Slumberland

by Bradley Carter

  Squinting, my head nods. These flashes, they don’t hurt. They only startle me. But if I expect them, maybe I can focus more on details in such a short burst of time.

  Sam rolls away, and then another click. Another flash.

  28657

  Each time the X-ray takes a picture, it’s like my head takes a snapshot of these random numbers.

  Certainly, my anxiety shows through but I play it off as though I’m preparing myself for a stun of pain if my arm moves too much.

  Sam tells me to relax. One more to go.

  My eyelids closed, I hear the wheels spin across the floor to the other side of the room.

  “Deep breath…Hold it…One… Two… Three.”

  A click and a flash.

  46368

  This isn’t normal. X-rays don’t flash.

  I’m afraid to tell him. Afraid I’ll have to explain. Afraid if Randi didn’t believe me, Sam won’t either.

  “Can you tell if it’s broken?”

  He takes the black board, pushes the machine away, and flips the off-switch to the crosshair laser.

  As he pulls the sucker from his mouth, but before he can say anything, Doctor Lane’s nurse comes in. She says the doctor is viewing the results now and walks me back to the exam room.

  This emergency room nurse, she’s not as friendly as those at the doctor’s office.

  She checks my vitals and I tell her I think something is wrong.

  “I’m having short-lasting changes in my vision that come and go.”

  She listens to my blood pressure instead of me. Pulling the plugs from her ears, she feels my pulse and counts the seconds on her watch. She says my blood pressure is high, so is my heart rate. Both are high because of the injury. Both vitals elevate when someone’s in pain. Higher blood pressure, harder pulse, these could explain any visual disturbances.

  It makes sense even to someone not in the medical field.

  “But these flashes started before I injured my wrist.”

  Finally, a friendly face. Not like the nurse. Doctor Lane, still a friendly face, but a disappointed one. Holding the film of my X-ray to the light, he examines my arm.

  This is what happens when people who have encountered a rather traumatic event immediately jump back into their routine. The body hasn’t healed yet. Even if there are no signs of injury, other things could progress and you need time to readjust.

  “No more work,” he says. “No more yoga and no more physical activity for at least two weeks.”

  Doctor’s orders.

  bloodshot

  13

  For the next few days until the pain subsides, I’m restricted to keeping my wrist in a brace.

  Doctor Lane said I was lucky nothing was broken.

  But added to my bruised wrist bone is my already bruised ego.

  With not having to work tomorrow, I haven’t a clue what to do while at home by myself.

  Not knowing why someone is upset with me is the worst part. It’s hard to fix something you never knew was wrong. It’s like trying to find a solution when you don’t know the variable.

  Solve for X.

  Something has to give. There’s only so many times you can pace your home before the carpet wears thin. Some of this guilt has to lift from my shoulders. It makes me nervous thinking Mom and Dad are two more people I care about who are unhappy with me.

  Dad’s name in my phone has tiny hearts on both sides.

  In his contacts, I’ve seen my number saved as ‘CC’ in between the same emojis.

  That’s what pops up on his screen when I call.

  “How’s my CC?” he asks.

  He sounds peppy, happy to hear from me, and not saddened by the last time we spoke.

  I tell him about my injury and the incident at work this morning but most importantly how terrible I feel for kicking my mom and him out of my condo.

  “CC,” he says, “you’re just like your father. You know how hardheaded I can be when people try to take care of me. Your mother worries, we both do, but we can celebrate your birthday anytime. She and I are just grateful to have that option.”

  “Still, I feel horrible for seeing you so sad.”

  “I wasn’t sad,” he says. “My acid reflux and nausea kicked up again.”

  Dad would never tell me he’s upset. I should have known he would use his ailment as an excuse.

  Still, it’s a relief to hear his voice again. Still, it makes me smile.

  "If you and Mom still want to celebrate my belated birthday, I have all the time in the world.”

  Dad says it’s a date.

