“Dr. Lucas Greene, age thirty-two, orphaned at six years old, Psychiatrist at Fort Hill, single…” I stared at Audrey, “… brother, uncle, I have a size—”
“Thank you, Luke.”
I guess he figured out where I was going with that.
“What is the last date you remember?”
“June, 1.”
They both looked at each other.
“What?” I asked them. This whole act was getting pretty frustrating quickly. What the hell was wrong with Seth? I could understand Audrey pulling shit like this. She was an opportunist. She’d do just about anything to be dramatic, but Seth. He was about as straight up as anything.
“It’s July, Luke,” Seth answered.
“What the hell? It is not. Give me your phone,” I demanded. Audrey handed her phone to me, and I noticed the calendar said July.
“Am I dreaming? I’ve got to be dreaming because this right here is as fucked-up as anything.”
“Luke, you’ve been in a coma. It could be why you’ve lost a bit of your memory.”
“For how long?” I couldn’t believe this.
“A month,” Dr. Richard said.
“What!” I crossed and uncrossed my arms. “This is impossible.”
“Luke, you need to rest. That is about all I can suggest. This may not make sense now. We don’t expect it to. But it will in time. Just rest.”
I leaned against the pillow and closed my eyes, willing everyone in the room to leave, and when I opened them, only Seth was there.
“What happened to me?”
He scratched his beard like he always did when he was in deep thought. “You were on your way home and got into a car accident. We thought you wouldn’t make it. I’m just glad you did. The rest of it will fall into place.”
I didn’t understand any of this.
I displayed all the post-traumatic signs.
I just didn’t believe it.
How is it that you find yourself living a life which doesn’t feel like your own? I had a wife who smothered me and a brother who now visited more than once a month. I hadn’t been out of the house in a while and still hadn’t found a way to process everything. But I was going to change that today.
I’d apparently never worked at Fort Hill. I was still working for the police force psychiatry division freelancing with my brother and was allocated a psychiatrist as part of the process.
She was a woman about my age and was apparently the best trauma counselor there was. I hadn’t told Audrey or Seth my plans, and I hated the way they watched me. I was not sick, and yet they treated me like I was. There were times, though, when I felt like I was losing my mind, so I stopped bringing up Alyssa because it seemed to upset Audrey, and Seth grew more worried.
I drove to the Fort Hill facility at ten o’clock. Everything was just as I remembered. If I had never been here before, why was everything about it still so vivid in my mind? It took a good ten minutes to have my credentials verified at the gate, and I didn’t recall security being that tight when I was here.
Matron Dean, a tall, stocky elderly woman, met me at reception, introducing herself as the head of the nursing staff at the facility. She acted like it was the first time we’d met. I knew all of this like I knew she confiscated valuables to sell them on the black market any chance she got. I knew she never married and had sex with the Head of Security, Mr. Peters, every Wednesday in her office.
“Dr. Greene, I am not sure how I can help you?” We were seated in her office with the best view of the mountain range. I’d spent the last fifteen minutes trying to convince her I’d worked here and treated patients, one of them was Alyssa Morgan. She was clueless and looked at me like she was going to make a recommendation for my admission.
“Can I see the facilities, my office, the room Alyssa stayed in?”
“Dr. Greene, you do not have an office here, but you’re welcome to look around if that’ll help,” she offered sympathetically. “I am truly sorry you’re in such limbo, and I am happy to help where I can.”
She led me down the familiar passage. My office would be at the end of it.
