Transplant (© Biswapriya Purkayastha)
Page 1 This is darkness, and it is pain. I think I moaned just
now. I can’t be sure, because this throbbing in my head is so awful I don’t
think I’ve ever had this bad a headache, not even when I had migraine. What on
earth happened? Is it a hangover? I don’t
think I’ve ever had this bad a hangover. Besides, I don’t remember drinking. I don’t remember
anything. The darkness fades to
reddish brown. How did that happen? I can’t think how it happened. I hear a voice, faintly
through the pain. It seems to be a very long way away. "She’s awake," it says. The reddish brown goes
redder, brighter. "Can you hear me?" someone says, closer than the other voice.
I think I just moaned again. "Open your eyes if you
can hear me," the voice says. My eyes? Of
course. That reddish glow must be a light, shining on my eyelids. "Open your eyes," the
voice repeats, insistent. I try. My eyelids won’t
open. They either weigh a ton, or else someone’s kept them tied down with
hooks. "Her lashes moved," the
first voice says. It’s lighter than the second. Female? Who is she? Where am I? Who am I? I can’t remember. "She probably has some
pain," the second voice says. It’s heavier, more formal-sounding, probably
male. "That’s why she’s whimpering." Some pain? That’s a laugh. "Monica," the second
voice says. "Monica, can you try and open your eyes please? Just for a while?" Monica? Is that who I am?
He wants this Monica person to open her eyes, and if I’m Monica, then I ought
to try and open my eyes. I make a superhuman effort. The dull red glow is
split in two by a dazzle of yellow. It sears through to the back of my head,
turning the throb into white-hot agony. This time I do scream.
I can hear it, echoing in my head. But nobody else seems to hear me. "That’s very good," the
male voice says. "Now open just a little wider." Wider? Dear gawd. I can barely make it this far. "I don’t think she can,
Doctor," the female voice says. Doctor? What’s happened to me? I have no time to ponder
this question. "She’ll just have to do it next time then," the male voice says.
I feel a touch – a very slight one, filtered through the pain – on my eyelid
and the band of dazzling light banishes the red glow completely. "Pupillary reflexes
normal," the male voice says, letting go of my eyelid, and the red glow returns
immediately again. It’s a familiar friend by now, as is the throbbing pain. Both
are preferable to the agony that comes with the blinding yellow light. "It must
have integrated, then." There’s a lot of satisfaction in his voice. "You’re a lucky young
woman, Monica," a third voice says, of gender undeterminable."If it hadn’t been
for these..." But the darkness is
creeping back again, like an old friend, and I don’t want to listen. Letting
myself go, I sink away.
This time the pain is much less, down to a dull ache
around the circumference of my head. And the weights are gone from my eyelids.
Opening them isn’t easy, but the white-hot agony doesn’t burn me like last
time. At first I can’t see.
Everything is blurred, wavering, as though I’m under a waterfall looking out. I
can make out something off-white, looking very far away, and a couple of dark
masses closer to me. Then, like a camera focussing, my eyes suddenly adapt, and
my vision clears. I’m in a bed, on my back,
looking up. The off-white thing is the ceiling, featureless white concrete. The
two dark masses resolve into people. They’re nobody I’ve ever seen before, two
women, one in a white coat, the other in a nurse’s uniform. They both have
surgical masks on, and are both looking at me with peculiar attention. [ Continue to page 2 ] |