Chapter One: Long Forgotten

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The beat is slow and steady, unlike my heartbeat, which is fast and uneven. The people who are hovering over my head are distant and unclear, as is their speech.

"Ni…" Someone starts, "Nico…" I hear again.

The sounds that seem so far away abruptly come and shock my ears. I wake with a start; halfway up on my bed, or what seems to be my bed. The tubes sticking from my arms and nose hold me back from sitting straight up. Hands push me back down again, and voices become calm again.

"Wha…" I begin, looking at the lights from the monitors next to my bed. I see where the beeps are coming from; the monitor closest to my bed. The lines creates tall mountains and short hills.

"Nicholas Roth," I hear one voice say. This time it is crisp and clear, but my response is not.

"Huh…?" I manage to say.

"You've been in a seizure induced coma for 17 hours." It is the doctor. He continues, "I'm Dr. Khatri."

"I...have?" I ask without thinking. My head is still groggy from...whatever happened last night. Or was it the day before? I can't remember anything but the crazy dream I had. As strange as it seems, it all makes sense. The dream was about my childhood, though I was still an adult. I know that there was another man in my dream, Mr. Peterson. A villain, or just misunderstood? At the end of the dream, I wasn't sure. I am cut off from my thoughts by the doctor.

"Nicholas, are you feeling alright?"

"Other than the fact that I was out cold for 17 hours?" I ask.

"Well," Dr. Khatri starts, but I interrupt.

"Now that I think about it, my head hurts...a lot."

"Nic-"

"And my back hurts from laying down so long."

The doctor can't even start his next sentence before I butt in again.

"Could I get water?"

"Nicholas!" Dr. Khatri says a little too forcefully. "Never mind the question." Then he turns his focus on one of the other nurses. "Get him some water." The nurse reluctantly goes out of the room to get it. The doctor's focus is back on me. "You seem to be stabilized, but you should stay until morning while you..uh," He glanced at me, probably noticing how high I looked, "While you can properly think cognitively again." Which I think is a polite way of saying "While you can actually act like a sober person again."

I sigh, and say, "Alright." Things are not really alright; I still have no idea how I got into a coma in the first place, or how I got into the hospital. My eyes search the room for answers; answers that could be hiding within the pale beige walls. As I stare absentmindedly at the water bag hanging above me, the nurse sets down the glass on the table next to me. She isn't the same nurse from before; I knew because the nurse that came out to get the water did not have light brown curly hair with bright light green eyes. Her skin is a tan color and her smile is sweet. The other nurse has a sour face and messy dark brown hair pulled into a messy bun, and considerably older.

"Do you need anything else?" She asks me, her cherry red lips curling into a smile.

I am in a daze for a moment, then I finally respond with a slow head shake.

She nods at me and begins to leave.

"Wait," I say without thinking...again. She turns around with her eyes wide as if to ask what I want. "Do you know who brought me here?"

She cocks her head slightly.

"I mean," I continue, "Do you know who called to bring me here?"

She takes a deep breath, "Well," She starts, "I believe your neighbor called."

I sit up, as much as I can anyway, "My neighbor?" My heart starts to beat faster.

"Yes, she said she lived in the house to the left of yours."

My heart slows its pace. At least it isn't Mr. Peterson. Why am I worried in the first place? He's gone; and even if he isn't, he should be better now. "I don't know my neighbors well." I say finally. It was a partial lie; I know some neighbors too well.

"A senior citizen, I don't know her name, but she apparently made a pie for you to welcome you I suppose-"

"What kind?" I felt inclined to say.

"I, uh," the nurse is caught off guard, "I'm not sure, but she made one and she came to your house this morning...or yesterday morning…"

I glance at the clock, and it's almost two in the morning. What's this girl doing at the hospital at two in the morning? She should be sleeping.

"And she peeked through the window to see if you were awake and…"

That's a little creepy.

"Sir?" Broke through my thoughts.

"Uh-oh..Sorry, uh, continue." I say, embarrassed at my lack of concentration.

"She found you on the floor, and not knowing what to do she called 911." She finishes.

I blink at her trying to process all the information. I say, "Oh." Seeing that she didn't leave I add, "Okay, um...thanks." I'm not exactly sure what to say.

She nods and is about to walk out when I ask another question, "Hey, uh, what's your name? I'm Nick."

She laughs, "Yes, I know. I'm Kate."

"Oh," Right, she's been here the whole time. I continue, "Cool."