  This makes me feel better. Much better.

  The kitchen table is still cluttered. Scattered at my feet are the papers with red circles drawn on them.

  Kneeling down, I gather them together and tuck them under my arm. I step into my bedroom and toss the stack on my nightstand.

  Dad wants to know what I think about my present.

  He tells me I should have noticed it by now. He says it’s been sitting on my kitchen counter next to the window. He says I need to pay attention to it, that it’s time sensitive.

  On the countertop, next to the sink, sits a potted sunflower. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why I didn’t notice it before. It was being ignored this whole time.

  Slightly tucked under the clay pot is an envelope. With my phone held between my ear and shoulder, I pull a card that reads:

  ‘To our loving CC, our sunflower.’

  Dad says he hopes I like it. These days, at twenty-nine, its hard for them to pick something special for me.

  “Any kind of gift from you is special. I love it. I love you."

  He tells me he loves me and Mom shouts the same from the background.

  From what they’ve heard about my day, Mom and Dad agree I need time to rest. Time to heal. They’ll try not to baby me but they are there if I need them.

  “I know. I’ve always known,” I say.

  Dad says I’m too smart for my own good. He’s always had a way of making me feel better. He tells me we’ll get together for a sumptuous belated birthday dinner soon.

  Gazing at the sunflower on my kitchen counter, I feel a bit of relief. It needs to be cared for until it’s strong enough to grow on its own. This flower warms my soul. This flower and I can take care of each other. It needs to be next to the window above the sink until I find someplace better. Because the sun has set, it looks as though the sunflower and I will need to rest and start growing tomorrow.

  Showering one-handed is difficult when you’re not used to it. Gravity only falls one way, so keeping my swollen wrist straight above the elbow, it doesn’t bend and causes less pain. The warm water soothes as it pours across my hair, trickling down my shoulders and back. I can’t help to take an extra moment to stand here and enjoy it. But the sooner I get out, the sooner I can get dressed. And the sooner I get dressed, the sooner I can call it a night. My eyes close. My head wobbles. Lifting my face to the faucet, it’s like standing in a steaming rainfall. Something peaceful, interrupted by something startling.

  A barking noise from the other room.

  The shower curtain slides far enough for me to peek my head out. For a brief moment, the only sound is the faucet squeaking as I turn it off. Then another bark. A dog’s bark.

  “Bart?”

  I must have left the television going. But something doesn’t add up. I’m certain I never had it on.

  Call it being tired. Maybe I’m hearing things.

  Before bed, it’s boy-short underwear and a comfy tank top. Pulling a comb through my damp hair, I notice my gift from Annie sitting on the edge of my bed.

  My arm back in its brace, I have to stretch the cord to the sleep machine to reach the plug behind the nightstand. As the prongs slide into the socket, there’s a chilling sensation, like electricity. But it’s not that I’m being shocked, it’s the feeling I’m being watched. I’m uncertain if it’s that or the cold air on my damp skin sending a shiver up my
spine. My bedroom window has the curtains still open. The apartment building across the street, with the side of patios facing me, somebody must be able to see me.

  With the flick of a switch, my lamp turns off. Only the dim colors from the sleep machine light my way, and I slide the curtains together. From behind one of them, I peek into the darkness. Nothing there but some of the patio windows illuminated by those who are still awake. Nothing there except a fading orange dot, hovering floors above. The tip of a cigarette. It glows bright and then fades. Careful not to draw attention, I pull the corner of the curtain.

  My new sleep machine sets on the stack of drawn circles.

  My bed welcomes me with a hug.

  My eyes are heavy.

  I’m ready to put this day to rest.

  For five minutes, subtle glows of violet reflect on the wall, fading in and out.

  The ambient sound of a gentle breeze blowing across a beach set a tranquil mode.

  The soft lights from the sleep machine transition to a dark blue as raindrops trickle on top of ocean waters for five more minutes.

