Hospital Beds and Memories

“Hey, Cam, I’m going to bring Jack to the airport so he doesn’t have to worry about his car!” I shouted through the house. Cameron was probably still sleeping, even though it was already 11 am. But now I could at least say I told him that I would be gone, so technically he could get mad at me for ‘disappearing’.

I took the car keys from the drawer Cam always kept them in. This was again a thing he technically couldn’t get mad at me for. I just asked him before he fell asleep, so he basically didn’t know what he said yes to, but I made sure to record it so he couldn’t deny it. It was a trick I had learned over the year of living with him; ask things when he’s sleepy and record it so you have proof later on.

I checked myself in the mirror. Today was special and I had to look presentable, but also like myself. So I just put on a striped sweater, black skinny jeans, red shoes, and a leather jacket. It was still winter and cold outside, but I was going to be inside most of the time. I had all the stuff I needed in an army green bag. It was going to be fine, hopefully my appearance wouldn’t make a difference.

I got into the car that was parked on the road in front of the building and made my way to Jack’s house. When I got there I saw he was putting all of his suitcases outside, so I rolled down my window instead of getting out of my car.

“Yo, asshole!” I shouted.

Jack looked up at me and smiled. “Hey, bitch!”

“Cocksucker!”

“Ass-kisser!”

“Bugger!”

“Going all British on me, are you, clitface?” He opened the door to my car so I could get out.

I laughed and decided to help him put all the suitcases in my-- in Cam’s car. Jack and I had started this thing where we would just call each other insulting names, some better than others. Over time we started to get more creative, but those names only came out when all the common ones were used. Weird thing was that Jack never called me a slut or a whore, but I would call him those nonstop. But to be honest, he did sleep with a lot of girls. I was just glad to not be one of them.

The suitcases barely fit in, but we managed to do it by putting some bags on the backseat. Jack got in the passenger seat and I looked at him with the most serious face I could make. I looked back forwards and started the car without saying a word. Jack looked so confused as I rolled down the window. I was never serious so I would have been confused as well.

“Umm… Isle, did I do something wr--” Jack started, but I interrupted him.

“Making my way downtown, walking fast, faces pass, and I’m homebound!” I screamed out of the window. Some passersby look at me weirdly, but I didn’t give a fuck. It was fun to confuse Jack like this. We got to a busier part of the road and I continued, “Staring blankly ahead, just making a way, through the crowd.” Jack joined me for the chorus while we were standing at a stoplight. Seeing people gave us strange looks would be an understatement. When we finished the song we burst out in giggles.

“You really had me scared there, Isle. I really thought I did something wrong.” Jack pouted.

“I’m sorry Jacky.” I patted his head. “It was funny seeing your face though.”

“Gosh, I’m going to miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too, but you’re going to be traveling around the country so don’t be upset. I’ll never have that chance, don’t take it for granted.” I briefly looked at Jack. He gave me a sympathetic smile and put his hand on my hand that was on the gearshift.

“I won’t, I don’t. I promise to bring you with me once.”

“When I get Cam sorted out I’ll be able to come. Right now if I miss a week of work I won’t have enough money to pay the rent, the bills, and buy groceries.”

“I can always help you out with that.” Jack offered.

“Jack, if I wanted help, I would have asked my parents.”

I turned onto the exit for the airport and drove the short distance to it in silence. There was nothing to talk about. It was really weird talking to Jack about serious things like this. Not like serious-get-to-know-each-other talk, but serious-I-might-have-money-problems talk. I stopped at the drop-off part of the airport. There were many people saying goodbye to each other: families, friends, couples…

“Are you sure you can’t come in with me? I still need to prove you’re real,” Jack asked.

“I’m sorry, Jack. My job interview’s in 20 minutes, I don’t want to be late,” I said with a sigh.

“Ok then.” Jack kissed my forehead. “Bye, bitch.”

“Bye, asshole,” I whispered back.

I watched as Jack disappeared into the crowd. For some reason, I was really upset to see him leave. It was only going to be for a month, but this felt worse than saying goodbye to my dad as a child. Jack and I had grown so close over the last months that it felt weird saying goodbye to him. I really loved him, he was my best friend, and I wasn’t going to see him in a month. But there were going to be times that he would be gone for a lot longer, so I guess this was a test to see if our friendship would last through these conditions.

----

I got out of my car and looked at the studio building. It was basically an old warehouse that had been renovated to hold offices and photography studios. So, it was basically my dream place to work at. The magazine that had asked me to come in for the job interview had seen my work in the last magazine I had taken photos for, you know the coffee stained photos that were totally Jack’s fault. That job was unfortunately a one-time thing, but this fashion magazine had offered me a permanent job. They were still small, but were also growing a fanbase pretty quickly. The target audience was girls around my age give or take a couple of years. So this was literally the perfect job for me.

I entered the building and walked up to the reception. A girl that wasn’t that much younger than me was sitting there and asked how she could help me. I told her I was here for the job interview, to which I was asked to wait here for somebody to come pick me up. I sat in one of the round red chairs that fit nicely with the white and red decoration. Before I knew it an older woman came up to me and introduced herself.

