Page 27 of Heart Sick
“Hello,” she says, reaching for the clipboard off the end of my bed. She doesn’t seem too impressed with Monique loitering, so she quickly makes herself scarce, but I know she’ll be back.
She takes her time, reading over the information and if the deep frown is anything to go by, whatever is on my chart, can’t be good.
“I’m surprised your body hasn’t rejected your heart,” she finally declares, flipping through the pages.
“No such luck, Doc,” I quip with a smirk.
“Dutch—” she cautions in a low voice.
“I thought we aren’t to use our real names?” I sarcastically scold.
But Dr. Norton isn’t in the mood for games. “I don’t understand. I thought this is what you wanted.”
“No, I don’t want this,” I reply, tapping my temple. “The emptiness hasn’t gone away. I can’t hear anything.”
“That’s normal. I explained that’s because of the medication.”
“But for how long?”
She sighs, and I wish I could be more grateful for her, at least. “I honestly don’t know. The studies vary from person to person. I—”
But I zone out because all I hear is Dr. Norton telling me, in a roundabout way, that I am fucked. Who I once was died the moment she took my heart, and gave me another.
“I want to know who the donor was,” I blurt out, interrupting Dr. Norton.
“I can’t share that information with you.” She toys with the small key that hangs from a thin gold chain she wears from around her neck. I wonder what it unlocks.
“Why not? He’s dead. He won’t know any different.”
Dr. Norton clears her throat, and again, I realize I am being really rude. “This is the reason why I need to know,” I explain, not above begging. “Since the transplant, I feel…different. I don’t feel like me anymore.”
Dr. Norton stops writing something down. “What do you mean?”
I can see her interest is piqued, so I don’t hold back. “I have visions that I’ve never once seen before. They feel like memories I should remember, but I don’t. I am fucking angry most days, and yes, the fact I can’t play music is part reason why. But I don’t feel like me anymore. This…heart, it may be a match medically, but on every other level, it’s a fucking foreign entity, eating me away.”
I decide to leave out the inexplicable connection I have to Luna because I don’t want to give Dr. Norton more of an excuse to separate us as I’m sure she knows why we were thrown into “the vault.”
“Interesting,” she says, which doesn’t really help. “What are the visions of?”
I close my eyes and focus on thelub-dub…lub-dub…
In sync with it, I see headlights, I feel panic overwhelm me as I try to avoid them. I feel leather as I catch a football and hear the roars of the crowd. I feel the slap on my back as I bend low and snort a line of blow. I feel frustration as I try and find someone I have never met before.
I can’t breathe as I try to be the perfect student…the perfect boyfriend…the perfect son.
Guilt tackles me harder than the guy in football gear as I deceive the one person who loves me more than anything in the world. I see the eyes of a woman I don’t know. I smell roses. And then I see something which I’ve not seen before…I see me, but it’s not me, as I am looking through the eyes of a stranger, staring up at a beautiful woman as she fucks me senseless.
Her face is blacked out, but she feels…familiar. And it’s wrong…so very wrong.
Gasping for air, I almost launch off the bed as I rub over my chest, wincing in pain.
What did I…what didhedo?
“It’s okay, Dutch! Calm down. You’re safe.” Dr. Norton’s composed voice is my anchor and I focus on it, afraid I will float away if I don’t.
“What’s happening to me?”
My heart rate soon settles, and the visions subside, allowing the present in. Once I can breathe again, I open my eyes.