  Sixty multiplied by five equals three-hundred seconds.

  Another cycle plays, this time a dark red color with faint rumbles of thunder in a distance, and lasting for another five minutes.

  Another three hundred seconds added to the first equals six-hundred seconds.

  Fifteen minutes pass by and yet I still lay here. Wide awake.

  That’s a total of nine hundred seconds.

  My body weighs heavy, too weak to move. But inside my head, thoughts come racing from the gate. Not only basic math, but more advanced. Feeling sorrow is difficult when your thoughts are determining wind speeds. The time elapsed between the sleep machine’s claps of thunder, calculating the speed in which the artificial storm travels. The volume of the rain and speed calculate the size of the drops.

  All repeated in five minute intervals.

  Looped over and over again.

  It’s frustrating, to say the least. The mind should come with an off switch but the only switch to click is on the lamp. My arm struggles to pull the sleep machines cord from the wall.

  UGH!

  My elbow bumps the nightstand, spreading the papers of circular drawings to the floor.

  Wrapping the cord around my braced fist, I toss the sleep machine to the carpet. Unplugged, the clock still runs on a backup battery and the time flashes: 1:44 A.M

  All I need is a few hours of sleep. Is that too much to ask?

  With a brace on my wrist, it’s hard for my fingers to grasp the paper drawings. Gathering them together, I make a stack, but before setting them back, my eyes stare to the red circles.

  These have to mean something.

  An ink pen had fallen with them, landing within reach. I lower myself to the floor, my back against the bed, my knees up. With my right wrist in a brace, it’s hard to draw a perfect circle.

  My sleep machine, still sideways on the carpet, the clock beeps: 2:44 A.M.

  Jumping forward through the rest of the night, what seems like minutes have become hours. Never mind desperately trying to fall asleep, the kitchen lights are on and a calendar spreads across the table. The other gifts set unopened against the wall. A spiral notebook has collected my handwritten calculations of math statements. What started off as me trying to doodle circles, transformed with each page to super-advanced mathematics.

  Calculus.

  Trigonometry.

  Combinatorics.

  Number theory.

  Logic.

  Differential equations.

  Chaos theory.

  As an aspiring meteorologist in college, math and physics were a necessity to learn.

  But these days, well into my career, my weather predictions are reliant on what the computers calculate. Nobody does anything by hand anymore.

  Some of these more advanced math languages are things I’ve never been taught. Some of them taught but long forgotten. But somehow, they’re things I’ve been scratching down on paper all night long. Where they come from, I don’t have a clue. It’s like they’ve been loaded into my brain and my sore right hand can’t stop scrambling to make sense of them.

  You can’t solve a problem with empty variables. But I have no idea what the variables should be. Something is missing.

  Solve for X.

  What’s worse, I’m uncertain of what that something should be or where to find it.

  Last I checked, my burning eyes were bloodshot, as red as the circles I scribble aside each equation. For the life of me, I can’t draw one that’s perfect. And no matter how many ways to write these problems, I can’t find a solution.

  RX

  14

  When you’ve been awake all night, the daylight can be uncomfortable to the eyes.

  When you’ve been awake for three days, the bright sun is absolutely blinding.

  My potted sunflower, it needs the light. So it sits in the window, wrapped under the curtains to keep the light from leaking inside my kitchen. Even then, inside an otherwise darkened condo, I still wear sunglasses.

  I’ve gone through every bottle of wine on the rack. I’ve cleaned out sleep-aids from my medicine cabinets, even the antihistamines which contain the same active ingredients. The only thing left is headache medicine which has little effect on my pounding brain. My wrist, still secured in its brace, is excruciating.

  Every page from any type of book found lying around are covered front and back with complex math equations. The pressure of repeatedly circling over them has left indentations in the pages. To not know the situation, it would seem to anyone else, an unsupervised kindergartener got hold of some office supplies.

  Each month of the calendar is torn off and lay beside each other on the table. Each day circled in red, some of them dramatically marked with an X.

