The Love Note (Chapter Two, Heavily Edited)

Brad groaned and blinked open his eyes. Every part of his body ached, and the bright fluorescent lights glared down harshly. His head was fuzzy, and he couldn't figure out where he was. He tried to look around, but glaring white light seemed to come from everywhere, giving him a headache. On his left, his mom was sitting in a stiff-looking wooden hospital chair. Her head had drooped onto her chest and she was snoring lightly. As Brad looked at her, she opened her eyes, and immediately jumped up. "Brad? Oh thank goodness."

In a louder voice she called out, "Doctor? Doctor Smith, he's awake!" Brad gave her a puzzled look, and she quickly explained, "You were completely unresponsive. We were afraid you had gone into a coma. Do you remember the crash?"

Brad nodded, sending throbbing pain through his head. "Jus' a lit'le bit." He remembered seeing the eighteen wheeler, vaguely remembered the flipping over, but the most vivid memory was the pain.

Brad fell silent, and just watched the nurses run around checking their clipboards and scribbling furiously. His head still throbbed and he desperately wanted to go back to sleep. Before long, a thin old man with tufts of white hair and thick glasses hurried into the room. "Good morning, I'm Doctor Rosario. How are you feeling today Mr. Liftridge?" His voice was surprisingly deep.

"Mm head hurt."

"Headache? No surprise. That was a pretty nasty crash. You're a lucky young man. Just remember to thank Molly when you see her; she's the one that called us. Got paramedics there not five minutes after the crash."

Brad couldn't believe he was lucky, but something else the doctor had said surprised him even more. "Who M'lly?"

Dr. Rosario had bent to read the screen of one of the monitors by the foot of Brad's bed, but straightened up again as Brad spoke. "You don't know her? She gave the impression you knew each other. She knew your name, after all." He looked mildly curious as Brad painfully shook his head, but quickly returned to the monitor.

A memory of seeing a black-clothed girl through the windshield popped into his head, but was gone before he could grasp it.

Everyone quieted down, and a few moments later an old nurse with tightly pursed lips walked up to Brad's bed and forced two Aspirin and a glass of water into his good right hand. Without waiting for him to reply, she turned and hurried away, heels clicking on the linoleum. He gratefully swallowed them.

Suddenly Brad perked up, as much as he could. "Wha' time it? I'm mi' party!"

Dr. Rosario gave Brad's mom a confused look, and she answered, "Brad Sweetie, it's Tuesday. The party was three days ago. You, you-" her voice wavered and she was threatening to burst into tears again, so Dr. Rosario hastily took over.

"You were in a coma, we couldn't tell if you were going to recover or not. You went brain dead twice; you're very lucky. It's not often people survive after their car flips."

"Thank God you did," Brad's mom whispered.

Brad wanted to comfort his mom, but his head was throbbing and the conversation had drained him. He couldn't see clearly; the white lights seemed brighter than ever. Dr. Rosario looked at him knowingly. "You need more sleep. We'll leave you to rest." Gently, he led Brad's mother out of the room.

Gratefully, Brad closed his eyes, and was asleep in seconds.

Brad didn't know how long he slept for, but when he woke he felt much better. The throbbing white lights had faded to nothing but regular ceiling lights, and the painkillers were working nicely. He found he could sit up and look around more or less painlessly for the first time. As he did, a nurse near his bed smiled at him and rushed out the door, presumably to get the doctor. Brad remembered meeting him, though couldn't quite recall his name. Dr. Roscoe or maybe Dr. Robins.

On his left the chair his mother had been in was vacant, though the indention in the cushion suggested she had been there often. A hazy memory of an indent in the passenger seat flashed through his head and was gone. Though he tried desperately to remember the crash, everything after leaving Brittney's house was foggy.

On his right, the bedside table was covered in get-well cards and candies. Reaching out with his good right arm, Brad slowly went through the cards. One from his parents and a couple from his friendlier extended relatives. All the guys had bought him joke cards, and Christian's had "Congratulations, Birthday Girl" in a bold pink letters on the front. Shawn had left a sincere card. There were more from the rest of the football team, the coach, and a few of Brad's nicer teachers. Even Becca and Keren had left one, with a short note on the bottom saying they hoped he got better.

All the while, nurses were running around checking monitors and readings. He knew a nurse had given him aspirin, but he couldn't remember what she had looked like, only that she wasn't friendly.

In about a minute, the nurse that had left returned with the doctor in tow. He smiled when he saw Brad sitting up and reading his cards. "How are we feeling today, Brad?"

"Much better Dr.-" Brad trailed off, trying desperately to remember his name.

"Memory a little foggy? Not surprising. You landed on your head and you've been practically overdosed on painkillers for a week."

"It's been that long?"

"Not quite, but almost. You're parents have been worried sick. I think they believed you were gone."

