The Girl Next Door

by Lisa Aurello

  A black hole.

  For all intents and purposes, Jane was dead.

  Chapter 7

  Melanie finally tracked down Jane’s surgeon and he told her what happened. Following her surgery, Jane’s brain swelling began to worsen despite the surgical team’s best efforts to prevent it, so her surgeon made the decision to medically induce a coma. Brains need less oxygen when unconscious so coma is a helpful tool in treating a TBI, he explained to Mel. If it got worse, he might have to perform additional surgery, removing part of her skull to relieve pressure that can easily damage the brain further or even kill it. The first twenty-four hours were the most critical for an accident victim, so Dr. Lavelle ensured that Jane Jensen would be checked on every fifteen minutes—without exception, he’d told the ICU staff. He was making every effort to lead Jane Jensen out of the woods, he assured her stepsister, but he made sure she understood the severity of the situation. The patient was on the bridge between life and death—she could go either way.

  A few hours later, Mel had stepped out of the ICU suites and spotted Jane’s surgeon speaking to the redheaded admin or nurse—Mel wasn’t sure of her position. He told her he was ducking out for a nap. “Were you able to get any information on Ms. Jensen’s family?”

  The older woman grimaced. “According to her stepsister who was listed as her emergency contact at her job, there’s no one in the area.”

  Mel smirked. Meet Melanie, Jane’s brand-new stepsister. Her ears perked up at the next comment.

  “…so no kids then?”

  “No, Doctor.”

  “That’s a relief. I assume if she had pets or anything, her stepsister would see to them.”

  “I’ll double check with her if I see her again.”

  “Thanks, Lois.”

  Mel spun around so they wouldn’t catch her eavesdropping. She began to walk the other way, deciding to grab a breath of fresh air. Exhaustion was starting to take its toll, and she needed to stay up a few more hours, hoping to wait until Jane was out of the woods before she left the hospital—if that was even possible.

  An hour later as Mel, slouched in an uncomfortable vinyl chair, was nodding off like a junkie, she felt a warm hand touch hers. Startled, her head shot up, and she saw Dr. Lavelle crouching in front of her.

  “How about I find you a bed so you can catch a few hours of sleep?”

  Mel smiled at the distinguished-looking doctor. “That’d be really helpful. Thank you.”

  He crooked his finger at her to follow him and led her to a small room with a single cot inside and a shelf stocked with bed linens and towels.

  Mel smiled again in gratitude, and the moment the doctor closed the door behind him, she sprawled on the bed and was out within seconds.

  The kind surgeon came back about four hours later to wake Mel.

  “Good nap?” he asked her.

  “Really good.” She smiled. “I feel a thousand percent better.”

  “I had my own nap too. Let’s hunt down some coffee, shall we?”

  When the two of them crossed paths with a nurse in the hall, Dr. Lavelle begged the young man to get him two black coffees and find him on his rounds. He turned to Mel.

  “Black coffee is the only way it’s palatable—trust me. Come on. My first stop is your sister.”

  The amazing nurse bearing coffee found them before they’d even gotten on the elevator. Mel watched as the doctor downed the small cup of bitter coffee in two gulps, and then he seemed instantly energized by the caffeine. The elevator arrived and they got in and punched six for ICU. Outside of Jane’s room, he eyed her chart and gave Mel a big smile.

  “She made it through the night. Our girl has a fighting chance.”

  Mel grinned back and wondered if it was bad etiquette to plant a big smooch on the surgeon’s lips. She decided against it.

  After Jane survived the first day post-accident, Dr. Lavelle became more confident about her prognosis. She remained in the drug coma, however, since there was still significant swelling. Mel finally had to go home, but she told Lavelle she’d return after work or early the following morning.

  It took almost three days for the brain edema to reduce enough to bring Jane out of the coma and would take another seven days to get her from the ICU to a regular room but her condition continued to improve daily. Though she had other significant injuries, the main threat to her life had been the cranial pressure due to the swelling, so as that eased, she was upgraded from critical to serious and finally to stable. They told her it was a sure thing that her youth helped her recovery.

