Ghost white pain

I feel myself unable to stand without getting dizzy, a nauseas mixture of the worst sort of things set to my nostrils like an old feeling, a memory, burnt tire and gasoline, and then, fresh, salty air, and I find myself gagging, as the light burns my eyes.

“Fuck, where am I?” I mutter under my breath.

I stumbled from a grassy area and still feel half asleep, until I feel a free flowing exertion on my foot, and I realize it’s sand.

Sand? What the ever-loving hell?

I see the aching, smooth waves climbing on the shore, and my heart pounds and leaps into my mouth.

I remember being in the hospital. A ghastly bright spot light of radiating pain.

I remember the darkness, too. Being surrounded by whirling machinery and being enclosed in pitch blackness.

And now I’m on… land? On a beach? Where was this place? Hawaii? The Maldives?

I look up at the sky. It’s a huge deal for me to see such beautiful, fluffy white clouds and the pale sun peeking just barely out of the fresh blue, sapphire expanse. I never thought I’d see such a sight again.

It’s so nice to breathe in open, clean, salty air like this and I’m trembling, going to my knees.

Cancer.

That word stokes out a dying ember in my mind.

The flames inside grow and I lay on the sand.

I feel the smooth and warm sand tumbling and meshing with my body and I hear seagulls crying off in the distance.

I almost start to fall asleep when-

“Oy! What are you doing down there?” I look up and see a large grin and big brown eyes staring at me.

“I..uh, I’m not..” I get up and stretch my back and yawn, “I’m sorry,” I shrug nervously. “I was just resting. I’m not sure what is.. where I am.”

The man with long black and reddish dreads stares back and I feel so weak and shy, I’m not a big people person, yet I feel so close to spilling out my guts to him.

“What’s your name?” He asks and I sigh.

“Matthew. Yours?” I say as I see his hand extend to shake mine.

“I’m Kaycee, man,” he looks past my shoulders and at the sea after we shake hands briefly.

“Where… is this an island?” I ask, putting my hand on my head, I felt a wave of nausea hit me and I started to gag, throwing up a little on the sand.

I felt an arm over my shoulder and I felt Kaycee’s breath.

“Whoa, there, friend—-calm down,” he says and I frown, thinking about how someone I just met calls me a friend … but it soothed me.

I got my bearings and he nodded, “Yeah, mate, it’s an island. Not..” he says with a bit of concern on his face, “not sure where I am though, either.”

We stepped a few foot paces away from each other and when his arm left me, I felt a bit of a strange feeling like homesickness.

I shake off the feeling and frown.

“Maybe… we’re stuck in a dream..” Kaycee starts and I snort into a laugh.

He looks at me funny and I can’t stop laughing.

“Get off it, mate. You’re a bit of a funny duck, aren’t you?” He teases and I feel my face go warm.

“So-sorry, I just can’t believe this. None of it feels real. Where are you from?” I ask and take in a breath.

“The UK. You?” He fumbles with a braid and I feel my brain go blank suddenly.

“Uh, well… probably I’m from there too…” I mumble and he chuckles softly but looks at me in disbelief.

“You don’t remember where you’re from? Where you were born? What about your family? Do you have family?” He asks me and I feel overwhelmed and my mouth shuts.

He notices and gives me a gentle apologetic look. “Sorry, I’m trying to look calm and everything but… really, I’m freaking out here…”

His dark brown skin plays off the sunshine and I feel myself feeling another feeling—something like a gut feeling, and I go over to him and pat his shoulder.

“It’s alright, man,” I say lamely and he gives me a side eye, a slow smirk and an eye roll.

“Is that your way of calming down someone?” He laughs in an affectionate way.

I shrug. “Don’t know much else. Other than tough it out.”

“Must’ve learned from someone… who? Your dad?”

I blink at his correct guess and feel a rush of something that feels like pang to my heart.

“Yes, actually. He never knew how to comfort anyone. Only patted my back, my mum’s… not really did much else. Hugs were.. off the menu.. so to speak…” I keep over explaining and he nods.

“Usually are. I get that..” he kneels down and palms the sand.

“Do you remember anything at all, Kaycee, I mean.. before the island?” I ask, kneeling down next to him and our eyes meet.

He closes his eyes and sighs deeply.

“Uh… I remember my office. A stuffy place. I got a call. Had to rush out.” He frowns and I see him shuffling in the sand and sitting down. I sit down as well.

“And.. my boss, the sodding muppet… he was absolutely infuriated at me..” he laughed and opened his eyes. “Y’know how much he gets to me.”

I nod but then blink in shock. “I’m, umm… how would I know that?”

His lip moved up in a questioning and confused way. “Ah, I didn’t mean to put it that way. I only meant how bosses can get, I’m sure you understand.”

I nodded but I wasn’t convinced of his explanation.

“Well, anyway,” he continues, but I see he looks frazzled. “I had been rushing out of work a lot, if I recall correctly, and things were getting tense at my job.”

“Do you remember why?” I ask slowly, my heart thudding against my chest painfully.

“Emergency… lots of emergencies…” he placed his hands on his face and sighed in an exhausted way.

“About?” I sputter out, but I am afraid of the answer. I don’t know why.

“Well… I’m not sure. I do know I was zooming in my car. I remember… crashing…” he says and his eyes look at me and I frown. “I didn’t seem to be worried about myself though. Just wanted to get to the hospital.” He leans back and pulls his arms back and crunches his hands against the sand, eyes looking at the sky.

“Then… black…” he finishes and we both take in a breath together.

I pluck at my natural curls that are getting too long and bite my lip.

“Are you still struggling to keep that Jew fro in place, man?” He asks and my heart goes to my throat.

