Chapter Text
The first question you hear is a simple one.
“Do you know who you are?”
A woman in scrubs stands at the foot of your bed. She has kind eyes and a clipboard. She asks more questions.
“Do you know your name?”
“Do you know where you are?”
You answer the same way you answered yesterday.
“I don’t know.”
The words feel thin in your mouth. Not painful. Just empty. Like you’re reading off a script someone else wrote.
Every day you try to push for more.
Every day your head punishes you for it. A tight, sharp pulse behind your eyes warns you to stop digging.
The doctors tell you not to force it, but the silence in your own mind is loud.
Felix sits in the chair next to you again. Same soft posture. Same patient smile that never quite reaches his eyes.
He is, apparently, your best friend.
You don’t remember him.
He looks unreal, almost delicate. Hair that catches the light. A face that feels like it should be familiar. But when you look at him, something inside you stays blank.
He notices every time. He tries to hide the hurt.
It’s been a week. You only know your name because everyone keeps telling you it. They repeat it the same way they repeat the date, the hospital name, and the reason you’re here.
A drunk driver hit the side of Felix’s car.
You were in the passenger seat.
You took most of the impact.
They didn’t know if you would wake up.
They didn’t know what you would wake up as.
The doctors talk about traumatic brain injuries and wide ranges of outcomes like speech issues, mobility issues, memory loss, personality changes. Any combination. Or none at all.
You woke up with all your words, most of your movement, your reflexes.
Just no memories.
The doctors call it a miracle. You call it torture.
Felix shows you photos every day. He scrolls through albums full of bright colors and big smiles. The two of you squeezed together at concerts, in cafes, on rooftops.
Laughing. Hugging.
You look safe with him. You look like someone who lived a whole life before this room.
He tells stories to match each picture. Inside jokes. Trips you planned. Nights you stayed up too late talking.
He doesn’t push. He doesn’t beg you to remember. He just wants to give you the proof that you were real before all this.
But to you, he’s still a stranger.
A stranger who won’t leave your side.
He only goes home when the nurses remind him to.
He apologized for leaving yesterday.
He apologized for eating in the hallway earlier.
He apologized for anything that resembles taking care of himself.
Survivor’s guilt, nurses whisper when he’s out of the room. He wasn’t hurt in the crash. Not even a scratch.
You took everything.
He carries that like a weight you can see.
Now he leans forward, elbows on his knees, hands folded. He looks tired. Not physically. Just tired in a way that sits in the eyes.
“Do you want more pictures today?” he asks.
His voice is gentle. Hopeful. Careful.
You shake your head.
He nods once. Accepts it. Tries to smile anyway.
Outside the window, the sky shifts from morning gray to something brighter. Inside the room, the beeping machines keep their slow rhythm. You watch Felix fiddle with the ring on his thumb while pretending he’s not waiting for you to look at him again.
You don’t know him.
But you know he cares about you.