Mr. Nobody(39)

His eyes dart around the room again, searching for something to trigger a memory.

Remember! Remember something.

He looks back out to the hallway. She’s holding a file now, some notes, she’s nodding as she flicks through the sheets of paper. She’s a doctor. Okay. Is that good? She’ll be coming any second and he can’t remember who she is or why this is all so incredibly important.

Is she dangerous? Should I run?

He flicks his eyes across to the only other exit in the room. The large floor-to-ceiling windows, rain-spattered. He is on the second floor. Outside the insistent glow of the hospital the pale sky hangs listless. In the distance, the blur of dark treetops, a forest.

    His breath catches in his throat. A forest.

And then it comes. A memory.

…the cold of a forest.

The tiniest flash of memory; he squeezes his eyes shut, chasing it. He’s running through a wood, at night, running fast over the slippery mulch of the forest floor, his chest heaving, his throat burning as he struggles to catch his breath. Underfoot twigs snapping, his clothes snagging on branches, the echo of his footfalls resounding through the deep chill of the night. His heart is pounding. And then he hears something else. Another person’s breath, right next to him, the soft gasp of it. A girl’s breathing. Labored, scared.

His eyes flash open.

Oh God. That doesn’t seem right. That doesn’t seem good. What does it mean? Why am I running?

Dread fills him. Something is very wrong with what he just saw. He looks up now at the hallway. Someone is pointing over in his direction, saying something he can’t quite make out, and suddenly she is looking straight at him. Her eyes locking with his. All her focus on him.

Her expression flickers, she seems to sense his fear, he can read it on her face, her concern, her empathy. But who is she? Her face shows the briefest flash of confusion.



* * *



—

Emma looks back at the patient sitting at the far end of the dayroom, silhouetted against the pale glass of the windows. Behind him the rain-soaked landscape rolls all the way to the North Sea. He is watching her. But it’s the way he is watching her. His expression. He recognizes her. She feels a flutter in her chest. Does she know him?

The look in his eyes, it reminds her of someone a long time ago—but it can’t be, it can’t be him. That would be impossible. She knows it’s not him. He’s gone. Long gone, one way or another. The patient doesn’t even look like him, he’s too young to be him, his features too dark, too chiseled. The man she knew was softer. But the eyes, the eyes have the same quality. She tries not to let herself think it but…but there’s definitely something about him. An understanding of what went before.

    She then does something without even thinking: while the nurse beside her talks on, she nods back directly at the man. It’s almost imperceptible, but he sees it.

His breath catches in his throat.

He remembers the warning he was given. Don’t fuck it up.

Easier said than done.

You need to speak to her. So you have to remember.

She says something to the nurse, smiling, and she starts to make her way toward him.

She’s coming.

His heart is racing now, adrenaline sizzling through him. He rises from his seat as the prickle of pain in his skull spikes. A fresh throb of it rips through his head; the room spins out beneath him and suddenly he’s falling. His palms and knees smacking down hard onto the plastic flooring. The dayroom swirls around him, in and out of focus. His eyes find her somehow, her shoes nearing as she runs to him, then her hands touch his shoulder and finally her face comes into view, inches from his, the unexpected warmth of her breath on his cheek.

“Can you hear me, Matthew?” she says.

And just like that her name comes back to him.



* * *



—

Emma can’t quite make out what he says, it’s mumbled. The patient’s breath coming in loud snatches as he tries desperately to stay conscious. She leans in closer to catch it, her ear close to his lips.

He says it again.

“Marn?”

She pulls away sharply to look at his face, her eyes wide in shock; she needs to see the look in his eyes as he says that, to see who he is, to see what he means. But she is too late. As she pulls back, he crumples down in front of her, unconscious.

    Emma orders the junior doctor to monitor the patient; blood pressure and vitals are taken. According to the patient’s notes he’s blacked out three times since he was admitted eight days ago. Emma reassures the ward staff that the patient’s losses of consciousness are most likely the result of stress response. But she instructs them to test for the usual physical causes—cardiac, neurological, orthostatic, metabolic, or drug-related—to be safe.

She doesn’t mention the look the patient gave her just before he collapsed. And she certainly does not mention what he said to her, or that he spoke at all.

As people had rushed to assist them it became clear that no one else had seen, or heard it. She had barely heard it herself.

If she heard it at all, she thinks. Because he couldn’t have really said that, could he?

He couldn’t know that name. They’ve never met; she’d remember meeting someone who looked like him. Besides, he would have been too old to have been at school with her back then, he’s about ten years older than her. The first time she saw him was online two days ago, when she googled his case after speaking to Joe. All her knowledge of her patient comes from her research, the grainy YouTube footage from the beach, the photos in the newspapers, and his medical records.