Chapter 2
You might be wondering why, of all the feeler accidents across the world at any given moment, I was drawn so intently to this one. You may also be curious as to why I had taken such an interest in Henry—who, by most feelers’ standards, would be considered dull or even forgettable. And you are probably questioning why I would take the time to tell you his story. Well, here are three things you must know, in no particular order:
First, I watch all feelers with great interest. I am not God, if that’s what you’re thinking. Seeing is simply what I do. I have many jobs to do, and I do them well, if I must say so. But seeing and remembering is a particularly poignant gift of mine. I’ve worked at it. As you might expect, my point of view makes it easier.
Secondly, Henry’s crash involved a remarkably resilient live oak tree which had become a reluctant participant in no less than eight feeler auto accidents prior to this one. I, for one, find this significant (the tree is thus far unconquered).
And third, every feeler is uniquely worthy of observation. None are dull. None are forgettable. Besides, it wasn’t Henry’s accident that enchanted me to the point that I should tell you his story. It was the wonder that followed.
(IMAGE)
Chapter 3
Needles. And broken sandbags. This is how he would describe it. Everything was dark, including his memory of what had happened. When the tiniest hint of awareness began to emerge, he could almost touch the profound absence of light. Then came the needles. It wasn’t completely painful either. His entire person was overcome with the sensation of hundreds of thousands of tiny needles gently pushing against his warm skin. Not enough to make him shout. Just enough to make him realize it and wonder who could possibly have gathered so many needles in one place. His brain thought to move, but he felt as if he were under a collection of sandbags. Broken sandbags because, when he tried to lift any one of his limbs, not only was he unable to move under what he was sure was an impossible weight holding him down—but that very limb would then experience a distinct sensation of sand spilling on and all around it. Then the needles returned. First, he tried his hands. No luck. Then his left leg. Same result. Then his right. You guessed it.
Because his head sensed the prickling feeling most distinctly, he wondered if he ought to attempt moving it all. He did. And something finally happened. A flash of pain. In an instant, a burst of blurred, bright light—just enough to allow him to see the outline of another feeler lowering a mask to his face. Then more needles—and this time the pain was excruciating. Then the blanket of darkness returned. Then nothing.
Henry’s mind remained cloaked in an impenetrable blackness for precisely 38 minutes and 52 seconds before any sign of light returned. If you cut this time into pieces, the slices would look like this:
1 minute and 41 seconds: Lisa witnesses the dramatic crash. The wind is vacuumed from her lungs as she stares in disbelief, slamming on her breaks, nearly flipping her own vehicle. She bounds out of her SUV toward her husband. Then, a small but startling explosion from the engine of the bike seems to thrust the air back into her chest as she screams hysterically, sprinting to his unresponsive and brutally battered body, a damaged helmet still on. She shakes his shoulders in desperate hopes of even the slightest response. One of her hands is immediately soaked in blood where the ground had sheared off the leather jacket and shirt beneath from his left wrist all the way to the side of his clavicle. Her other hand held to a roughened, but still existent, sleeve hugging Henry’s limp right shoulder. No response. The first of three bystanders arrives as she’s screaming for help. The sky still carried adequate light, though in short order I would begin my proverbial descent.
9 minutes and 4 seconds: An earnest feeler named Rita dials 9-11 standing between her blue sedan and the wreckage. A couple in their 60’s emerges from a second car and runs toward Lisa and Henry. One of them tends to Henry while the other kneels behind Lisa.
“Hang in there, dear!” A man implores Lisa as he places two clammy palms on her shoulders while she weeps uncontrollably. “My wife’s a doctor, she can help.”
This was true. He didn’t explain that his wife, Saundra, was a psychiatrist, far removed from triage demands she saw during her last year of medical school and intern year before residency. But calmness in chaos was a part of her. Once on a plane, he watched as she jumped to the aid of a seizing elderly woman and helped until the plane landed. Adrenaline in instances like this brought her back to her life-saving training and study of the body.
The physician had already removed her blouse and was using it as a tourniquet on Henry’s left leg, just above a indistinguishable mashup of skin, gravel, and cloth as mangled subcutaneous tissue is bleeding profusely.
“Demarcus, your shirt!” She demands.
The man quickly removes his green polo, and the woman presses down firmly on another mess of tissue and puddle of blood pooling just inside Henry’s left shoulder.
“What’s the status?!” She hollers to the woman on the phone, pushing harder on Henry’s gaping wound.
“It’s ah… any… Any minute now, they say!” Rita calls back nervously.
Proving her prophetic, the ambulance arrives.
The faintly clouded blue sky gently converts to an amber gray. Still, enough of my light remained to see easily.
2 minutes 38 seconds: This amount of time allows for the emergency responders to relieve the psychiatrist of her rescue efforts while the couple and Rita rush to keep a hysterical Lisa back as Henry is tended to. It was a struggle at first, her instinct to rush back to her husband. Then, shock settles in. The three helping feelers feel the terrified woman suddenly cease her frantic efforts to rip away from their grip. She slumps to her knees and softly begins to weep. In the sky, the first two stars become visible as any remnants of orange and red are chased away by night.
21 minutes and 1 second: The amount of time between the rescue team lifting an unconscious and blood-drenched Henry onto a stretcher and into the ambulance, and their arrival at the Medical University Hospital downtown. His heart stopped three times in route, the last time happening just as they pulled under a brightly lit awning at the crimson-bricked hospital. The entire sky was dipped in a brilliant navy (a personal favorite of mine), the moon arriving for her shift.
2 minutes 53 seconds: Hospital emergency team receives Henry into the ER, whisking him to the nearest operating room available for triage and life-saving efforts as a cacophony of hollered orders, chirping medical equipment, and noisily clanking rescue cart drawers are orchestrated in organized chaos. No one could see the sky.
1 minute 32 seconds: IV’s are placed and three shocks of the defibrillator are completed. The anesthesia team begins pushing meds just as Henry’s heart jolts to life on the third effort of the AED, only to return to flatlining a moment later. The OR is brightly lit with a white and pale-blue hue reflecting off the floor and all the silver equipment in the room, while overhead medical lights shine warmly down on Henry’s battered body-bordering-on-corpse.
3 seconds: Henry’s eyes burst open to a blinding light and agonizing jolts of pain for just three seconds, only to have the milky propofol in his IV mercifully send his eyes rolling back in their sockets. Darkness returns.
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