This is the longest chapter yet of the story, coming out to roughly five thousand words. That's why it took me so long to write. That, and I had a lot of things to do on Saturday, so I had a lot less time to write.
Also, if anyone ever wants to talk to me on Discord, my tag is SkyClubba #5443. I love meeting new people there, so do not hesitate to message me if you want to chat. Because I love chatting about various topics with people.
Anyway, enjoy the chapter, and it would be awesome if you guys would review. I've only gotten twenty so far, and my goal is 100. It would be very awesome to reach the triple digits.
Claire must have blacked out for some time after that, for she wasn't aware of anything again until she woke up once more in an unfamiliar setting.
Opening her eyes, she saw that she was lying on her back in a stiff bed. Looking to the left of her, she saw that an IV had been inserted into her arm, while her head was propped up on pillows. Her legs were covered in bandages, and there was a bandage around her head as well.
Speaking of her head, it felt like it had been in the middle of a freezer for a really long time. It was as though it had been inflated beyond the point of anything even approaching comfortable. The headache was worse than that time she had gotten mono.
I must have the flu. Or meningitis. It MUST be meningitis, or else why does my head hurt so much?, she thought. She realized that she was in a hospital room, that much was clear. She was even wearing a gown, just like the ones that patients wore. She wasn't entirely sure how she'd gotten there, but she could make a pretty decent guess.
She supposed that, at some point, an ambulance must have come and picked her up from where she'd been sitting, unconscious, in her car. She didn't remember a thing since then.
Really sucks that I'm in the hospital, Claire said to herself. If only there was something to do here.
A police officer entered the room. He looked around, wearing a very stern expression on his face. Eventually, his eyes alighted on Claire, and they were full of hatred.
Claire didn't know if that hatred was justified or not, but, after she was told what had happened, she would probably understand. She tried to be a very righteous person, always acting in a morally correct way. If she'd been told that she had done something that she wasn't able to remember, she'd be the first to chastise herself for it.
"Claire Morrisey...do you know what you are charged with?"
Claire's heart skipped a beat. She'd only just woken up in a hospital room, with no idea how she had gotten there. And now, she was being told that she'd been charged with a crime. What on Earth could it possibly have been?
"No" the young woman replied. Her voice sounded extremely hoarse, and it felt quite hoarse to her as well. She wondered how long she'd been out for.
That was the most honest answer she could give, because, in truth, she had no idea why she was in trouble. She had no recollection of the car accident at all.
"You veered off the road and into a telephone pole, knocking over power lines. You caused over half a million dollars in property damage by doing so; do you have any idea of how much money that is?"
Claire didn't respond; she didn't know what the police officer expected her to say.
"Didn't think so" the cop snarled. "Not if you were so willing to wreck a telephone pole like that. Honestly, I would have thought that you'd know better than that".
The cop continued. "You caused all of this property damage. Your driver's license has been revoked; you appear to have been distracted while driving. That is all you need to know for now".
After that, the police officer turned around and left the room, leaving Claire to continue lying there, wondering what, exactly, was going to happen to her.
Now that the cop had mentioned it, it was starting to come back to her. She was able to realize that she'd been in an accident, and she remembered crashing into that telephone pole. She also remembered the police officer being there, although she wasn't sure if the one she had just talked to was the same one who had apprehended her at the scene of the accident.
No more license, she thought, thinking about just how grim a prospect that was. It meant that she'd no longer be able to drive herself, or her friends, anywhere. It meant that she'd have to live with the shame of having had her driver's license revoked.
Whatever. She couldn't dwell on it too much; what she had to focus on was the present. Right now, she had a lot of explaining to do with her parents, who would no doubt be coming in within the next few minutes.
Her father was the first to enter the hospital room. This surprised Claire, for one simple reason.
Claire's father, a lawyer, tended to work late very often. It was rare that he'd be at home around this time. Then again, when his daughter had been hospitalized, it only made sense that he would want to visit her.
However, he did not look happy to see her, not in the least. On the contrary, he looked quite angry with his daughter, and Claire knew that she was in for quite the verbal spanking.
At first, it appeared as though her father was going to yell at her like crazy. That was what Claire probably would have done in his position; she did not pride herself on being able to control her temper. Then again, she wasn't her father, as evidenced by what happened next.