“Huh? What’d you say?”

“Oh. I… don’t know. That just seems like what you are trying to do with your hair when you do that. Keep it from roaming around too crazy. I’m sorry… I just… it came to me naturally…” he grumbles something unintelligible after and looks flustered. “Did I offend you?”

I shake my head. “Not at all. I’m just.. I am Jewish.”

“Oh. Cool..” he says quickly and looks away from me.

“Wanna get some shelter set up?” I feel the stress of the day starting to close and night settling in.

“In this improbable paradise? Sure.” He gets up and as I stand I stumble. He notices and helps me up.

“That’s a funny way to put it,” I say.

“So are your funny green eyes, pet.”

I feel a strong heat all over my body as he looks at me in an almost passionate way.

“Pet?” I say under my breath and he starts walking off.

“Uh… Kaycee? Where are you off?”

“Gotta find some stuff to make a fire, man!”

I nod and follow him.

We end up finding a fallen tree in the wooded area and he manages to pull off a good chunk of bark and bits of easier to take off wood pieces.

“And coconuts!” He grins widely and I laugh as he grabs three coconuts from a tree(he climbed it yelling look out below!, as he tossed them to the ground) as I carry the wood.

“You’re a loon,” I smile and he winks.

“Only the best people are, after-all. How else can we deal with insanity?” He questioned and I softly chuckled.

“I guess so,” I answer and he scoffs with a cheeky side smile.

“You are always just so, are you? You like to be a stoic sort of guy. Huh?”

“Better than a lunatic!” I counter and he throws his head back to laugh raucously. I roll my eyes but I smile anyway.

We prepare a makeshift sort of shelter with our jackets covering some decent drift wood and leaves, and create a semi-decent fire. We crack open the coconuts and drink the water from it.

We huddle under the very temporary shelter, and my teeth start to clatter from the chilly night air.

“Come closer, mate, and get warmer, that fire won’t last too long.. I’m afraid I am not an outside person, at all..”

His words carry a gentle tone and I scoot in as he wraps his arms around me, and I sigh.

“The sea looks so intense out there, I see the waves from far off…” I say and we move closer to each other as the crackling fire gurgles and spits out a burnt orange glow.

“Matthew?” He says softly.

“Yeah?” I answer.

“Do I know you?”

Our eyes meet from the side and I shrug.

“I am trying to remember that.. remember anything.. but I think…” I start to say and his reddish black dreads fall on my shoulders. “I do, actually.”

“What a weird thing to share a feeling without memory behind it,” he says and I nod.

“Somehow.. I remember a large machine covering me. It was helping me breathe..” I felt myself get dizzy again and I fall against his chest.

He seems to be pulling me closer and I relax.

“And I… was told I had cancer… an enlarged part of my body… and I was fainting a lot. In and out of hospital and such,” I tried to explain. Kaycee got quiet and I started to close my eyes.

“Hyperplasia of the endocrine cells…”

I heard him suddenly and jumped.

“Huh?” I answer in a sleepy stupor.

“That’s… what they said. They told us. What was wrong.” He sighs deeply and sits up; I sit up too. “That you had cancer. Oh holy God, Matthew? It’s you!”

He gets up and I feel my heart leaping and pounding.

“Me? What? You were with me at the hospital?!”

“Can’t be.. must be… you are Matthew! My … my Matthew..” he says in a realization that makes his eyes go wide.

“Yours?” I can’t stop bursting out one liners and he growls.

“Oh get off it, Matthew!” He says in frustration. “You have to remember me!” His brown eyes water and I frown, trying to remember everything… remember him.

“Oh shit…” I get up and he comes over to me and puts his hands on my face.

I pull close to him and I noticed in all the commotion he snuffed out the fire with his shoes.

“The hospital called me. I was your primary emergency contact. They said you tried to commit suicide with your car… carbon monoxide poisoning…” he says with tears running down his face, “I was freaking out horribly, I ran to my car and almost fell… you were out they said. They put you in a hyperbaric chamber for treatment…”

“I’m your… your…oh my God, dear,” he says frantically and I pull him in my arms and hold him tight.

“You’re my husband,” I declare quietly and I hear him sob immediately after.

His crying makes me tear up and I feel a rush of memories flood me, the way he’d tease me about my hair, his infectious laugh, the way he’d take a comb and brush my bangs so neatly to style it—his cooking and my complaining, our late night cuddles—

Our first kiss at Uni. That soft way he pressed his mouth against mine, so fitting and perfect.

“You went to every appointment. Never failed. You.. were always there for me, Kaycee, my dear..” I said, finally regaining my composure.

“Why… why did you do that?” He asks in a painful and rough speech.

“I felt in so much pain, all the time….my heart, I didn’t want to leave you…” I start to cry.

“Oh my dear, I can’t believe we’re here together.. it must be a dream. Like a lucid dream..” Kaycee thinks out loud.

“Maybe we’re both in a coma..” I add and he sputters out a nervous chuckle.

“In an impromptu, improbable paradise…” I continue and he laughs, wiping his tears away.

“Maybe when we wake up, we will be together..” he holds me close and I nod.

“This island brought us home, I think..” I say but I feel unsure.

“It’s always home in your arms…” he whispers.

“That’s not hyperbole is it?” I ask jokingly and he rolls his eyes.

“No, it’s a metaphor, Einstein!” He yells softly and I laugh.

He plays with my curls as we kiss, a slow start to our endless night, and as we close our eyes the sparkling moon and stars cover us, slowing down into settled clean, hospital white. It was as though the oasis had disappeared and we were thrown in between a dry heap of desert and another reality of ghost white pain.

Engulfed in the desert's parched silence, I was nothing but another grain of sand in the wind.