  Twenty-five was a good age to be.

  ******

  Although Mel was allowed to visit throughout, Jane had been unconscious the whole time so when Mel stepped into the room late on the third day, she was more than surprised to see her friend’s eyes open and tracking her movements.

  She felt the relief all throughout her body at seeing Jane conscious but also fear that she might be… different. Would she even remember Mel? The doctor said she’d lost a lot of recent memory. She forced her voice into an upbeat tone. “It’s about fucking time your snoozefest ended. Here you’ve been getting all this beauty sleep while I’ve been trudging all over New York City.” She leaned in to peck Jane’s forehead. “Boy, it’s good to see your pretty eyes open, Jane.”

  Jane’s lips pulled into a slight smile. “Thank you. I’m so sorry to impose on you so much…” she managed in a rusted voice and then cleared her throat.

  Melanie shook her head, her dark, glossy hair swinging with the motion. “Stop it. I was kidding. I’m just so glad to see you awake.” She carefully eyed her friend. Jane was super pale but her eyes were animated and that made Mel feel better. “How do you feel?”

  A rueful grin appeared on her face. “Like I was run over by a truck… which essentially I was.” Her face fell right after she spoke the words. “A nurse told me the other driver died. I feel so bad about it… like it’s my fault.”

  “How is it your fault? It was an accident. I seriously doubt you set out to collide head-on with some poor schmo on the road with you. Why were you upstate anyway? Do you remember?”

  Jane tried to shake her head but had limited movement with the neck brace. “No clue. My memory is all screwed up—recent memory, that is, because I can remember pretty much everything up to ninth grade and then a few scattered memories here and there afterward. It’s really weird…” Her voice cracked. “…and scary.”

  “I’ll bet.” Mel dragged a mauve-colored vinyl chair closer to the hospital bed, its legs scraping in protest across the tile floor, and she lowered herself into it. “What does the doctor say about that?”

  “He says I’ll probably recover most of my memory as my brain continues to heal. He said it’s likely I won’t ever remember the accident itself and the immediate aftermath… but honestly I think that’s a good thing.”

  “Yeah, remembering that trauma wouldn’t do anyone any good.” She patted Jane’s blanket-covered leg. “So everyone at the office told me—”

  “I’m sorry,” a nurse who strode into the room interrupted, “but you’ll have to step outside the room for a few minutes, miss. You can continue your visit in about a half-hour.”

  Mel glanced at Jane. “I’m going to get a coffee. Want one?” Her eyes darted from Jane to the nurse. “If it’s allowed?”

  The nurse just smirked and shook his head, his blond-streaked dreads swaying with the motion. “Afraid not.”

  “OK, I’ll go have one then. No sense in both of us suffering, right?”

  Jane mustered a smile. “Thanks a latte.”

  Groaning, Mel waved goodbye and moved toward the door.

  Jane called to her. “Please come back.”

  Mel turned her head and winked at her friend, so happy that Jane was her old self. “Only if you promise no more corny puns.”

  “Cross my heart.”

  A shot of whiskey, Mel thought, would go nicely with the coffee right about now. And that
nurse with the dreads was kinda hot. How come this hospital had so many male nurses? Mel knew where she was coming if she ever needed a place to convalesce.

  Chapter 8

  “Ugh.”

  Jane pushed the gelatinous slime away from her. It was gross and didn’t deserve to be called dessert although she had to admit, it was fun to play with for a little while. The hospital food in general was so bad. The only thing she found edible was the rice. At least she could feel more pounds of ugly fat sliding off her body because of the horrid fare.

  Food, edible or not, was not her major concern.

  Profound depression mixed with discomfort was. The walls of her hospital room were closing in on her, and though she was getting better physically, her state of mind was worsening. Each day dragged painfully by as she lay in the hospital bed, the time measured either by the variegated light outside her window or the subpar meals she was served three times a day. It had gotten so bad that even though the food was putrid, she looked forward to the arrival of the meal tray since it broke up the monotony of the day.

