Sunflowers

It is about ten in the morning when I look up from my book and realize that I do not know my name. I know it has been used recently-as recently as yesterday- with friends and coworkers whose names I recall quite clearly. Yet, when I try to imagine their lips moving, shaping my name, I cannot recognize a single movement as familiar. I glance down at the book I am reading. It is more of an encyclopedia, classifying and enumerating different bird species in North America. But I have read it many times, always engrossed in the Latin spellings and habitat descriptions as one would expect to be in a thrilling mystery novel. My eyes scan the page’s paragraphs detailing the life of a particular bird- Grus Canadensis- but I see no trace of familiarity within the words concerning what I call myself.

It is about ten thirty when I’m reduced to calling out random names into my empty kitchen, hoping to catch at least a syllable that sounds right. Paul, Marty, Alex, Alec, William, Jonathan, Bill, Grady, Ben, James… I continue until I cannot think of another name. It’s ten fifty. I look around my kitchen. Surely my name must be written somewhere; printed on an official letter, scribbled on a notepad, some kind of trace evidence. Something as fundamental as a name could not have just disappeared, leaving the man and the life behind.

I stand up from my wooden chair, closing my book. I head towards the front door, where next to it lies a small basket with my recent mail. No lights are on- I sift through the envelopes and letters under the hazy blue light coming through the frosted windows. I am too distracted by my mail to notice that late mornings are not supposed to emit blue light.

Nothing. No name at all, on any of the envelopes. Where my name should be there is just white space. My façade of calmness begins to crack at the edges. What is my name? Why isn’t it on my mail? Is someone playing a trick on me?

More frantically than before, I search the rest of my house. There is not much to search. There is the foyer, the kitchen, a small living room, a bathroom, and two bedrooms, one of them converted into an office space. I make my rounds through the kitchen and bathroom first. In the living room I flip through notepads and books and search on and under every surface in the room. In the office I tear through every file, journal, and card and see no name where there should be a name. My name. I listen to the voicemail on my landline. Nothing. When I am convinced my name is not printed anywhere in my office I almost run to my bedroom. The walls are a dark amber color, something you might expect to see in a sunset. My bare feet sink into the carpet as I dash from corner to corner, attempting to find some trace of who I am. There is nothing.

I sit on the edge of my bed, trying to think of a solution. What do you do when you remember everything about yourself but your name? Remember everybody else’s name but your own? I stand up. That’s it. Someone else will remember my name.

Hurriedly, I throw shoes and a jacket on and leave my house. The light is no longer blue, but a radiant white. I walk to where I know a friend will be; the café. Every Saturday Seamus is seated at the corner table by the granite carving of a naked lady all day. The café is three blocks away from my house, an easy walk. In what feels like no time I am walking through the glass doors and waving to Seamus, who smiles and waves back. He is exactly where I knew he would be, with papers and pens spread across the table, a steaming mug haphazardly set near the edge.

“Hello,” Seamus calls out as I sit across from him. Many of the papers are half filled with his small scribbles.

“Hello, Seamus. How are things today?” I feign a coolness and ease that I in no way possess at that time. He nods in response to a question I did not ask, staring intently at his scribbles. He is often like this- so apart from this reality that you would think he’s taken residence in another one, offering his physical presence simply as a courtesy. I wait a minute or so before I speak again. “What is my name?”

This startles Seamus. He looks up, incredulousness spread across his features. As he opens his mouth to answer, he freezes, and doubt wipes away all details of his face. Then an unsettling discomfort. “I-I… I can’t seem to recall.”

A dense cold begins to seep into my core. It is dread, the feeling of knowing something terrible and inevitable. Without a real reason I know that if Seamus does not know my name, no person whom I ask will remember, either. In a way I am relieved. I do not know how I would feel if I asked every person in this town what my name is, and not a single one of them could tell me. I would rather learn of this loneliness theoretically and not experimentally.

Forgetting my name has caused Seamus to revert entirely back to his other reality, distress painted on his face. I leave him there, and walk numbly out the door. I look back in the direction of the café as I walk, and something catches my eye, causing me to stop. At the edges of everything I see in the distance, there is a thin black aura emanating from the buildings, the sky, my very vision. The day feels silent and ominous all of a sudden; I do not know how to react. Things seem very uncertain, as uncertain as my name.