Before walking out she says, "Any more questions?"

I chuckle, "No, sorry for keeping you."

"It's fine," She says and closes the door behind her.

I'm alone again in the hospital room. It's kind of hard to sleep when the room is so bright. I can barely sleep anyway, so I suppose it doesn't make a difference. I don't want to risk another dream like that again.

As I look around the room, I notice how new it looks. I don't remember a hospital in Raven Brooks. A lot is new. It could be the progression of twenty years, but maybe the people around here got tired of looking to the past, and finally looked to the future; maybe.

—

I don't know when I fell asleep, but when I wake up it's already nine in the morning. My head is throbbing and pulsing in pain. I reach up to touch it but a hand is already there. I gasp, and I'm up on the bed suddenly.

"Lay down," Someone tells me.

I do as they say.

"I'm checking your temperature," A nurse above me says. Not the same nurse as before; at least she can get some sleep. This nurse had short brown hair and rich dark skin.

"Am I okay?" I struggle to say through the pain just above my eyebrow.

"You seem to be fine," She starts, "But Dr. Khatri needs to see you before you're released."

I sigh again. "Okay," I say. I really don't want to stay here. I'm tired of hospital food; tired of the smell of a cleaning agent, and tired of my back hurting from laying down at an angle for so long; but all I say is "okay".

She gives me a tight smile and walks out without another word. In what seems like forever, the nurse walks back in.

"Is it the doctor?" I ask quickly.

"No," She says, slightly annoyed. I should be the one who's annoyed.

"It's your neighbor; she wants to see you." The nurse says, opening the door for a small woman. She has puffy white hair, and creases along her face, outlining her eyes and mouth. She smiles at me and her wrinkles deepen so much I think they'll pierce through her skull.

"Hello," Her frail voice says to me. "Are you feeling alright?" She has a slight accent, European maybe.

No. "Yes," I answer, "Much better." Not.

After the nurse walks out, my neighbor and I are left in awkward silence, in which at the moment I decide it's a good idea to drink my room-temperature water that's still on the nightstand. As I drink, I notice that the lady is still staring at me expectantly. I take the last gulp of water a little too hard. "Um," I start, "So your my new neighbor?"

She nods timidly, "Yes, I've been in the neighborhood for about fifteen years."

"Hmm," I mumble. She moved in a few years after I left. "I just moved in...two days ago?" I chuckle, "I being in a coma and everything, I lost track of time."

"When I saw you on the floor...I did not know what to do," She says with a tinge of fear mixed with embarrassment in her eyes. "I suppose I just thought you had fallen and could not get up."

I can't stifle my laughter now. She reminds me of the Life Alert commercial I always see on my cable channels. She notices this, and laughs; her laughs are more like squeaky hoarse ones.

"I am Ms. Krause." Yep, European; German I think.

I feel an urge to ask her about Mr. Peterson. Not that she knows him, but just to see what happened to him after all these years; and Aaron. Now that I think about it, it's been a long time since I thought about Aaron; not until yesterday. I've been too busy just being an adult to think about past nightmares. "Do you know Mr. Peterson? He used to live in the neighborhood…" I say, hoping that she did know him, somehow.

She blinks slowly; I guess even blinking is slow in old age.

After thinking a few seconds she says, "I have heard of him."

My eyes grow wide, "What have you heard?"

"Only terrible things," She shakes her head.

"Anything about a family?"

"Yes," She stares hard at nothing, "A wife, and a daughter."

Aaron? "What about a son?"

"I have not heard of a son."

My chest deflates How can they forget Aaron...how can I forget Aaron? I must've been silent too long, because she says, "Did you know a son of his?"

I nod slowly, "Yeah. A long time ago." She gives me a sympathetic look; then I continue, "Do you know what happened to Mr. Peterson?"

"I am not sure…" No one knows about them. And for the longest time, I didn't care.

My throat tightens up, and I can feel my face getting red. I guess I feel like I betrayed Aaron in some way, that I didn't go to look for him afterwards. After all that trouble searching for him just to escape after, I never tried to get in touch. I left, and that was that.

"But…" I hear her say, and I sit up a little straighter. "I think, though I am not sure, that he went to a…" She lowers her voice, "Mental hospital."

I blink. Insane? I knew he wasn't quite right in his head, but a mental hospital? I guess after they found out about Aaron, he was gone for good. Hopefully not completely gone. "Where?" I ask.

"Not in this town," She continues, "I do not know where."