  Basically a stranger to herself, Jane nonetheless still felt like she was the kind of person who had to be doing something—either mental or physical. Strenuous. She couldn’t just lie here anymore.

  She couldn’t escape into books because reading aggravated her constant headache. Nor could she tolerate listening to music for more than a few minutes at a time. Mel brought her laptop from work since her personal one had been in her car trunk and was destroyed in the accident, but surfing the Internet also made her head pound. The only entertainment she had apart from Mel’s visits—and that of a few other people from the office who dropped by, including her bosses—was television. She ended up watching a lot of home improvement shows and true-crime dramas. When the editing was too choppy, she’d close her eyes and just listen.

  She wanted out of the hospital—desperately. She was so ready.

  Her memory was still liberally peppered with huge gaps, though she’d recovered some recent memories. Not a lot, though. When the very distinguished-looking Ty Renault, the CFO of MT, strolled into her room, she had no idea who he was at first. He had to introduce himself and after a few minutes, his face became more familiar. It was sort of funny that Jane was becoming inured to the shock on people’s faces when she looked at them blankly, having no recognition of them at all. She even found it mildly amusing. Mel, though, she’d somehow remembered all along.

  The part of the memory loss that itched at her most was the feeling of losing herself, her identity. Jane had no clue as to the woman she’d become since high school. It was a bizarre and surreal feeling. Identity is one of those things that a person doesn’t appreciate having until it’s gone.

  She just hoped that she could go home soon and do the rest of her recuperating from her new house. Mel had described it to her in great detail, and now she couldn’t wait to see it again.

  On the Monday evening of the third week after the accident the surgeon stopped in Jane’s room, she was more than ready to hear what he had to say. After seeing only nurses for the past few days, his smiling face was very welcome and for the first time, Jane noticed him as a man instead of just her doctor. He was handsome—a taller, thinner, and slightly older George Clooney-type, his hair completely silver and the bags under his eyes prominent.

  “Jane, how are you feeling?”

  Her hazel eyes lightened as she smiled. “Surprisingly decent, Dr. Lavelle. Really well, all things considered. My headaches are not nearly as severe and my wrist feels like it’s healing.” She waited a beat. “Please tell me that you’re here to spring me?”

  “Maybe. Ribs still giving you a hard time? Every breath you take?”

  She smiled weakly. “Yes. The stalker’s anthem, right?”

  He laughed. “Yes, and one of my favorites, though I’m no stalker. But I am old enough to be a Police fan.”

  “Well,” Jane said with a smirk, “not all stalkers are bad, are they? Especially if they look like Sting did way back when. How do you suppose he got that name anyway?”

  “I don’t have a clue as to the name. Getting back to you, on a scale of one to ten, with ten being unbearable pain, how would you rate the pain you’re experiencing of late?”

  “Six or seven, depending on the time of day. The discomfort and stiffness from lying in bed all day is pretty constant though. The pain medication helps a lot, though, and my headaches are getting much more tolerable.”

  Pursing his lips, he nodded his head. “I’ll be sending you home with a script for oxycodone, which is not as strong as the pain meds you’ve been getting here. I’d like you to try to wean yourself off of it, however, since it’s highly addictive. You don’t want to borrow more problems in trying to solve those you already have. Ibuprofen might be enough to keep much of the pain at bay, so you can try that during the day and maybe take the stronger stuff at night so you can sleep.”

  “OK,” she agreed meekly.

  He lowered his hip onto the edge of the bed. “This wasn’t the first car accident you’ve been in, was it? Your x-rays and scans showed evidence of past traumatic injuries.”

  She looked at him as she felt curls of panic begin to rise that she quickly flattened. “I can’t... Maybe there was another… I’m really not sure, Doctor.”