“Hey!” A bright voice chirps behind me. I turn. It’s Teresa, a coworker of mine who lives in the same neighborhood. She must be heading out somewhere.

“Hello,” I respond, hesitating. Would she remember? Could she understand what’s happening?

“How are you? How is Marie?” She is a very enthusiastic talker, I think. That’s why she’s so likeable at the office.

“I’m well. And how is who?”

Her face wrinkles for half a second before maintaining her wide smile. “Your daughter, of course. How are her classes?”

I tilt my head a little, my brows coming together. She must have me confused with someone else. “I don’t have a daughter. You must have me confused with someone else.”

Teresa nervously laughs. “Are you playing a trick on me? If that’s the case, it’s a terrible one. Everyone knows Marie!” She laughs again, convincing herself that I’m joking.

“What is my name?” I ask. Surprise contorts her face before she returns to her smile.

“Another trick, huh? Well, it’s…” she stops mid sentence, and the smiles fades slowly from her pink lips. “Oh my.” She folds her yellow cardigan across her front, a nervous habit she’s had for years. “I was thinking it just a minute ago. I’m so sorry, I can’t seem to remember.” She seems disturbed; she briskly walks past me. “I apologize, I must go.” I turn to watch her, and see that half the sky is black. I follow the blackness to its edges and see it’s covered a lot of the town as well. It’s nearly at the café.

There is no way to describe the emptiness this encroaching blackness emanates. It is like an approaching army of silence and nonexistence- I cannot fathom even running from it. In the window, I see a crouched figure at a table next to a sculpture of a naked woman through the window. I do not know this man, but I feel as if I should warn him of the darkness. I jog past a woman in a yellow cardigan until I reach the café. The darkness seems to be right behind it. I can hear a low humming coming from the massive void. I try to look into it, but I only become dizzy as I try to concentrate.

My feet stop moving. Even when I try to run- towards or away from the café, I do not know- they do not obey. They merely stick to the ground and force me to watch this darkness engulf its prey.

It seems that the people enjoying their coffees and teas do not even realize what is happening. One moment they are sipping something from a steaming mug, or scribbling frantically on a piece of paper, and the next, tendrils of black emptiness wrap like vines around their arms, torsos, legs. The tendrils then expand until the last thing untouched- the gleaming eyes of a fearless writer- are absorbed into the dark.

It is then clear to me that everything touched by this darkness ceases to exist once past its border. A duet of fear and horror play thunderous dissonant chords in my head until I force myself to move, to run, to get as far away as possible from the enclosing darkness.

I run home. That is the only place I am safe. As I run I notice that the darkness has circled the town, and now it is closing in on some center point. The faster I run, the closer the dark slithering tentacles seem to reach.

By the time I reach my front door, the void is at the ends of my block. I look at my door and think absently that I don’t actually recognize it as my own. But my feet have led me here, so I automatically walk through.

I lean against the front door, breathing heavily. The foyer almost glows blue from the light seeping in through the frosted windows. Only now do I really notice that that is not supposed to be the case. The air is thick and silent, the kind that holds memories together in old houses such as this one. For a moment I do not think of how I can’t remember my name or why I know this house is mine when it is so unfamiliar. I think of an image: a field of sunflowers and a young girl with silky brown hair in a grey dress smiling at me. The sun lazily drifting across the light blue sky. Freckles, so many freckles. For that small, tiny second, I am in another world. I close my eyes and smile, thinking of the sunflowers and the girl.

A small tendril wraps around my pinkie.

I yank my hand away and jump away, my eyes wide in terror. The door is surrounded by the black aura I first saw so few minutes ago, and I watch it turn into dark nothingness. I back away more, and glance into the kitchen. I don’t remember ever being in this kitchen, but something tells me to step inside it, despite the dark aura surrounding the windows and cabinets. I see a book on a table- something about birds. For some reason this book is important to me, though I can’t recall why. As the walls are swallowed, I snatch it and step into the hall.

