The Glass Secret (Chain of Secrets) (12 page)

“Uh?” I shook my head, holding back my laughter. “No, listen...no one is trying to kill me for real. It’s a figure of speech...you know like in...
eat your heart out
?” I burst into laughter. He stared at me, intently. By the look on his face he was not amused.

“Miss Eden, you seem to use a lot of dark expressions. That is very disconcerting.” His eyes deadpanned, and lips tightened to a straight line.

What side of the plant am I on?
Certainly I was not in Kansas anymore. I could feel my eyes bugging out of my head. I squared my shoulders, sealed my lips, trying to take on more of a serious approach with him. Holding back my grin, I said, “I think we’re having nothing more than a communication problem.”

“Perhaps,” he said passively. I noticed his eyes flicked on the clock.

“Listen...I’m not a violent person at all, and a silly expression shouldn’t determine my state of mind.”

“I see. I am sorry my diagnosis has upset you.”

I spoke over him. “I’m not upset...but will be if I end up getting sued.”

He apparently was not listening very well.

“I haven’t concluded you are violent. All I said...is that you are showing tendencies. You’re definitely manifesting key symptoms of post traumatic stress,” he rattled on, “suppressing memories, you’re easily agitated, and possibly paranoia...if in fact, someone isn’t
really
after you.” He frowned then referenced my chart and then me.

Narrowing my eyes, I focused on peeling back a hangnail on the edge of my cuticle.

“Arrrgh...” I grumbled out of frustration. “I’m not angry,” I protested, speaking louder than I had anticipated, then immediately caught myself. “Listen, I’m not paranoid or suffering from any of those symptoms—I just need to get home. Besides, I think my memory is coming back.”

“I’m sorry, but I’m not prepared to release you. At least, not until we feel it is safe for you and for the safety of others, as well. I really think I should report to the authorities the incident with the man that had visited you earlier. This is for your own good.”

“What? Are you kidding me? That’s just stirring up trouble. I told you, I don’t know that man. Furthermore, you’re the one who said he entered my room by accident...remember? You can’t force me to stay here. Please, just give me my damn clothes, so I can get the hell out of here!”

“Miss Eden, there’s no need for profanity.”

“Then...” I huffed, relenting when I remembered an old friend’s words of wisdom: you get more honey with bees, wait, that wasn’t it, but close enough. The point was to be sweet. “Please, Doctor Tagorski, can I
please
make a quick phone call,” I asked in the calmest tone that was possible. At best, I figured I would call Nuilley as backup. She wouldn’t put up with anyone’s manhandling—shit. With her by my side, I would have been able to stand up to him, even in my weakened condition.

“After you’re assessed we’ll make arrangements for telephone privileges.”

“You have got to be joking. You can’t stop me from leaving...this is ludicrous!” I snarled, forgetting any past experiences where my quick temper would only make matters worse.
Fuck it!
I thought,
who gets injured then ends up imprisoned in a hospital? This is really bullshit!

-11-

What the hell!

While my temper soared through the roof, he remained calm and composed, almost too composed. He picked up a cord that was tucked in beside the pillow, which I hadn’t noticed earlier.

The next thing I knew the room filled with at least six nurses dressed in traditional white caps and gowns. One of the nurses carried in a small black box with sorted dials on it. A headphone gadget with metal connectors attached to the ends of the wires. The blonde nurse set it down on the side table. Two other nurses rolled in a chair-like bed, upholstered in black rubber.

What the hell?

My eyes widened. I felt my heart begin to thump wildly inside of my chest. I could not believe that less than a few hours ago I had just woken up from a terrible incident, and now I was scared to death.

This totally confirmed that humans could be the most frightening creatures of all. The irony of insanity is sane people do insane things. That was something to give further thought to.

“What the hell is going on?” I hissed angrily. No one answered me. They treated me as if I were invisible. I tried to push up to stand, but to no prevail, because two large breasted, heavyweight nurses latched onto me and held me down. “Get your fucking hands off me.” I screamed.

“Katharine, get the restrains.” Dr. Tagorski insisted, his voice lethally calm. In keeping with his mild demeanor, he called out to another nurse, “Let’s start out low...at 120kilometers.”

“What? Wait! No, please don’t do this,” I cried out, feeling my stomach drop to my knees. Adrenaline surged through my body. The bubble had burst. It was time to get up and go. Where would I run? I felt like a cockroach with nowhere to hide, yet directly in the path of a can of
Raid
! I was gripped with anxiety.

The nurse he called Katharine quickly unbuckled straps from beneath the bed. She couldn’t have been much older than twenty-three or so. Close to my age. When she stood, long strands of her shiny red-hair fell into her face. She swiftly brushed it back, when doing so her eyes caught with mine. A sympathetic countenance for my behalf splayed on her eyes. I could tell she felt sorry for me.

I needed someone on my side, someone to help me make sense of what was going on.

“Please, help me.” I mouthed to her as the other nurses scurried around the room, connecting wires into the small box that suddenly seemed larger than me. Pending doom grew in me; I knew something awful was about to happen.

One of the nurses shimmied behind the table and plugged a thick wire into the wall outlet. A good amount of electricity was needed to power up the little beast. My blood coursed through my veins so fast that it caused my breath to stop. The gates of Hell cracked wide open. I wasn’t ready to give in.

“What is wrong with you? Hold still,” one of the nurses barked demandingly.

Yeah, right...I don’t think so!

“Let go of me you...cows!” I wiggled, squirmed, and cursed at the two nurses who held me down. The chaos heightened. “You can’t treat me like some lab rat, that’s caged!” Then a voice of an angel interjected.

