The forceful words echoing hauntingly in his mind, Nick’s eyes flashed open to find that the dark ocean, the boat, Claire and the rest... they were all gone. The walls of bare whiteness and glass, the sterile smell, and the high-pitched beeping reminded Nick of where he was – the hospital, ICU. It had all been a dream, a horrible nightmare.
He took a moment to let this sink in, then, concentrating hard, tried to lift his left leg. He saw it rise slightly beneath the bedsheets, the whole long thing, and although it hurt to do so, he felt immediate relief. Wondering if the drugs they had given him had caused him to dream such scary shit, he looked around, wondering where his nurse was.
Something in the very corner of his cubicle catching his eye, he glanced over and jolted in surprise when he saw a figure curled up in a chair. On second inspection, he realized that it was Howie, and that he was sound asleep, scrunched in a very uncomfortable-looking position in the stiff chair.
“Howie,” Nick tried to say, but his throat felt funny, and no sound would come out. Alarmed, his hands flew to his mouth and were met with tubing. The respirator. So they had put a tube down his throat. He let his hands drop and assured himself that at least it was not a paper towel roll, like in his dream. Still, he couldn’t talk, and he had to find a way to get Howie’s attention.
His fingers crawled blindly down his neck and to his chest, where he touched one of the wire leads stuck to him, measuring his heartbeat. He gave it a pull, and off it came, the others pulling off along with it. Immediately, he heard the short, steady beeps of the heart monitor transform into one, long, continuous wail.
Flatline.
Well, that was cool. He glanced over at Howie to see if the sudden change in noise would awaken him, but his friend did not stir. Damn Howie. What if his heart really had stopped beating? He’d be dying over there, and Howie would still be sitting on his ass, sound asleep. Some friend he was.
Vaguely, he heard a voice call over some intercom, “Code Blue to ICU 9! Code Blue to ICU 9!” It didn’t occur to him that ICU 9 was his cubicle or that a whole team of doctors and nurses were running to it at that very moment, ready to resuscitate him.
Clear! Nick thought and secured the leads back to his chest. The short, steady beeps returned. We got him back, Nick thought, thinking it might be fun to be a doctor. Maybe he could persuade that cute nurse Samantha to let him play with some of those shocking paddles when he felt better.
At that moment, the code team burst in, lead by Mersey, the only familiar face of the bunch.
“Nick!” she gasped when she saw that he was awake. “Are you all right?!”
“Where’s the code?” a man behind her asked, looking around in confusion.
“No code,” Mersey said breathlessly. Striding up to Nick’s bed, she checked the wire leads on his chest and frowned, apparently seeing that they were not placed in the same spots as they had been before. “Did you pull these off?” she asked him.
Nick nodded guiltily. Whoops. Maybe that hadn’t been such a good idea.
It did its job though. Amidst all the commotion, he looked over at Howie to see his friend leap out of his chair, a befuddled expression on his face.
“What’s going on?” he asked, his voice high and frantic. “Nick!”
“Nick is just fine,” Mersey said dryly. “He only pulled the leads off his chest and gave us quite a scare.”
“But he’s awake?” Howie asked, hurrying over to Nick’s bed.
“Hey, Howie,” Nick started to say, then remembered he couldn’t talk.
“He’s triggering the vent,” said Mersey, glancing back at one of the men in white coats that had come charging in with her. “Should we extubate?”
The man came up and looked at Nick’s monitors. “Yeah, I think he’s ready.” Looking down at Nick, he asked, “Do you want me to take the tube out of your throat?” Vigorously, Nick nodded, his eyes pleading. “Okay. Then when I say so, I need you to blow, like you’re blowing out a candle. Got it?” Again, Nick nodded, and the doctor took hold of the hose coming out of his mouth. “Ready? Now – blow out.”
Gathering together all of his strength, Nick blew, and the doctor pulled the tube from his throat. Immediately, he was sent into a violent coughing fit, his throat burning. He gasped for breath, choking, hacking, trying to fill his lungs with a single precious breath of air.
“Just relax; it’ll pass,” urged the doctor. “Mersey, get him on a mask.”
The nurse covered Nick’s mouth and nose with an oxygen mask, and a moment later, he lay back in relief, the sweet oxygen pouring into his lungs. He took a few deep breaths, and his coughing ceased, though the fiery sensation in his throat did not.