All around me the darkness approaches, except for right behind me. This darkness, it seems to be corralling me to one area, one final destination before devouring my skin, my mind. Slowly it advances, and forces me into a bedroom with amber walls. I can only guess that it’s mine. I back away from the hall into the room, sitting on the bed. As I do, the hall disappears- there’s only a final, thick void now. I glance at a clock next to the bed. Eleven forty. Almost noon, yet there is only total darkness in this room. Clutching the book, I close my eyes. I don’t need to see to feel the tendrils snaking through the door hinges, across the walls, through the carpet. Sunflowers emerge in my mind. A girl in a grey dress with grey eyes. These things are the only things that occupy my head now. I do not even remember that there is such a thing as memory. Only sunflowers and freckles.

As the tendrils wrap themselves around me, I am no longer scared. I am calm, at ease. The only thing I see is the girl laughing, smiling, dancing in the sunflowers. The only thing I feel is adoration for this girl. As I am completely taken over by the nothingness, I wonder who she is.

- - - - - - - - - - -

“Time of death is nineteen o’ six,” the doctor states, glancing at her watch. How many times does she have to look at her watch to indicate a death? Does she think only of death when she looks at it other times?

I look at the frail body in the bed. He looks too skinny. Too pale. A nurse sits next to me, places a soft hand on my back. She says something that I assume is meant to comfort me, but I just stare ahead until she sighs and gets up to resume her duties.

“Is there no one else who can be here with you?” No. “Do you have any other living relatives?” Some cousins in LA. “Is there anyone else we can notify about your father?” No, I’ve got it handled. “Do you want to talk about it?” Not really.

The doctor informs me of my responsibilities now that he’s passed. The process. She even gives me tips on things unrelated to the hospital procedures.

“Doctor?” I interrupt her in the middle of her sentence. It was something about buying a slot at the cemetery. “What goes through his mind when he’s in a coma? Does anything?” I bite my lip. “Did anything?”

The doctor half smiles. “This may not sound very encouraging, but we still know very little about what a person experiences during a coma. Many people don’t remember it at all. Some have claimed that they could synthesize information about their surroundings, such as being able to hear people talking at their bedside. Some say that they were in an endless dream-like state. In the end, we don’t really know. We can only hope that your father’s experience was peaceful.”

I stare across the room at my father. His expression is slack, but if I let myself, I can imagine the slightest hint of a smile on his lips. I sigh. “He has a friend,” I say to the doctor. “Seamus Overmann. I’ll have to let him know. I’ll have to contact his office, too. They’re all still hoping that he’ll wake up, and I have to tell them that they’re hoping for something impossible.”

The doctor says nothing, which is exactly what I need her to do. I don’t feel anything; I don’t allow myself to. “No one in that town has even seen me for over five years. They’ll know right away when they spot me. They’ll say to themselves, Look, Marie’s Here, Where’s Her Father? Where’s George? Why Would She Leave His Side? And then I’ll have to greet them with a memorial invitation.”

The doctor understands what I’m doing, even if I don’t. She’s seen it hundreds of times. She knows that the only way to keep myself from breaking apart in this cramped hospital room is to crowd my mind with a thousand other things, a thousand trivial, meaningless things.

I know that soon I will have to stand up and pretend. Pretend that I can handle this by myself. Pretend that I can bury both of my parents before the age of 25 and not want to unspool my existence and join them. Pretend that my heart is not turning as grey as my steely eyes at this very moment.

But for now, I just stare. I stare at a speck of yellow on the white walls above my father’s head. It makes me think of the sunflowers that used to grow in a field near our house, when the town was a little smaller. Every summer I would spend all afternoon there, painting them in little watercolor journals. Sometimes I’d paint the bugs that squirmed in the dirt beneath the protective yellow petals. Every day there would be a new wondrous thing to explore in that field; every day I would march home completely caked in dirt and filled with adventures to tell my dad.

I smile. I would want to dream of that field, I think. If I were to pass away in a coma. That’s where I’d want to be, clasping the thumbs of my parents with my tiny hands. Letting the sun slowly drift past the horizon and not care about a thing except what new adventures I’ll have. I look at my father, still and cold in the hospital bed. I close my eyes.

I hope you’re having all the adventures you could ever dream up, Dad. I’ll want to hear about them someday, so make sure they’re good.

I stay there like that, eyes closed and perfectly still, until there is only a calm nothingness in the room, permeating the air. I know now that this is what peace feels like.