By Sam Smith
Published: October 18, 2007
Updated: January 7, 2009 PrintEmail
Following is an excerpt of the completed, published novel -- the first two pages. If you enjoy this excerpt, please look for the novel to add a copy to your library.
The mind roots itself in a body, anchors itself in a head, looks out through a pair of pink lids. Blue-green curtains hang from a grey squared ceiling. White sheets are cold on hot body. A rocking motion. A woman, dark curly hair, rises from beside the bed. White cap, blue tunic, pale blue belt, olive skin. A gasping sucking breath; trying to hold the thin air in the inextensible lungs. Another nurse rises from the opposite side or the bed. Short fair hair, pink skin, white uniform, white belt. The rocking stops. The two nurses have been making the bed. The dark-haired nurse smiles, "So you're back with us again?" Another deep trembling breath pulled into the strained lungs. Again? The bed sways. The squared ceiling recedes. Arms move to counterbalance. Arms trapped under tight white sheets. Panic. "Steady," the dark-haired nurse reaches out a hand. The nails are pink against the brown skin. Jaws clenched, neck arching, another breath is pulled into the body. Sweat cools on the hot exposed skin. The pink nurse looks on through grey eyes. Curtain and ceiling move away. "Take deep regular breaths through your mouth," the dark-haired nurse instructs him. Opening wide the jaws the lungs are ventilated. The pounding within diminishes. The belaboured breathing becomes superfluous. Tension leaves arms, legs, shoulders. "That's a good boy," the dark-haired nurse bestows a rewarding smile. Boy. Male. Child. He studies the smile. Why should a showing of white teeth have a calming effect? With a friendly double pat the dark-haired nurse removes her hand from his chest. The curtain around the bed billows out. Soft rapid footsteps on the other side. The pink nurse listens to two low female voices. The sheet again presses down on him. He tugs his arms free. The pink nurse lays her fingers on his forehead, smiling tells him to lie still. Each of her fingers feels cold. He decides he doesn't like her. Why doesn't he like her? The dark nurse has collected a clipboard from the bottom of the bed. A red chair beside the bed is pushed back against the curtain, alters its folds. She lays the clipboard upon the red chair seat. "You've had us quite worried..." the pink nurse says from the other side of the bed. She has put laughter into her voice. Her words though... He puzzles on the remembered sound of them. The smooth pink face doesn't look worried. A woman laughs somewhere within the building, a startled laugh, trailing quickly off. He searches for words of his own, composes them, studies them, rearranges them, practises them with closed mouth. "Where am I?" he asks the dark nurse. "Would you believe," taking his wrist she grins at him, "in hospital?" Hospital... He looks at the green and white striped pyjamas on his arm, at his inert brown-pink hand beyond the probing fingers of the nurse. He has a large crooked thumb, four bent fingers, a criss-crossing of lines on his plump palm. Not a child's hand. More words to be shaped and practised. "How'd I get here?" "Don't you remember?" her brown eyes flick up from the watch pinned to the breast of her tunic. He looks inside himself. A vacancy. "No," he says without having practised the word. "You collapsed in the street," the pink nurse tells him, "Early this afternoon. You recovered consciousness in Emergency. You remember that?" Again he looks inside himself. Nothing. "No," he tastes the movement of his tongue, "This isn't Emergency?" "This is the heart ward," the dark nurse releases his wrist and busily writes on the clipboard. "You have a very erratic pulse. I need a name on this. Surname?" Both nurses have name tags clipped to their tunics. His name? Surname? He has no memory of a name tag. He searches for other memories. But this is all he knows of himself: his being here. "I don't know," he tells the dark nurse, "How did I get to this ward?" "A porter brought you," the pink nurse smiling tells him, "No beds in ITU. So you were brought here." The dark nurse has inclined her head. The pink nurse stares a second at her, then parts the curtains and leaves. "We can take your temperature anyway," the dark nurse flicks a thermometer, reads it. "Open your mouth." The glass thermometer scrapes over his lower teeth, is cold under his tongue. "Close your mouth. And while that's cooking I'll take your blood pressure." Breathing noisily through his nose he watches the nurse unclip the lid of a rectangular box and extract a black armband and tubing. Pushing up his pyjama sleeve she straps the armband around his biceps. Putting the two curved pieces of a stethoscope in her ears, she pumps up the inflatable armband, then watches the mercury fall in the tube on the inside of the lid. She writes more figures an the clipboard. While she is doing this he wonders how it is that he knows what a stethoscope is, knows that she is taking his blood pressure, that these things are familiar to him. Has he been in hospital before? Looking about him he realises that he also knows what a curtain is, and a bed, and that this is a hospital ward; and yet he doesn't know his own name. "Don't worry about it," the dark nurse has taken his blood pressure again, "It'll come." Can she read his thoughts? He examines his thoughts. His sole thought is himself examining his thoughts. Curtains, bed, pillow, sheets, blanket, chair, bedside locker... he names all the things about him. Turning his free hand over he examines the freckles on the back of his hand, the wrinkled knuckles, the short black hairs on the white wrist. A hand. He doesn't recognise it as his own. A hand, nothing more. The nurse removes the thermometer, reads it and makes a cross on the chart. "Still high," her smile says that it is nothing to worry about, "Any luck yet?" He knows to what she refers, gives a slight shake of the head. "What street did I collapse in?" he asks her, listens to himself speaking, wonders where he first learnt to form words. "I'll find out later for you," she pushes herself up from the chair. A doctor in a white coat steps through the curtain, is followed by the pink nurse. The man wonders why he isn't pleased to see her. Because she feigned concern? The doctor is young. How old am I, the man wonders, feels the hammering up a tempo within him and breathes deep to quieten it. The doctor has looked to the bottom of the bed for the charts, sees the clipboard on the red chair. The dark nurse steps out of his path. The doctor glances over the clipboard, takes the man's left wrist. "I'll need an ECG," he says. Both nurses exit through the curtain. The man listens to the doctor's slow breaths. The doctor has a pallid complexion, red spots on his cheeks. The man wonders how he knows he himself is a man, recalls the dark nurse calling him a good boy. He is beginning to learn. That thought pleases him. The doctor looks tired, the eyes dull and blurred. His pale hair is cut short at the sides, long on the top. Straight hair it stands up at odd angles, looks unclean. With his free hand the man feels over the top of his own head. The hair is clipped short. It is damp at the roots from his sweating. What colour is it? He doesn't know. Releasing his wrist the doctor makes a note on a pad.
