Amnesiac

After the car accident, the only thing Thomas could remember was his name.

He opened his eyes to a hospital room, white and sterile, filled with beeping equipment, wires, and far more doctors and nurses than it seemed possible to fit in the small space. Thomas blinked once, twice as they shone a bright light in his eyes.

"Visual calibration normal," one of the doctors announced.

"Can you understand us?" a nurse asked.

Thomas tried to nod, but found a thick bandage around his head obstructing his movement. "Yes," he croaked. His throat felt dry, his voice cracked like he hadn't used it in a while.

"Good. Can you tell us your name?"

"Thomas."

"Your last name?"

It felt like his brain had short-circuited suddenly. He couldn't think of it. Why couldn't he remember his own last name? Finally, after struggling for a minute, he gave up.

"I don't know. Where am I? Why am I here?"

The doctors muttered to each other. He caught things like "possible amnesia" and "too soon to tell."

"What's going on?" he demanded, as loud as his returning voice would permit.

The head doctor took a deep breath. "Ok. Your full name, according to record, is Thomas William Murphy. One day ago, you, your parents, and your younger brother Chuck were in a car accident."

Worry seized Thomas-worry for a family he couldn't remember. "Are they ok?"

A young looking blonde nurse, tasked with breaking the news, stepped forward. She put her hand on top of his, and the simple gesture set his heart racing with fear.

"Your father and brother are fine, a couple scrapes and bruises, but nothing major. Your side took most of the impact. I'm sorry, Thomas. Your mother is dead."

Thomas stared at her in shock. Memories were starting to circulate, vague images that couldn't quite surface of a hand on his forehead when he was sick, a woman and a younger boy cheering at his baseball games, a gentle voice in the passenger seat teaching him how to drive for the first time. Everything was so faint, even the faces unclear, but the pictures were definitely there. But the person in them, she was gone.

He wanted to scream or cry or maybe both. What was happening? Why was this world he had woken up into such a messed up place?

"Can I see them? My dad and brother?" Thomas' voice shook more with every word.

"Your dad is in another wing, overseeing certain...matters that need to be dealt with, but we can send your brother in."

"Ok. How old is he, by the way?"

"Chuck is 12."

"And me?"

"You're 16, Thomas." 16. He felt older. He felt like he had lived a thousand years in the few moments since he'd been awake.

Five minutes of silent waiting later, in which he desperately wracked his brain for anything other than brief flashes of memory, a boy was guided in by yet another nurse. Thomas looked him over quickly. He was short, but a little on the bigger side, with curly brown hair and red-rimmed, bright blue eyes that clearly showed he'd been crying.

"Thomas, are you ok?" Chuck's voice was trembling even more than his own.

"I think so. I don't know what all this-" he made a vague gesture at the wires and bandages he had ignored in all the chaos, "-is for, but I feel ok except...I don't know if they told you this, but I don't really remember anything.

"That's what they said," Chuck replied. He was clearly fighting not to burst into tears and Thomas felt a surge of respect for how hard he was trying.

"It's alright. You're just going to have to help me for now, until everything comes back." He didn't look at the doctors, didn't want them to say it never would.

Someone provided a chair,and Chuck sat down and started talking. "We live in Denver, Colorado. Our dad, John Murphy, he's a salesman, and he's not around too much. This was the one weekend he was in town. Mom, Eleanor, she was great though. She was always there, and-and-" That was the last straw. Chuck broke down and started sobbing. Thomas tried to think of anything he could say to console him, but it was like he was lost in an ocean, alone and confused.

Hey guys, this is a random series of oneshots I wrote when I was stuck on Letters to the Glade (I'M WORKING ON IT, I PROMISE, DON'T HURT ME). Anyway, it basically came out of the idea that we tend to categorize people, and then I decided on one word for each of the characters I wanted to write about. There'll probably be about 5 total. So, hope you liked it, please review!