Brad smiled weakly. "It takes more than that to take out the future quarterback."

Dr. Rosario nodded. "Well, I'll leave you to your thoughts. Push the call button if you need anything. Try to get some sleep. You need to rest." He started to walk out the door, then turned back, his eyes twinkling. "Oh, and don't be afraid to put the nurses to work," he added, much louder than necessary. A few of the nurses laughed. Smiling, he walked out of the room.

Brad decided to take the doctor's advice and go back to sleep; he was still extremely tired and the ceiling lights were starting to glare at him again. He closed his eyes and fell back asleep.

The next time Brad woke he felt stronger still. His head had completely cleared, though his memory of the accident still had not come back, and he was a little tender if he moved too fast. Suddenly there was a commotion outside the door to his room. There was some yelling, and Brad recognized the voice of one of the nurses saying, "I'm telling you, you can't go in there. He's asleep and he's weak." The old nurse with the stiletto heels burst through the door, followed by Kent and Arik. She looked extremely dismayed when she saw Brad was awake.

Kent, who had been looking over the nurse's shoulder, also noticed Brad was awake. He grinned. "Oh, hey, Brad. Sorry to hear you're asleep. We'll come back later when you're awake, okay?" Brad laughed, sending, a short spark of pain through his ribs.

Speaking to the nurse he said, "They're friends. Let them stay? We promise we'll be good?" He put a huge phony smile. Kent tried to do the pinky-promise with the old nurse. Without cracking a smile, she huffed and walked out of the room.

"Well ain't she friendly?" Arik grumbled. Grinning and turning to Brad he said, "You know Becca and Keren were asking about you at the party. They said to make sure we told you how much they hoped you got better."

Kent shoved him playfully, and accidentally pushed him into the wall, less than a foot away from an expensive looking computer screen. "He's lying. The party never happened. We were gonna make it twice as big since we thought you were gonna die, but when we found out you would pull through no one felt like partying no more."

"Hah. Hah," Brad muttered, throwing one of his many pillows at Kent with his good hand. it fell to the ground at least two feet away from where Brad had aimed it.

Arik laughed. "Man, you plan on bein' quarterback next year with that throw? Ashley's got better aim."

"Shut the hell up," Brad retorted.

"Now, now Bradley, watch your mouth. You'll break my poor old heart," Arik scolded in a scarily accurate imitation of Brad's grandma.

The old nurse came back in. "I'm sorry, but you have to leave now. The neighbors have complained about the noise." She didn't look sorry at all, and Brad suspected no one had really complained. Without listening to the protests, she ushered them into the hallway, closing the door behind her.

The room was too quiet with the departure of his friends, and for once he didn't feel tired after being awake this long, so Brad switched on the TV. It was, for a reason unknown to Brad, playing a Scottish band squeaking away horribly on bagpipes. He channel-surfed past Iron Chef, Spongebob, news, golf, and other programs Brad couldn't begin to guess at.

Finally he stopped at a semi-decent channel. Some station was playing a compilation of car crashes, and one had just started. Some teenage guy was driving a Volvo down a busy highway. That's funny, Brad thought. That looks a lot like my car. Suddenly the camera zoomed in on the driver. He was staring at something to his right, and was slowly drifting into the far lane. Brad hardly noticed; his blood had run cold. That's me. That's me driving my car back from Brittney's house.

As TV-Brad continued to stare intently at the empty seat, an eighteen wheeler came barreling around the bend, straight towards the Volvo. So that's how it happened? I saw something on the seat? Suddenly it all came back. He had seen the impression on the seat, and the airbag had been on. Then he had looked up to see the truck.

And that's just what TV-Brad did. A look of horror came over his face and he jerked the car back over into his own lane and off the road, hit a ditch, and began rolling. Brad hardly noticed. The thought that's me, just kept repeating over and over in his head.

His attention jerked back to the screen a few moments after the Volvo had stopped. TV-Brad was upside down and his eyes were open, looking out at barefoot girl clad in all black. The camera closed in on her face, which was split in a grin of delight. Brad recognized that face. It was the one he had seen, staring out upside down through the busted windshield. The face that had been so pleased to see him lying there, apparently dead. The face that Brad was sure was somehow connected to his almost fatal accident.

Except this time, something happened that Brad, who had sunk back into unconsciousness, hadn't seen. The look of delight on her face slowly faded away. A half crazed, half angry expression replaced it. Her eyes narrowed, not in anger, but in some emotion Brad couldn't quite place. Maybe fear, maybe regret, or maybe some mix of the two. Quickly, she snatched a cell out of her back pocket and dialed into the phone.

That must be her dialing 9-1-1, but that doesn't make sense. She was so happy to see I was almost dead; why did she regret it? Brad didn't know why she had chosen to save him this time, but he got the feeling that the next time, she would make sure he didn't bounce back.