Mr. Morrisey's eyes moved back towards the ground, and he began to look extremely sad. Eventually, he said, "Please explain what happened".
Claire felt as though she might cry. It was bad enough, thinking that her father was going to yell at her. This, however, was far worse; he seemed colder, more calculating, right now.
"I was driving to school this morning - is it still the same day?" she asked.
Mr. Morrisey nodded. "Yes, it is still the same day as the accident. Please continue".
"Well, I was driving to school, and my chest started hurting like crazy. I really had no idea what that was all about. I still don't. I wasn't having a heart attack, was I?"
Her father shook his head. "There's still no known explanation for the chest pain. All that can be said is that they did an EKG as soon as you arrived at the hospital. They found nothing"
"I swerved over to the side of the road" Claire said. "I didn't want to cause an accident involving another car, you see. One thing led to another, and I ended up crashing into that telephone pole. Do you know how badly I got hurt?"
Right now, Claire's body didn't feel that sore, only her head. She supposed that she was probably being pumped full of some type of pain medication, as that would be the most likely explanation for why she felt somewhat detached from everything.
Mr. Morrisey nodded. "They gave you a couple of stitches to close a wound on your head. You also have a concussion, so you're supposed to take it really easy over the next few days. That drip is giving you some pain medication, but they're about to take it out. I hope that your pain is going to be manageable once you are off of it".
Claire nodded. She was hoping the same thing, although she somehow doubted it. Looking up at the IV stand, she noticed that no new bags of pain medication had been hung from it. Clearly, they were going to try and wean her off of it.
"I'm really hungry" Claire said eventually. "Do you know if they can get me something to eat?"
Her father frowned. "They say that they don't want you eating too much, if at all. You might end up throwing it up, because of the concussion. I know that, when I got a concussion when I was younger, I ended up puking a lot".
TMI, Claire thought, but she didn't say it. She was focusing her gaze on her father still, and how mad he looked at her.
He appeared stone-faced, so angry that he didn't know how to express it properly without hurting somebody. Claire, even though she didn't want to admit it, was scared of her father in this moment.
He's probably going to ground me for life, she thought. After all, I DID wreck his car.
It was true; the car that Claire had crashed into that telephone pole had belonged to her father. It was probably completely unusable now, she realized. Her father hadn't noticed at first, since he usually took the subway to work in Jubilife City, but that, of course, hadn't lasted forever.
"How did you find out? Does Mom know yet?"
Her father nodded. "I called her to tell her all about it. I'd been given a call by the police, and I hadn't believed it at first. After all, you've always had a very good driving record".
If the goal was to make Claire feel ashamed of herself, her father was definitely succeeding at that. Claire was feeling more guilty than she ever had before in her life, and, what was more, she understood what the consequences of her actions could have been. She knew that she could have seriously hurt others.
"I'll go now" Mr. Morrisey replied. "I need to head back to work; they only gave me an hour off, and I'd been waiting for you to come to".
Okay, Claire thought. Really, it wasn't as though she could have done anything about him leaving. She supposed that she did deserve it; it was her own fault that she was in the hospital.
But the pain, she thought. The doctor says that they did an EKG on me and found nothing. But is it really nothing?
The chest pain had started to return. Nothing was there, but it felt as though her chest were trying to expand in either direction. That wasn't a pleasant sensation in the least.
Just then, a nurse came into the room. "Good afternoon, Claire. I'm Nurse Joy, and I'll be your nurse during your stay here. I'm going to take out the IV if that's fine with you".
Claire nodded. She was afraid of needles, and she was glad that it had been put in while she was unconscious; she didn't know what it would have been like if she'd had to get a shot while awake.
After the intravenous line had been taken out, and a bandage placed on her arm, the nurse asked her, "Any lingering discomfort that I ought to know about? Because that is what we're here for".
Nurse Joy's demeanor was definitely different from that of either the police officer or her father. Instead of sounding accusatory and angry, the tone of Nurse Joy was far more conciliatory, far more...forgiving, in a way.
Of course, Claire thought to herself. She's a NURSE. Of course she'll try to sound forgiving, while still blaming me for everything.
Claire did blame herself for the car crash still. No matter which way one sliced it, the fact remained that she had moved it to the side of the road, resulting in the accident.
"Yes. My chest still hurts" she said.
