Page 55 of Inside Silence

I’ve never been this fucking bored in my entire life.

There’s only so much walking the halls I can do in this small regional hospital, and if I’m gonna spend forty-eight hours mostly in bed, I can think of a lot more fun ways to do that than by myself in this drab room.

Had a lot of time to think though, which isn’t always a good thing. Doubts creep in, self-recriminations, rehashing shit I can’t possibly change at this point in time. There’s no one to talk to, other than whatever nurse pops in to check my vitals. Tate stopped in for a visit yesterday with Roy, but after half an hour I started dozing off, and they hurried to get out of this depressing room.

The whole weekend, Savvy has been a big no-show.

All in all, I’m not in the finest of moods when Doc Wilson finally shows his face, this afternoon’s nurse following him into the room.

“Mr. Gaines. I hear you’re doing well.”

He doesn’t get more than a grunt from me, which he seems to take in stride.

“Excellent. This morning’s blood work looks good,” he continues. “No more dizziness? Blurry vision?”

“No.”

“What about the headaches?”

“Mostly gone.”

“Fabulous. Let me have a quick peek at the bump on your head.”

I turn the back of my head toward him and he lightly palpates the swelling that formed there. It’s a little sore, but I’ll bite off my tongue before I mention that to him. I want out of this bed.

“Still a bit swollen, it looks like a bit of fluid buildup under the skin from aggravated soft tissue. I expect it to disappear over time. There were no markers to indicate a possible infection in your blood work, and I don’t see any excessive redness around the wound either.”

He moves to the foot end of the bed and flips through my chart, marking something with a pen before handing it to the nurse.

“If you could get Mr. Gaines discharge papers ready? Include a flyer on wound care and a list of things for him to look out for relating to his concussion.”

I almost do a fist pump when he turns back to me.

“You’re good to go, my friend. Be smart and don’t rush back to work. I want you to take it easy for at least this coming week. Come and see me Friday for a quick checkup, and I’ll take those staples out as well.”

He shakes my hand and leaves the room, but when the nurse catches me swinging my legs out of bed, she stops me.

“Not so fast. It’s gonna take me a while to get the paperwork done, so sit tight. I still have to finish rounds with Doc Wilson before I can get to it, and you need to find someone to take you home.”

Shit.

Who the hell am I going to call? I go over the limited number of people I’ve interacted with since I’ve been back, but there really is only one person I’d feel relatively comfortable asking. I don’t want her to feel put on the spot though—I know she’s busy—so I send a text instead.

* * *

Hate to bother you, but any chance you could give me a ride home from the hospital?

* * *

I hope that gives her enough room to say no. I hate asking.

Of course, I start overthinking when I don’t hear from her immediately. Something I tend to do when I have too much time on my hands, like the entirety of the past two days. My mind shuts up when my hands are busy. I’ve been called a workaholic before, told I need to take a break, but in truth I can’t handle sitting still for very long, and this weekend has been taxing on me.

I’m recounting the holes in the ceiling tiles when, finally, my phone pings with an incoming message.

* * *

When?