“Doctor Tagorski, may I please have a word with you?” Nurse Katharine daringly asked
.
He stopped dead in his tracks as if her small voice had the power to momentarily paralyze him. My eyes flashed at them as they stepped out of the chaos.

He seemed very interested in what she had to say. I wasn’t the only one that seemed curious, but, not in what Katharine had to say, but in the fact that Dr. Tagorski dropped his tasks at hand and followed in Katharine’s footsteps.

The young blond nurse who held my legs down released me and stared pointedly at the doctor. Her eyes narrowed, nostrils flared, and she blanched, turning to a notable shade of green. She covertly whispered something to the nurse closest to her.

“Doctor, what should we do next?” the blonde nurse called out trying to interrupt his conversation with Katharine. It appeared she was vying for Dr. Tagorski’s attention, too. With her attention on them, it gave me a few seconds to try to eavesdrop.

“Jane, you are one of the best interns on staff, and frankly if you don’t know how to proceed, then why don’t you leave the area and make room for someone that knows what to do.  I will discuss in
detail
procedure with you later.” Doctor Tagorski spoke harshly to her. The room grew silent; you could have heard a pin drop. All the other nurses stopped and stared at Jane.

“I just thought...fine Doctor,” Jane sassed back. She turned beet red, steam poured from every open cavity in her head. She threw her arms into the air and stomped out of the room.

How embarrassing that he reprimanded her in front of all her colleagues. I suspected two things, he knew she had purposefully interrupted them, and of course, he had extremely high standards when it came to medical procedures and expected the nurses to act accordingly. Nothing like teaching someone a harsh lesson, she’d know what to do next time that was for sure. Honestly I believed she knew how to proceed, but her jealousy got the best of her, and he made her pay for that one.

“Please, proceed Ladies,” Doctor Tagorski ordered in a soft voice to the remaining nurses, who were now all gaping with open
mouths, and then diverted his attention toward Katharine.

I eyeballed the doctor and Katharine as they spoke in the corner, across the room. Suddenly, I became acutely aware of a large presence hovering over me. A mannish looking nurse grinned down at me, preparing a syringe. My eyes widened, there was no time to brace myself. Without notice, the battle-axe nurse jabbed the long needle into my arm.

Oh shit, that hurt like a @#$@&%.
I wanted to curse her up one side and down the other. However, I refrained, after all look where my temper had gotten me. Justified or not, my fury found a cage.

I lay there so still, fat tears streaming down my face. I was trying to come to terms with the horrifying situation I may have to face. How did I find myself in such a deplorable place?

My eyes fell languid and closed as I spiraled into a hypnagogic state, half-awake and half-asleep. I could still hear whispers and rustling movements around me. However, I was unable to move.

“Hold up.” I clearly heard Dr. Tagorski order with authority. “Let’s just give her time to calm down before we go any further,” he said. Relief poured through me when I felt the palm of his hand pat my forearm in a comforting manner. “She’s such a spit ball of fire...like a comet that fell from the sky.”

A comet, someone had called me that once before.
In my current daze, I couldn’t recall who that was. I heard a few other nurses muttering on about how out of control I was.

Mean Bitches!

“Yes, doctor...but I think she might be more than a comet, there’s something special about her.” A female’s voice piped in. I was certain it was the nurse named Katharine. I recognized her melodic voice. I believed she saved me from having my brain scrambled like one big egg—then it hit me hard, the intruder, the man who had appeared in my doorway had definitely come to warn me!
Who was he?

-12-

No Service

The room grew silent, sucking me a million miles away. My eyelashes fluttered like wings against the eclipse of the narrow light; my reaction was to not fight it.

Clouded memories soared through my mind, and it felt like I was balancing on a pillar of light, looking down on the world, or was I viewing this from the outside in? Behind me there was blackness, accumulating a noir of bleakness. I felt watchful eyes on me from behind a smoky glass window. I had always felt like someone was watching me. It was a constant feeling that I wished sometimes would go away, but then I would be lost without an audience.



The loudest crack of thunder woke me from the unwarranted, induced trance I was under. I fought against the powerful drugs they had forcefully administered to me. I was hell bent on getting out of there. I struggled to open my eyes, and once fully opene
d, it felt as if I had on a thick pair of glasses.

My eyes darted around the hospital room. I was alone. I examined every inch of it the best I could. A thin light diffusing into the room from the bathroom had caught my attention. I noticed through the cracked door a small green locker. My curiosity heightened. This was something worth checking out.

I threw the blanket back and flipped out of the bed...when my bare feet hit the floor my knees buckled. I reached out and grasped onto a metal standing tray, it rolled forward, and everything, including my body went crashing to the floor. There was no way the nurses would have mistaken this as roaring thunder. I lay there on the cold vinyl tiles, breathless. What an epic fail.

“Ms. Eden...what happened, are you okay?” When I turned my head, my eyes came parallel with Nurse Katharine’s white nursing shoes. She quickly dropped to her knees to get a closer look at me. Her hands rapidly inspected my legs, ribs and arms for possible injuries. “Do you hurt anywhere?”

“Not anymore than I already did. I had to use the ladies room,” I lied, pressing up to my elbows.

“You should have called us on your buzzer—we’re here to help you,”—
Maybe you are, but I don’t think anyone else is
—“You haven’t walked on your legs in weeks and doing so without assistances could cause further injuries,” she said, quietly scolding me.

“Can you help me now? I need to go really bad,” I lied again.

“Yes, of course, perhaps I should call for help...but you’re such an itty-bitty thing—I think I can manage. Here slip your arm around my shoulder.”

“Thanks,” I said as she lifted me to my feet and helped me to the private bathroom.

“I can make it from here, thanks.”