Nurse Joy began looking extremely concerned. "Oh, my. That's more than a little worrisome, I must say, although it's best not to panic. I'll order another EKG done; you just sit there, okay?"
After Claire nodded, Nurse Joy left the room. She sat back in bed for another few minutes, waiting for a doctor to enter the room.
"Hello. I'm Dr. Walz, and I'm going to be doing your EKG test today. I actually did one earlier, but you were unconscious for it, and did not notice me".
Uh, yeah, Claire thought. I'm pretty sure that that's part of being unconscious.
"In any case", Dr. Walz replied, "let's get this thing done".
He took a machine next to Claire's bedside and pressed some buttons. After that, he placed a couple of stickers on the girl's chest, arms, and legs.
"Stay completely still and don't talk" the doctor said.
Claire did as she was told, not moving for a good five minutes. Eventually, Dr. Walz said that they were done, and the girl was able to speak again.
"Do you know how long it will be before the tests are back?" she asked Dr. Walz.
"It should be pretty soon" the doctor replied. "I suspect that we'll have an answer shortly as to what is troubling you. I'd advise that, until then, you stay calm. It's certainly not going to get any better if you keep freaking yourself out over it".
"I suppose so" Claire replied. She wasn't too worried about the possible implications of the chest pain. After all, she worked out often, ate a fairly healthy diet, and didn't smoke. And, most importantly, she was only seventeen years old. She shouldn't be having a heart attack.
Just because something shouldn't be happening, doesn't mean it isn't, a dark voice in her head replied.
Oh, shut up, she told the voice. You're really not helping.
What if I AM helping you?, the voice said.
Soon enough, Dr. Walz came back with the test results. "The EKG came back showing no evidence of any heart problems. It seems that the chest pain was just a spontaneous event, with nothing happening to cause it. It certainly bears some watching, however".
"I see" Claire replied. Even though she hadn't been awake in here for very long, she was already getting sick of this hospital room. She couldn't wait to get out of here.
"Any other questions?" Dr. Walz asked her.
"Yes" the girl said. "How long will I have to stay in here?"
The doctor took a glance at the clipboard he held in his hands, giving a curt nod. "With the discharge instructions given on this sheet, you can leave in about an hour. You won't have to spend the night here, if that's what you were wondering".
"That's good" Claire replied. She'd never spent the night in a hospital before, and she certainly didn't want to start now. Not when she'd have to try and start the process of getting her license back.
"Indeed it is" Dr. Walz replied. "Just follow the instructions on this sheet, and you should be back to normal in no time".
Claire was bored out of her mind.
She'd been home from the hospital for two days at this point, and she couldn't believe how horrible the post-concussion recovery was.
One thing that hadn't fully sunken in for her, when she was being read the discharge instructions, was that she couldn't watch TV or use a computer for a couple of days. Nothing that would strain her brain at all was allowed.
How am I supposed to entertain myself, then?, Claire wondered. She almost said it aloud, but talking would have caused her aching head to hurt more. Luckily, she hadn't thrown up from the pain, so she was able to eat. That was one thing she was doing a lot of.
It wasn't just that she was more bored than usual. She was also more hungry than usual, feeling like she could have eaten a Lucario for breakfast. Claire wasn't sure if there was any causal relationship between it and the car accident, and, quite honestly, she didn't care. All she knew was that she was hungrier than she had ever been.
The pain in her chest hadn't completely gone away, either. It still felt like it was trying to stretch out in both directions, not a pleasant feeling at all. And it was a constant feeling; the pressure was almost as bad as the time she'd had pneumonia. Not fun at all.
She hadn't gone back to school, either. Even if she hadn't had the concussion, her chest was in too much pain to allow for that. Really, it was just as well, because she couldn't have focused anyway.
Her driver's license had been revoked. Starting once she had recovered from her injury, she was going to attend a class to learn how to control her road rage.
That in itself enraged her, though. She didn't like to think at all about how much damage she had caused, but, at the same time, the crash had not come as a result of road rage. It had been as a result of feeling like a spike was about to grow out of her chest.
She was lying on the couch, listening to an audiobook, when the pain suddenly spiked. Now, it was all over her body.
Well, it wasn't necessarily pain. However, there was a prickly sensation all over her body, and she knew that this wasn't normal. The stretching sensation in her chest, however, remained as intense as it had been before.
