The Aftermath | Part 1
I lay in the bed with an annoying IV drip, presumably glucose, and a pounding headache. What had even happened last night?
All I remembered was that Raima's mother had forbade me from seeing Raima, and then I had walked off to a bar nearby. How much had I drank?
I saw an oxygen mask on the table by the bed; how much did I drink? I wondered. To end up at a hospital with an IV drip - I must have gotten dangerously close to getting alcohol poisoning. I frantically searched for my phone, but the drip prevented me from making any lengthy movements. "NURSE!" I screamed out, my patience as thin as ever. Where was I? Was I at my hospital or somewhere else? Who brought me here?
My head hurt even more as I thought of these questions.
"Is ANYONE here?" I voiced out into a vacuum apparently. Eventually, a doctor showed up. "Finally!" I scoffed, however he rolled his eyes.
"Hello there, I'm Dr. Agrawal," he made no attempt at any eye contact thereafter. "You're a doctor right? Need I remind you the fatal consequences of alcohol poisoning? You're lucky someone found you and called the ambulance as soon as they did." All this he said while glancing at the reports in his hands.
I didn't like this doctor; how dare he talk to me in such a manner? But it seemed as if he was a resident and not an attending, so I shifted my focus to the attending - raising my eyebrow for her to take over.
"Mr. Sippy, I apologize for Dr. Agrawal - he's still learning how to talk with patients. I'm Dr. Dogra, and I'm your attending doctor. The emergency team found you in quite a vulnerable state. The IV treatment had begun immediately upon the paramedics' arrival, and luckily no intubation was required. However I would like to inform you that the oxygen mask is there for you if you experience any breathing difficulties. We will observe your glucose and oxygen levels, and if everything is okay, then you should be able to go home tonight!"
"Thanks Dr. Dogra," I was specific to address only the attending. They were just about to leave when I remembered to ask her something, "Umm, doctor... Who's the person that brought me here?"
"Aah, she's right outside. I'll let her know you're up!"
I let my head drop on the pillow - the headache was getting better but it still irked me.
"How are you now?" a soft voice emerged from the doorway.
"Sonakshi? What are you doing here?" I was confused.
"You stumbled in front of my car in your drunken state, and so Shankar and I brought you here. Are you okay?"
There was a calmness in her voice that didn't match her piercing gaze. It wasn't until she mentioned my "drunken state" that I started feeling ashamed.
"Umm, actually..." I was going to give an explanation, but I did the easy thing and just answered her question, "I'm fine, thanks!"
She forced a smile and was about to head out when I called her back, "Sonakshi! Thank you for last night!"
She shook her head, "You don't need to thank me for that."
"Also, sorry for causing you so much trouble. I don't even remember what happened," I confessed.
"Rohit," she started off slowly as she sat at the corner of my bed, "I know you're hurting, but this isn't the right way to deal with that. For a moment when I saw you last night, I couldn't believe my eyes that it was you. It wasn't until Shankar assured me it was you that I came out of the car to help. How could you do something like that to yourself? A few drinks here and there, I get it. But you almost got alcohol poisoning! You know how fatal that could've been!" She straightened up immediately after that last bit, "Sorry, I didn't come in here to make you feel even worse. It's just..." she sighed, "I was worried about you."
I looked down and fiddled with my fingers. "I'm sorry. I don't know what else to say. I can't seem to move forward with my life. I'm stuck on September 26 and I don't know what to do about it. All I wanted to do was meet Raima - tell her I was sorry. I was sorry for not being able to help... for putting her in the state that she's in. That I didn't mean for it to go the way it did. I was so sure I'd have been able to save her from any harm, but I couldn't..." I trailed off, unwilling and unable to continue any further. I cleared my face from the tears that were spilling and rested my hand on my forehead. "It's all my fault... all my fault."
--
I hugged him as hard as I could and patted his back. I couldn't bear to see Rohit like this, but I knew asking him to just snap out of it was a meaningless thing to do. And so, instead of saying anything, I just held him in my arms like that until he stopped chanting those words.
--
"No matter what I do, what I say. I can't change that night."
"You know Rohit, there comes a point where you have to just accept things the way they are. You can't go back to that night - you just have to forgive yourself and move on."
"You don't know what happened Sonakshi. I was the operating surgeon - it was all in my hands!"
"Just because you're a doctor does not mean you are God!"
I looked away, not ready to hear any of this. I'm guessing she understood what I meant as she began retracing her steps out of the room. "I'll just let your family know you're awake, and then I'll leave. Take care of yourself Rohit!"
Upon saying that, she left.
She wasn't wrong, but she wasn't right either. If I had just done one thing differently... maybe if I had controlled the movement of the scalpel a little more carefully; or if I were a millisecond quicker with my reflexes... maybe, just maybe things could have ended up differently.
I fell asleep with these thoughts ringing in my mind - I wasn't ready to let go. Not yet, maybe not ever. It had become a part of me now.
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