  “It looks like your broke the same wrist before, unfortunately, so this break was more serious, which is why we couldn’t use a splint. Do you remember ever wearing a splint or cast?”

  She paused for a protracted moment, concentrating. “I don’t… maybe.”

  He jotted down a few notes on her chart and then looked up again. “What about your memory? Any new developments?”

  “Not really. I remembered a few small things since last we spoke but nothing major. It’s weird, though. There’s no, like, pattern to the recovery… like, it’s not sequential or anything. Is that unusual?”

  “I don’t think there’s any right or wrong way to recover from memory loss. As long as there’s progress, I’d say we’re on the right track.”

  “Yeah, it’s just that at first large chunks came back, but lately it’s just been fragments here and there. It’s so frustrating.”

  “I know,” he patted her hand. “But you’re doing remarkably well, so let’s be pleased about that and take it one day at a time. Are you keeping the journal?”

  She flushed. “I started it on a scrap of paper, but I can’t find it now. When I leave, I’ll buy a book and be more systematic about it.”

  “Good.” He arched his unruly eyebrows. “Well, I’ve come with good news. I’m discharging you tomorrow. Do you have someone who can pick you up and take you home?”

  “I think my frien… um…” she felt her face go hot at her slip-up… “my sister can come get me. I’ll get in touch with her.”

  Dr. Lavelle smiled. Jane figured he knew about the lie that she and Mel had been hiding behind but he didn’t call her out on it. “Very good. I’ll sign your discharge papers so you can leave first thing in the morning.”

  “That sounds so good. Thank you for all that you’ve done for me, Dr. Lavelle.”

  “You’re very welcome. I want you to follow up with your GP and I’ll need to see you again when the neck brace and wrist cast come off within a week or two. I’ll have my office staff contact you to set up an appointment.” He stood up. “Good luck, Jane.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Lavelle. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

  He chuckled as he backed out of the room.

  ******

  As soon as he was out the door, Jane plucked her new phone from the table. Mel had brought it two days before after picking up her parcels. The nurses brought her handbag to her last week, and her phone was not among the effects. It was a crushing blow because Jane had no idea of who the friends and colleagues listed in her contacts were and whose numbers were now lost forever.

  The call went to voicemail. “Mel, please, please, please come get me in the morning? My
doctor is discharging me.” She was about to disconnect but then kept talking.

  “I want out of this room. So bad. I want to go back to the new house I barely remember,” she chuckled. “Call me when you get this message.”

  Her spotty memory was nothing to laugh at, though. What she told Lavelle was true: sometimes bits and pieces, sometimes large tracts of her memory were restored to her, often unexpectedly. Only yesterday, she was able to recall her high school graduation, and remembered Sulu Stanton, her best friend in high school.

  Pretty much her only friend in high school.

  Packing on an extra twenty-five pounds during the wretched affliction known as middle school, Jane was already overweight when she arrived in high school. Even worse, she had never possessed a sparkling personality to compensate for where she lacked physically. The very first day Eleanor Constantine, a girl with the shiniest long black hair and a dimpled smile, picked a fight with her in the cafeteria over a bottle of iced tea they both reached for. That incident set the tone for her entire tenure at middle school and high school afterward. There wasn’t a single social success, not a one.

  The thing that completely ensured her misfit status was that she was also smart, another cardinal sin on the high school popularity measurement chart. Sulu Stanton was of a similar constitution, so they relied on each other for moral and academic support, together making it through the ravages of the war zone that was high school albeit with plenty of scar tissue. Occasionally they were joined by the bizarrely tall Tara Rehnquist, another outcast who was a year older than they were.

  Jane could remember up to the first year of high school with startling clarity but very little afterward. Last week, though, Jane started to remember Melanie in more detail. When she first came to see her, Jane somehow recognized her without quite knowing why. Pretty quickly, Mel became more familiar, but in the beginning, it was frightening. The weird thing was that she was able to remember Mel but not much else about her life post-ninth-grade. Moreover, she couldn’t say how long they’d known each other or even how they’d met.