Indeed, it was getting worse. Claire thought of getting up and taking some ibuprofen, but she had her doubts as to whether that was really going to work. It probably wouldn't even take the edge off of her pain, because this wasn't even really pain.
"Mom?" she called. Normally, she wasn't one to ask for her mother, even when she was in a lot of pain. After all, she was seventeen, much too old for that. However, she was in so much pain at this point, and worrying so much about what this all meant, that she felt she had no choice.
Her mother came rushing into the living room. "What's wrong, Claire?"
"My chest is really hurting" her daughter replied. "I really don't know what's going on here, but it can't be anything good.
Mrs. Morrisey frowned. "They did an EKG test at the hospital, and they found nothing. You don't feel sick, do you?"
"No" Claire said. "It just hurts".
"I'll call Dr. Roberts, get you in for a blood test or two" her mother replied. "I'm sure that it can't hurt to have a little more information".
"I suppose not" Claire replied, although she was a little skeptical as to whether or not it was necessary.
Mrs. Morrisey went and grabbed a nearby phone. She then walked into another room, far enough away so that Claire couldn't hear her.
The young woman sat on the couch until her mother came back. She was beside herself with worry the whole time. Still convinced that something was very wrong, she wanted her mother to hurry up and book the appointment.
Eventually, Mrs. Morrisey returned. "He says to come in right now to his office in downtown Jubilife City. I'll drive you; you're in no condition to be driving yourself at the moment".
No shit, Sherlock, Claire thought in response. Honestly, who would have thought that she'd be driving herself to the doctor with the concussion and the chest pain?
Both women walked to the car, and then her mother drove her to Dr. Roberts's practice. The drive passed without much incident, even though the chest pain was getting worse and worse.
Once they arrived in the waiting room, Claire was feeling very annoyed indeed. She'd gotten a check-up every year, and, each time, the same thing had happened. She'd been told to arrive at a certain time, but, as it turned out, she would have to wait for someone else to be done with their appointment. Why couldn't they have just asked her to come later?
She supposed that doctors could also have problems with scheduling, but that didn't mean she had to be happy about it. Quite the opposite, in fact.
"Claire Morrisey?" asked the nurse at the desk eventually.
The young woman with that name stood up. "Yes?" she replied.
"Dr. Roberts will see you now".
After walking to her primary care physician's suite, Claire sat down in a chair and waited for Dr. Roberts to arrive. When he finally did arrive, she felt reassured that they would get to the bottom of what was causing her problems.
Dr. Roberts was a short, skinny man with glasses and very little hair. In spite of this, he had a smile that was quite infectious; it could make someone else feel good as well. However, that spell typically did not work on Claire Morrisey.
"What's wrong today?" the doctor asked Claire.
"I have a prickly sensation over my entire body" the young woman replied. "Not only that, but there's a lot of chest pain as well".
"I see" Dr. Roberts said. "Well, we have a couple of options for that. The first option is to just do nothing and see what happens. There are benefits and risks to that option".
"And those are?" Claire replied.
"Well, the benefit is that you wouldn't have to have any testing done. The risk, of course, is that it might be something serious, in which case you'd need to come back in if the pain continued. For your sake, I really would like to get to the bottom of this this visit, and not have to deal with it again".
My thoughts exactly!
"The other options are another EKG, or a blood test. I'll be honest with you; I'm not sure what we would be looking for in there, but, if it's a sign indicative of a serious problem, it's definitely something that I'd want to get to the bottom of".
"Well", said Claire, "I would like to know what's causing all of this".
"And so would I" Dr. Roberts replied. "Us doctors have quite the commitment to truth, as I'm sure you have realized by now".
The young woman smiled. Dr. Roberts than said, "I think that I'll order both an EKG and a blood test done. It's always better to be safe than sorry".
I suppose it is, Claire thought.
"For that test, you will have to be admitted. You can go and collect your hospital bracelet from the desk in the waiting room; they'll know what is going on".
"Okay" the young woman replied. She exited Dr. Roberts's office and went back to the waiting room, where her mother was still waiting.
"Any news?" Mrs. Morrisey asked.
"We're going to have to do an EKG" Claire replied. She wasn't too excited for another heart examination, but she was excited to figure out exactly what was causing her chest pain. She wanted all of this confusion to be over as soon as it possibly could be, because she was sick of it.
