Page 4 of Defect
The only thing that threw me off my violent track was the nurses rushing in at the sound of high pitched beeps snitching on me and alerting them that I’d ripped out my IV. “Mr. Fredericks, you need to lie down,” they said with outstretched hands and wide eyes. Mom hid behind them and pressed her back flat against the wall.
I never paid attention to my size before that moment but I knew I must have looked like a hulking monster right then.
“If you can’t sit down and let us treat you, we’ll have to sedate and restrain you.” Pain sliced through my head and the room swam before me. I was forced to fall on the bed. The nurses rushed to restrain my wrists but I wasn’t fighting them. I couldn’t. I was in too much pain.
“Please help him,” I heard my mother son in the corner. “God, please help my baby!” I didn’t need help. I needed to see my brother. I needed to see where his body was. I needed to understand why I was alive when he wasn’t.
Tears rolled like fire down my cheeks. Deliberate and determined to scorch. My face was blazing. My heart was charred and inside of my mind all I heard was thunder.
It took the two nurses fifteen minutes to get me hooked up to everything again and to inject a sedative into my veins that made me feel like I was wading through mud.
Before I could open my mouth to protest, my eyes fell shut almost as if on command from someone else.
Sleep took me quickly.
…
It took me two days to speak to my mother. I saw doctors and had every fucking scan and exam known to man. After my outburst the first night I woke up, I was labeled as difficult and non-compliant. Nobody would talk to me they all spoke to my mother. All the doctors and nurses took her into the hallway and muttered under their breaths about whatever was going on with me.
By night two, I’d had enough. I’d just been rolled back into my room after a second CAT scan and Mom was sitting in the corner chair reading her bible. Her lips moved over every line and I wanted to badly to snatch that fucking book from her hands and demand she tell me what was going on.
See, after my outburst, she didn’t want to speak to me either. Her reasoning was different though. What she was doing felt like punishment for the way I spoke to her.
Once I was in my bed again, I glared at her from my spot. Every time I looked at her my blood ran hot. “Can you stop being so fucking childish and tell me what’s going on? Nobody is talking to me and it’s pissing me off.” I fully intended to talk to her like a normal human being but that stormy rage lashed out instead.
Her walnut brown eyes snapped to mine and she drew her head back. Her usually arched brows were unkempt from sitting in the hospital with me for weeks.
“Ezra, I’ll speak to you about what’s going on when you learn some decency again.”
“Fine. Maybe I need to lose my shit again so I get some attention around here.” I stood up and she slammed her bible shut.
“Sit down. You shouldn’t be up like that.”
“Why not? Are you going to explain why I’m in the hospital or do I have to start running laps until I get answers?”
“They said you would change but never in my wildest dreams did I think you’d be like this, Ezra.”
“Who isthey? Can you stop talking in code?” Standing up hurt a lot less than it did the first night I woke up. My body was healing and I was getting stronger but for some reason, I was still in the fucking hospital. I felt like a prisoner.
“Ezra, we were rear-ended by a truck driver asleep at the wheel. The back of my SUV was completely crushed. You were partially ejected through the windshield. You broke a few ribs but mainly your injuries were to your brain. They’ve been slowly waiting for the swelling to go down to properly assess the damage.
That’s why you were put in a coma. You wouldn’t wake up though. A week passed and you didn’t respond to their efforts to wake you up.”
“So during that time, you decided to bury my twin? You didn’t wait for me?”
“I didn’t know if I was going to have to buryyoutoo, Ezra! I’m sorry you didn’t get to see Ev one last time. It breaks my heart.”
“Does it?” I barked out a harsh laugh and it filled the room like heavy gray clouds.
“Don’t sit here and act like you’re the only one experiencing grief.” She spat at me. Her words trembled from between her lips.
“You got closure. You got an explanation. You got to see Everett! The last time I saw my twin was when we were talking outside of your truck.” I knew we texted back and forth on the way to the game—the game we never reached—but I couldn’t remember what we texted about. I couldn’t remember anything about the ride at all.
“You need to listen to me, son.” Mom stood and took a tentative step toward me. Once she was close enough, I realized I could clearly see the gray hair sprouting from the top of her head. It was like she aged in the short time during the accident and my hospital stay. “Because of your brain trauma you’ll never be the same.”
“No, I won’t ever be the same because I lost a part of myself when Everett died!”
“This isn’t you speaking right now. The doctors said you’d be different after the brain trauma. Your frontal lobe was affected. You’ll have a short temper, you’ll be impulsive, and you’ll have trouble making decisions. There’s a lot of stuff you won’t be able to do anymore.
