Chapter 1 – Jane Doe
There were three hundred and six tiles in the ceiling. I had counted them five times, just to proof to myself that I was still able to do it. One of them had a crack that reminded me of something, but just like anything else, I couldn't recall it for the life of me.
I could see fifty-six rooftops from the hospital bed and nineteen planes had flown past the window. In the corner above the TV was a small spot I had first mistaken for a spider, but it hadn't moved for three hours, so it probably wasn't. I kind of wish it were, though. Then I could give it a name. At least one of us deserved a name.
I couldn't remember mine.
I couldn't remember anything. I had seven stiches in my skull and a fractured wrist, but no idea how I ended up that way. The hospital staff had found no ID on me, when I was brought in yesterday. The police told me I had been mugged and eyewitnesses had seen a man run from the alley, where I was found unconscious, but I hadn't even the foggiest memory of the incident.
My doctor had informed me that I was at the Sacred Heart Hospital in California. I had a vague feeling that I was far away from home, but honestly I'm sure I only came to that conclusion because I couldn't recognize the area I could see from the bed.
From I had woken up this morning to now, I must have been visited by every single doctor the hospital could provide: Doctor Cox, the no-nonsense Chief Resident; Dorian, who was young and eager, Reid, a fast talking female doctor and a bunch of interns who stared at me like I was a rare, but obscure specimen in a glass of formaldehyde.
I had gotten a CT-scan, an EEG and my blood had been drained by nurses with worried eyes and too-hearty smiles who called me 'Sweetie." I had been examined from top to bottom. I had talked to the hospitals physiatrist as well as the police. The result was the same. No one could find an answer to what was wrong with me. Least of all myself.
I was a Jane Doe.
I was no one.