Dr. Roberts came back out and told them to go to the cardiac lab in the hospital just across the street. He would place a call to the technicians there, so that they would know that Claire and her mother were coming.
"I didn't realize the problem was going to be this hard to figure out" Claire said. She tried not to sound like she was complaining, but, on the inside, she was quite annoyed. How hard should it have been to diagnose a problem, especially with today's amazing testing equipment?
"Yeah, well...sometimes things just happen like that" her mother replied.
Claire didn't know what to say in response to that, but, luckily, they were almost to the doors of the children's hospital, where the EKG was going to be done. Claire didn't really know if she qualified as a child anymore; she certainly didn't think so.
They had a small amount of difficulty finding the cardiac lab, but it wasn't that bad. It was near the intensive care unit, which did make her a little worried.
She wasn't afraid of hospitals, necessarily, but she was afraid of the various reasons why a person might need to go to a hospital. Being near the unit where the sickest patients were, the closest ones to death...that didn't sit well with her.
I'm glad I'm not one of them, she thought to herself. Or am I?
She didn't like to think about just what the problem might be, but, if it was something serious, she was sure that it would be diagnosed quickly and treated easily. The medical teams at the hospitals in Jubilife City were considered some of the best in Sinnoh, let alone the world.
You have nothing to fear, she kept telling herself. It was hard to believe, but it was true.
Eventually, she was given a hospital bracelet and taken into the room where the test would be done. She had her hopes that she'd show no evidence of a problem this time, because, if she did...well, it wouldn't be pleasant.
I really hope I don't have to stay overnight, she thought. That would really mess up my life.
Then again, she was already recovering from a concussion, so it wasn't as though she'd have anything to do at home either.
"Claire Morrisey?" asked the woman at the desk.
Claire stood up and followed the woman into the testing room. Along the way, she passed several rooms that might have had patients there. She felt very bad for them. Once I get back to work, she thought, I should give some of my paycheck to this hospital. That was certainly going to be a noble cause.
She sat down in the chair, and, once more, those stickers were attached to various parts of her body. It felt a little cold, but not too bad. Once the sheet had been printed out, and she was able to talk again, she asked what the potential problems she might have had were.
"There's really no way to know, Claire" the technician replied. "But, believe me, whatever it is will be treatable. No matter what, things are going to work out".
The young woman nodded. Soon enough, another doctor in a white lab coat entered the room.
"The test results came back" he said. "There's nothing wrong with her heart".
The technician looked at Claire. "I don't know what's causing the pain, but it doesn't seem to be a heart problem. Does that reassure you at all?"
At first, Claire was surprised to find herself shaking her head. She hadn't thought that she would be worried to not have any problems showing up on her EKG, but she was nonetheless.
She walked out of the room and back to the waiting room. "No heart problems" she told her mother.
Mrs. Morrisey appeared to perk up a little at that. "Claire! That's excellent news!"
"Yep" the technician replied. Looking at Claire, she said, "You're going to be all right. Your heart is perfectly healthy".
"That's a relief" the young woman replied, even though she didn't mean it. She hoped that the doctors present believed that she believed that.
"Yes, it is indeed" the technician said. "You may leave now".
Later, when Claire was in the car with her mother, and they were driving back from the hospital, her mother said, "I'm very glad that you are all right. I can't imagine how stressful that must have been for you".
"Yeah" Claire replied. "It was pretty worrying, but no problems were detected. And that feels good. Really good".
"Great, I like that" her mother said. "But you have to tell me if you're still having chest pain, okay? Because that's not a good sign, ever".
Her daughter nodded, even though she saw that her mother, currently driving through the middle of Jubilife City, wasn't paying that much attention.
Even though she wasn't going to tell her mother that, Claire was still worried even now. She had a feeling that the hunch she had, the hunch that something more was wrong with her, was more than just a hunch. That there was a problem that hadn't been detected on her EKG, because it was a problem that couldn't be detected on an EKG.
Little did she know, she would turn out to be more correct than she had ever realized.
I've decided to do a question and answer, because that's something that a lot of authors have done on their stories. I've done it before myself, and I'd love to get back into it. So I am going to get back into it.
Question: Where are you from?
Please answer the question in your review, and I'll post my own answer in the next chapter of the story.