"Would this hospital have records?" Finally something interesting to do. For the past few months, I've been living off welfare, looking for a job, and figuring out what to do with life. But finally, an adventure; I'll figure other stuff out on the way.

She shrugs, "I am not sure."

I look at her for a moment, thinking about the best way to do this. "Could you get the nurse-" Both the doctor and the nurse from earlier walk in at the same time, nearly running the old lady over with the huge metal door. "...for me?" I finish my sentence for the satisfaction of finishing a sentence. The nurse gently takes Ms. Krause by the arm and leads her out, which leaves just the doctor and me. He asks me questions if I had been sleeping well, or if I have had an experience of strong emotion like stress or worry in the past few days.

I can't lie, "Yeah…"

He scribbles on his notepad then asks, "Do you know what might be the cause of these emotions?"

I take in a deep breath. Ever since I came back here, all I've had was flashbacks. "Well, I have been having flashbacks…" I say quietly.

The doctor makes a quick "Hmm" then asks, "Do you have a history of PTSD?"

I don't know; I feel like I do, I guess I just suppressed all those feelings and avoided thinking about the past. "I...don't know."

Dr. Khatri after that does the routine physical exam, poking stuff into my ears and mouth and flashing bright lights into my eyes.

"You seem to be fine. You're lucky you didn't get paralyzed, or worse."

I give him a questioning look.

"From what I saw, you had a seizure in your sleep."

My jaw drops. He hands me a piece of paper with some messy handwriting about some medication.

"This you can get at the local pharmacy…"

There's a pharmacy now?

"...Take this once a day. Schedule an appointment in six months so we can check up on you." Then he smiles politely, and helps me off the bed. I struggle to get out the door as multiple bones pop.

I slowly make my way to the front desk which was three floors down from my room; the elevator is out of order, so I take the stairs. Ouch.

I slump on the front desk while making a sound similar to laughing but in pain, as my knee pops for the twelfth time. "I need to schedule an appointment in six months," I say to the bored-looking lady at the counter.

"What doctor?" She asks without looking up.

"Dr. Khatri," I say clutching my knee.

"He's all booked in six months, but I got a 2:00 on September third which is four months…"

No kidding. "That sounds great." I smile through clenched teeth.

"Have a nice day," The lady says emotionless.

Yeah right. You have a day too.

Just as I am about to walk out, I remember something, "Oh! Excuse me…" I walk back to the front desk, "Sorry," I start, which she replies with an enervating look. "Do you know who I can ask for hospital records?"

She lifts an eyebrow, "Go over to the 'help desk', they might know something." She continues to eagerly work on whatever it is she does on that computer. I walk over to the help desk, which isn't very helpful because there's no one there. "Great," I whisper to myself. A bell is there, but I always thought it was rude to ring the bell, even though its purpose is to let people know that you're there. I stare at my watch, counting every second.

"May I help you?"

I jump, and my knee pops again. "Ow," I groan, "I was wondering where I could ask someone about the records of this hospital?"

"You can ask me," The young man says. He seemed young enough to be doing an internship.

"I was wondering if a came to this hospital?" I ask uncertainty. I don't think this hospital was around that long ago.

"Do you know what year?" He asked me.

I think for a moment. If Ms. Krause moved here fifteen years ago, and was already gone… "I don't know for sure, but try 199…" Random number before 2000 and after 1995, "1998."

The kid fumbles on the computer for a while, like he doesn't know where to look first. "Excuse me sir, I'll be right back," he says, then quickly walks away. Great, more waiting. It's almost eleven; I've been in the hospital all day. And I'm hungry. I haven't had dinner or breakfast yet. How am I supposed to get home? Lyft it is.

"Sir?"

I jump again; thankfully my knee didn't pop. "Yes?"

"We found a Theodore Peterson...is that who you're looking for?"

"Yes," I guess I say a little too eagerly, because the kid steps back a little. "I mean...do you know where he went?"

"According to the records, was transferred to a mental institution near Columbia eighteen years ago."

It's that long ago? It seems like yesterday… "Oh…" is all I can say.

"By the way, it was in '97 not '98." He says with a smirk. It isn't a rude one, but one of those people do when they're trying to make you feel better. I chuckle at the kid, "Thanks." For more than you know, kid.

"My pleasure, sir." He says then disappears behind a door on the back wall.

I haven't felt this way in a long time; I have a mission now. A mission that has been long forgotten, but it's still there, and I'm determined to complete it once and for all.