Those days it was hard to remember that I had had a life. Well, it was hard to think. At all. But in the brief moments of lucidity, I remembered being a kid, a living human being, not a set of numbers. My friends and family came to visit, I'm sure, but all I felt was pain. Insane pain I never could have dreamed of.
Then he came, a kid just about my age, holding a pop can. "You want a drink?" he asked.
I couldn't speak through the pain and the tubes surrounding me, but blinked.
"One for yes, two for no?"
Blink.
Oh, the taste as it poured down my throat! After the blur of the hospital, every droplet was paradise.
"Are you Saddler?"
Blink.
"I heard about what happened. I'm so sorry." His eyes held compassion and something else that I couldn't identify. "I wish I could help you somehow."
Blink.
"Have you heard how bad the situation is?"
Two blinks. Twice the excruciation.
"Me neither. I hope you'll be okay." Somehow he'd managed to navigate through the maze of wires and took my hand. "I'd be so scared if I was you." Blink.
"Even though it doesn't seem, like, logical, y'know? Don't you think some part of us, like, lives on after we're, uh...dead?"
I'd never given it much consideration before. Through the haze of the room I blinked twice.
"You're so powerful, to keep...going, even though all this is happening to you. I would hope that some part of you would survive-" His face looked worried for a second, and mine probably didn't look so great either. He changed his tone. "if you did die, which I don't think you, uh, will."
At that moment I felt something indescribable. A sense of total relaxation and peace came over me and for a second I believed the kid. Then it was over.