“My name is Angelica,” she shook my hand, “and I’m here to show you around a bit and get to know you before you get to work and show us what you can do.”

I smiled at her, “I’m Ireland. It’s a real pleasure to be here.”

“Oh no, it’s my pleasure. I really liked your work, it’s so different and original. That’s why I asked you to come here.”

She showed me around the offices and some of the studios. Apparently, this was just for the photography, there was another building further in town for the writers and editors. This magazine was a lot bigger than I expected. Everything looked so friendly and creative. There were bean bag chairs and people wearing sweatpants. All the other magazines I went to were always so stuck up and formal. This place was a lot more like me. Some of the studios were large, they often had props such as cars and other large objects, but I was going to show off my skills in one of the smallest rooms. It had a white backdrop and some studio light emitting white light. You might think it wasn’t much, but this was fine enough for me.

“So, Ireland, these are the three models you’re going to be photographing,” Angelica introduced. “This is Anna, Lillie, and Abagail.”

I said hi to them, but all I could think about was how pretty they were. They were tall, skinny, and had a pretty face. I was tall, average weight, and didn’t really have the prettiest face at all. Jack would definitely fuck these girls. But I didn’t care, I was comfortable with the way I looked, except for my gigantic scar, but I could always cover that up with a t-shirt.

I set up all my gear: taking out my camera and putting it on the right settings, setting up my tripod in case I needed it, and adjusted the lighting to a way I liked. Normally there weren’t any people inspecting me, so this time I felt a bit pressured and stressed. But out of the corner of my eye I saw a speaker to which I could connect my phone. Luckily this shoot had a punk-rock theme, so it was basically my territory. This place was getting better and better.

I walked up to the speaker and connected my phone with bluetooth. “So I hope you guys like Greenday, because that the only band we can listen to in this situation. You guys literally look like you are ready to go to one of their concerts.”

“Oh my god, yes. I love Greenday!” Abagail exclaimed while the other two looked a bit unfazed.

“Ok, so. I want you to forget about me being here and focus on the music. Listen to the guitars, feel the drumbeat, and portray the bass line.”

The girls started dancing around and Abagail sang along with the lyrics. For as pretty as she was, she didn’t have the best voice, but it also wasn’t the worst. Let’s just say she shouldn’t try to make a career out of it. But who was I to judge, I couldn’t sing for shit either.

They all looked so different. Lillie had brown hair, green eyes and a delicate face, Anna was blonde with brown eyes and had a bigger chest, while Abagail had dyed her hair purple and had light brown eyes that fit perfect with the lilac. Everything contrasted each other, yet fit together so nicely.

“Ok, take 5 guys!” Angelica announced. “Ireland and Abagail, can you come over here for a second?”

We both walked up to her. Abagail seemed just as terrified as I was. What if I wasn’t good enough? What if I messed up? Was the music a good idea? Was I being too shy again? I know I didn't talk much, but once I got more comfortable around people I wouldn't be able to stop saying stuff.

“So, you are both here to try out and show us what you got,” Angelica sai., “Abagail, I’ll start with you. You probably know we can only hire one of you. It’s either you, Anna, or Lillie. You really seem to be into it and having a lot of fun, which is what we are all about. The other two just don’t seem to do that. So, I would like to tell you that we would like to hire you.” A big smile spread across Abagail's face. I was really happy for her, I didn’t know they were also trying out, just like me. Angelica then turned to me, “Ireland, I really like the way you handle it all. From the photographs I have seen, I know you have a lot of talent. Unfortunately, we won’t be able to publish the photos until a couple of months. These photos will be used in one of the spring issues. So I can’t tell you if you’ve got the job or not until we get some reactions from the photos. However, I will make sure to contact you as soon as I know something.” At least it was something, I could be having a full-time job as a photographer in a couple of months, and if I wasn’t, I would have at least had a good time here. “So, I’m going to send the other girls home, You guys can go get some lunch, and then come back here in about an hour and you will be able to have a one on one photoshoot session.”

Abagail and I had decided to go grab some lunch together so we could get to know each other. Something about her really made me like her. It was something like I had with Jack, yet still a bit different. She was actually a girl I could consider being friends with. Girls my age were normally bitches and only wanted to hurt each other and be better than one another. But Abagail wasn’t like that, she was like me. We discussed our problems with each other. She used to have anorexia, but it seemed so easy for her to talk about. Normally things like this were personal and you wouldn’t want people you had only known for a couple of hours to know stuff like that. But her telling me her story encouraged me to tell her about my memory problems and about the headaches I had been getting. I even trusted her enough to tell her I was scared.

I really was scared. Things had been going good for so long. Jack had been helping me memorize some random moments of my life. But then the headaches happened. I seemed to be forgetting stuff again. No, not stuff from my past, but short term memory. I didn’t know if it was normal forgetting things, or if it was my brain playing up again. I was more than terrified that my progress was slowing down, or even worse, reversing. Jack was gone and couldn’t help me anymore. All I had was Cameron and myself. I could only hope nothing serious would happen.