, I guess the whole process is kind of complicated, right? Do you at least know when I was brought stateside?"

            The nurse looks puzzled. "I'm not sure I understand, you were brought here by ambulance over a month ago after you were involved in an accident."

            Wait. Hang on. Stop. What does he mean by that? That's definitely not right.

            "I'm sorry, but are you sure you don't have me mixed up with someone else? How could I have been brought here by an ambulance? I've been in Iraq for the last 6 months..."

Reviews

[Kuro]

The protagonist's thoughts at having this new body are quite realistic, as is the portrayal of her confusion. After the twist in the last chapter it seems as if the story is now stabilizing to tell this new reality in detail. As a reader I can now expect that the story continues for a while in this new reality/setting; however I would not be caught off-guard if the setting were to change again with a new start at a later point in the story. I am enjoying the read and definitely appreciating the excellent usage of the English language.