Untitled Novel-Prologue and Chapters 1-2

Prologue:

I’ve learned to realize that the small moments we are presented with should be received with much larger amounts of gratitude. Like that one video of your former best friend laughing may be the one thing that can brighten your day and that junky car your dad used to drive around in contains all of your favorite childhood memories. And sometimes, these moments cannot be defined in material objects and they must be subject to only a memory. A memory, which is stored in the mysterious human brain. The brain, which is tirelessly studied but never fully comprehended.

Now, these small moments that you so preciously guard are not always protected. That the small pieces that hold your life together may evaporate and leave the roof of your establishment crumbling. You have nothing to build on, because your foundation has been taken away. The foundation is what every principle is based on, what every idea evolves on, and what anything stands on. Without the pieces, you have nothing.

That’s what I learned when I woke up on a New York City Street, November with a lost identity.

…

Chapter 1:

I woke up and it was wet. Not drenched, but a soggy, clammy, cold kind of wet. I felt a bump throbbing on my head and realized I was on the side of some pavement. No cars, so it must have been an ally. I struggled to sit up and my full body protested like when you wake up the day after a grueling workout session. It was dark too. The city lights were the only source of light as the apartment windows were all dimmed and shuttered. Dim enough to let me know it was after hours. What was I doing here? I searched my pockets for a phone, wallet, anything. I came up empty. I should go to the hospital, I thought. Where is the hospital? Sarcasm kicked in just in time. At least I still had that. I got up and started walking around the dull paved corner. The bright signs would surely lead me somewhere, I reasoned. Fifteen minutes of walking, and I found it.

I went to the emergency room and found the lady at the sign-in desk. I couldn’t have described her more than “typical”. She had the middle-aged brown hair and the dull brown eyes with little secretary glasses and an unpleasant smile to top off her wrinkly face.

“Hi.” My greeting.

The handover of a cardboard clipboard with about thirty papers attached. Her greeting.

I made my way over to an unsatisfying chair and stared down at the black and white letters before me.

Reason for check-in. I blanked. Why was I here? Why hadn’t I gone home or...wherever I was supposed to be? Ok skip that question, I thought. My eyes skimmed to the next section: Personal Information.

Name. I poised my pen mid-air. Name. What was my name? I had an inner-panic attack.

It must have been an hour or two that I stayed in that chair. My eyes struggling to make sense of what they were reading and my brain struggling to make sense of who I was. After the said two hours, I got up and handed the clipboard back. I had filled in the spot with “Reason for check-in” with amnesia, and had left everything else blank.

Two hours later and here I was now sitting on one of their examination chair-table thingys. You know, like they’re supposed to be chairs but they’re always leaned all the way back and flat to make them look like a table? Deceiving things, aren’t they? There was a stubble-faced doctor in front of me, the white coat and all. He questioned me as often as a detective would, but softer in order to glaze the illusion of aggressive.

“And you say you have no recollection of who you are or whatsoever?”

Nod.

“Name, address, your parents’ names?”

“No.”

“Where did you say you woke up again?”

“At the side of some pavement. In an alley. I was still in a haze when I walked here, I didn’t think to read the street signs. Not far.” My voice was calm and reasonable even though my instinct told me to just let it wobble, succumbing to the sobs I felt at the base of my throat. However, I wasn’t ready to lose my pride or dignity although I had lost any recollection.

He gave me a concerned look. “Ok, well you didn’t have any I.D. on you, and you only have that bump, a minor head wound.” He cleared his throat. It made me uncomfortable. He was a doctor in New York, wasn’t he supposed to have been exposed to these kinds of things before? Shouldn’t he have been more experienced? Couldn’t just someone anyone just for once tell that they KNEW WHAT TO FUCKING DO? Huh, at least I still remember profanities. “Well, here’s what we do.” The doc continued. “We’ll run some tests to find out what we can about you and also contact the police to see if anyone has filed any missing person descriptions that we can match up with you. I’m afraid they won’t come right away as this isn’t a high priority case but I’m sure we’ll get someone here to come and look at you.” The last words hung in the air, not so comfortably. Look at you, I mulled, as if I were a specimen or an exhibit at the zoo. “We’ll take care of you.” He added.

Then, they led me back to a waiting room. The walls were a light pink and the chairs were no more comfortable than in the other room I was in, but my head was tired and my body was exhausted. I wanted to escape from it all and leave this horrible situation I found myself enclosed in. I closed my eyes as I felt the whir of some air conditioning unit come to life nearby and fell into slumber.

…

Chapter 2

I woke up with a gentle prodding, a nudge of someone trying to wake me. It instantly bugged me. “What?” I croaked.

I looked up and the doctor was in front of me. He gave me a reassuring smile. “The tests have indicated that you’re an A positive blood type and you have no known disease, so you are a healthy human being. From data results, they confirmed that you have blonde hair, brown eyes, and you are approximately eighteen years of age.”

I gave him a look that said you better not have expected me to process all of this by now. But no, he just continued to plow on through.

“The police also came through and they could find no matching warrants for anyone in this or surrounding areas. You are ready for discharge here, and since you are a legal adult we have no other option than to release you.”

“Release me? It’s not like you were exactly restraining me.” And I got up and left.