  Hours upon hours into the late morning and I’ve solved nothing. I’ve come to the end of the road. The pens are out of ink and I’m out of ideas.

  The wine I’ve consumed didn’t faze me a bit. However, staying awake for more than eighteen hours is the equivalent of having a blood-alcohol level of point zero five. That’s point zero three less than the legal limit to operate a motor vehicle. Given I’m well on my way to the seventy-two hour mark, driving my car to Doctor Lane’s office might not be the best idea. But rather than have to call my parents for a ride and explain everything that’s been going on, I’ll take my chances. At this point, crashing my car and rendering myself unconscious doesn’t seem like such a bad scenario. My only concern is for the other drivers on the road.

  The drive is several minutes from home. The trick is to stay alert.

  My eyes ache from being open for so long. Everything’s a blur but some things seem to focus just to get my attention. Things I’ve see a million times but never acknowledged them. Numbers. They’re everywhere. I’ve always known this, but now they want their rightful credit. They want to be heard. Their edges sharpened and their colors vibrant, from their blurring faded backgrounds.

  Must be 21 to enter.

  34th street exit.

  Speed limit: 55 miles per hour.

  Everything seems to hold some sort of pattern. But what, I’m not sure.

  My mind races with these thoughts. Soon enough, I wonder how I got to Doctor Lane’s office so fast. Calculating the distance in miles multiplied by the speed and taking into account the delays of traffic, it should have taken some time.

  Thankfully, there are open spots in the parking lot.

  Inside the waiting room, to my surprise, there’s only one person waiting. She’s an elderly woman with a walker. A walker with three tennis balls on the feet and one missing.

  The other chairs are empty and the magazines are neatly placed on the side tables. The older woman skims the pages of the magazine I read during my last visit. Still tucked in the back is the sheet of paper I left behind.

  This song from 1956 sounds familiar. My lips move to the words but the singing comes from the
men on the radio.

  Life could be a dream…sh-boom, sh-boom…

  The sliding glass window opens to the registration nurse. Her face lights up.

  “Sierra! How can I help you?”

  A sharp pain bolts through my head and my body twitches. Behind my closed eyes, another number flashes:

  49.8951

  I play it off as though I’ve got a cold chill.

  “Dr. Lane told me to let him know if I experience anything out of the ordinary.”

  The nurse pouts her lips.

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart,” she says, “Dr. Lane is following up on a patient at the hospital.”

  Another pain, another twitch, another flinch, and another bright number:

  97.1384

  Breathing in deep, I try to refocus.

  Fortunately, with the hospital being only blocks away, I don’t have far to drive.

  Turning back toward the door, I’m stopped by the little old lady with her walker. This elderly lady, right behind me, she smiles.

  “Excuse me, dear,” she says, blocking my way out. “Are you the weather girl from channel six news?”

  She must not remember, we’ve met before but it’s a relief to see someone still recognizes me.

  “I was once like you,” she says, “young and beautiful…”

  Behind my sunglasses, my eyes glow. A tired smile stretches across my face.

  “…And stupid,” she adds.

  My eyebrows rise. Her step closer is unnerving. Her lowered voice is haunting.

  “You’d better get your head out of the clouds,” she says, “and wake up!”

  Something about the way this woman eyes burn at me. I’m at a loss for words. I’m at a loss for actions. The old lady, she scoffs. It’s not until she turns away that I’m able to move again. Moving fast to the exit.

  Rather than fight to find a spot on hospital property, I park in the street and hurry to the main entrance. My braced hand shades my eyes even with sunglasses.

  I don’t know what I was thinking. Finding Doctor Lane in a hospital this size is next to impossible. It’s the middle of the day, lunch hour in fact, people swarming in every direction through every walkway. But just as hope begins to leave me, I spot his slick hair and thick glasses coming from the cafeteria. A soda in one hand and a meal tray in the other.