Lasting Dreams.

It’s when she tells me that I’ve been out for three and a half months that I realize something is wrong. I mean, as soon as I hear that I have been literally unconscious for such a long period of time, my mind starts going off in all different directions, trying to figure out what it was that set off this long-staying hospital visit. I can’t remember ever being ill, so unless I managed to hit my head and have a heart attack while I was out cold, that situation was highly unlikely to have occurred.

Adrienne leans way back in the chair beside the hospital bed I’m laying in, and I just watch her contently because even though I’m in a hospital, it’s like I’m in this completely different universe where she doesn’t hate me at all; she isn’t yelling or screaming at me, and she isn’t insulting me (although I’m sure that I would deserve all the shit she could give me about how terrible of a person I am for leaving her). Anyway, it’s nice just watching her be all quiet and pretty, even if she looks tired and worn out and almost like she’s recovering from being lonely. Watching her behaving this way makes me want to get out of bed and kiss her right on the lips and make her remember that I’m not all that horrible, but my legs are still numb and it’s hard to move them so I don’t.

I sigh and turn my eyes to face the ceiling. I miss my house, and I feel like even though I haven’t been completely there for the past couple months, I need to get back. It’s all very nostalgic thinking about that goddamn cat. I miss taking care of it because that was pretty much the only thing I was responsible for back then.

“I still don’t know what I’m in here for,” I say, examining the extreme plainness of the white hospital wall above my bed. It doesn’t even have a texture or anything, it’s just strictly white and smooth. Clean and sterile like that machine that keeps on beeping on the other side of the bed. It’s still pissing me off, too.

I can feel Adrienne looking over at me and my body forces me to look back over at her again, too. Her eyes are really brown and warm-- like I actually need any more heat in addition to how stagnant the air in the hospital room is and what feels like five different layers of blankets I’ve got piled on top of me just in case I get cold.

There are still tears that are caught in the very corners of her eyes and on her bottom lashes, but that cloudiness that used to be there is completely gone. She wipes them with the back of her wrists, almost as if to tell me that she saw me observing what was still left of her crying.

“I’m really sorry about that,” she murmurs, her voice almost as hoarse as mine. “I just… I’ve been here everyday waiting to see if you’ll wake up. And after the doctors had just told me that you wouldn’t be waking up anytime soon…” She chuckles, trying to keep things light and airy like I remember she always used to. “It was just surprising, I guess. You all of the sudden said something, and it scared me a little.”

She doesn’t answer my question, what it was exactly that I’d been in the hospital for, nor does she contact a doctor to inform them of my recent recovery. This doesn’t really matter all that much to me, though, because sooner or later I’ll either remember everything that took place or they’ll come in and let me know what it was I’d done that had put me in a coma for three and a half months.

“So,” I start, knowing that I’d have to ask sooner or later, “what have you been doing for the past four years?”

Adrienne shrugs, pinching the bridge of her nose together before wiping the corners of her eyes with the thumb and forefinger of her left hand. Her head tilts to the side just a little before answering my question.

“Well,” she begins, albeit a bit hesitant, “I’ve been working, just like you.”

The funny thing, though, is that I don’t really think she meant it as a snarky sort of comment; I think she was just answering what I’d asked, and I guess that even if she did sort of mean to jab at me a little bit, at least she’s being honest and what she says doesn’t sound really angry like it used to. That’s why I’m okay with it. Also, another thing about Adrienne is that she doesn’t really get mad at me for things if they happened a really long time ago.

I think I just figured that out, though, and if it only just seems like she doesn’t hate me at the moment, don’t quote me on that one. Actually, I probably am wrong, because to be fair, I’d still be pretty fucking pissed if somebody did that to me. But it’s alright for now because she’s not acting like how she probably feels. That makes it a little easier on me, I think.

“Other than that,” she says, continuing, “I guess not much else. I’ve got back up on my feet, though.”

“Good,” I say. But I’m all of the sudden a little sad. Maybe I wished that she wouldn’t have gotten back up on her feet, and that I could have picked her up again. Too late for that, I suppose.

“Oh, and I got a cat,” she says.

I laughed at that. “So did I,” I admit, “even though I remember I told you I’d never get one.”

She smiles. “What did you name it?”

For some reason, I think that by her asking me that, I feel like either a complete idiot or sort of ashamed of myself. It’s either one or the other, or maybe it’s both at the same time.

“I didn’t really know what to call it when I got it,” I tell her, “so I just call it ‘Cat.’”

A laugh bubbles up out of her throat, and my heart swells up. I haven’t heard her laughter in a long time. Longing, my mind recalls, that’s what you’re feeling. I feel this immense longing inside of me to hold her and make sure that she is actually here and that this isn’t some fucked-up dream I’m having where I’m in a coma and Adrienne is actually talking to me again.

“What did you name yours?” I ask.

She immediately stops laughing and looks down at her hands. She still smiles, though. “I didn’t really know what to call mine, either,” she tells me, “so his name is Sam.”

I nod, propping myself up on my elbows so that I’m not laying down so flatly. I also do it because I want to look at Adrienne some more, even if I feel like an annoying little kid for doing it. Maybe this kind of behavior would be acceptable coming from a middle schooler, but obviously not a guy approaching thirty.

Wonder if she’s got a boyfriend, I think stupidly. Probably.

There’s a sudden knock on the hospital room door, and Adrienne probably jumps a foot in the air. I can hear a few of the nurses talking amongst themselves just outside, and there’s just a moment before they come inside that Adrienne and I exchange looks. I think we both know what the reaction will be for whoever enters the room, just because I’ve been out for such a long time, but we still don’t say a word. We just wait.

“Hello Adrienne,” a woman says, wearing matching scrubs with a pink, flowery print on them. She knows Adrienne by name. I wonder how many times she’s come to see me. Just thinking about her being here for me while thinking that I’m probably going to die whether she visits me or not makes my chest tighten. It’s a good feeling.

“I’ve been looking over Dallas’ records,” she says, staring down at a clipboard chart of what I’m assuming reads of my progress as a patient in whatever hospital I’m located at. “I want to discuss the options that we have--”

And this is the part where she looks up from her sheet that must have been pretty important in regards to my health, and she sees me staring at her without my glasses that are making her look just slightly blurry to me. And she jumps a little, probably feeling like she’s getting Punk’d or something like that. I’m not really sure, but she’s pretty flustered. She didn’t think that I’d be awake yet, I guess you could say.

“Mr. Green,” she says, a few hairs falling out of her ponytail because she’s all wide-eyed and flabbergasted. And I think it’s just hysterical. “I-I haven’t been alerted of your recent--”

“He’s back,” I hear Adrienne inform her in a sing-song voice from behind me. She sounds like she’s smiling.

And I just smile like the stupid idiot that I am.