“M-my throat,” he rasped, his voice soft and hoarse, as if he had a bad case of laryngitis.
“It hurts, doesn’t it?” said the doctor. “Don’t worry; it will feel better in a few days. Your voice will recover too. I know that’s important to you, being a singer and all.” He gave Nick a knowing smile.
“Good,” Nick whispered, although singing was the last thing on his mind. He hadn’t thought about singing or the Backstreet Boys or the new album in a long time. His career seemed to be growing forever more distant to him, something that lay just beyond his reach. Would he ever be well enough to record and tour again with the group? Maybe he should tell them to just go on without him...
“How do you feel, Nick? Are you in any pain?” Mersey asked, interrupting his thoughts.
“Not too bad, I guess,” Nick answered. “My chest is kind of tight, but that’s just the pneumonia, right?”
“Yes. But that should go away in a few days. You’ve gotten through the worst of it now.”
The nurse’s words struck him as strange, and he looked up in confusion. “How... how long did I sleep?” he wondered.
“You’d been out of it for about a week,” replied Mersey, and Nick’s mouth dropped open in utter shock.
“A week!” he cried. It had only seemed like a few hours! “W-was I in some kind of coma or something?”
“Not a coma, just unconscious,” she said. “You drifted in and out, but we had to keep you sedated most of the time because you kept thrashing around and trying to pull out your tubes and things.”
He shook his head, his head still spinning with this knowledge. A whole week... he had just slept through an entire week of his life.
“Well, if you’re feeling better, Dr. Dunn and I will go and let you visit with your friend.” Mersey glanced over her shoulder at Howie, who had retreated back from the bed.
“Oh... okay.” Nick watched as the doctor and nurse left the room and then looked to Howie. “D... what are you doing here?”
Howie smiled slightly and dragged a chair up to Nick’s bed, into which he then lowered himself. “Your mom called,” he replied. “Well, really she called Brian, and Brian called me and the guys. She was really freaked, and she thought we would want to come and be with you.”
“So are the other guys here too then?” Nick asked, surprised that his mother had called them. Had he really been that sick?
“Just Brian. AJ and Kev are still out in California, but they’ve been calling every day to see how you’re doing.”
“So I guess I was pretty sick then, huh?” Nick said slowly as he absorbed this information.
“Yeah,” Howie answered, his brown eyes wide and serious. “You have pneumonia, Nick. That can be pretty serious anyway, but in your case... well...”
Nick nodded. “I know. I just didn’t know it was that bad... and I didn’t think I’d been unconscious for a whole freaking week! It seemed like I had just slept for a few hours... I had this dream... God, it scared the shit out of me.”
Howie frowned. “What did you dream about?”
Nick snorted. “You’ll just laugh.”
“I won’t laugh. What was it about?”
“It was another shark dream. Where I’m swimming, and a shark’s after me. Man, I haven’t had those since I was a kid.”
“I know,” said Howie, both of them remembering how Nick had had nightmares about sharks when he was just a teenager and homesick on tour. Sharks – they had always been the one thing he feared. Some people had nightmares about vampires or spiders or clowns. Nick dreamed about sharks.
“Yeah... this one was hella freaky though. The shark... it... it bit off my leg, dude. And, God, the blood... it was fucking gory!”
“Ew.” Howie shuddered. “Don’t tell me any more, man, I don’t wanna hear it.”
Nick smiled. “They musta given me some pretty strong drugs to make me dream all that whacked out shit.”
“Yeah, it was probably the sedatives,” Howie said with a grin. “God, I’m glad you’re back, Nicky. You scared me, you know? You scared us all.”
Nick shifted uncomfortably in the bed, embarrassed. “Sorry.”
Howie laughed. “No, don’t be sorry! Not like you could help it. Anyway, I better go call the hotel – your family and Rok will want to know you’re awake.”
“My family?” Nick repeated. “They’re here? All of them?”
“Everyone except BJ. Your mom said she had some kind of modeling something or other, I dunno.” Howie shrugged. “But yeah, your dad and Leslie and Aaron and Angel all got in the same day I did. So anyway, I’m going to go call them, okay?”
Nick nodded slowly. “Okay.”
Howie smiled and started to leave the room. Then he stopped, turned back, and walked back to Nick’s bed, bending over and gently wrapping his arms around him. Surprised, Nick patted Howie awkwardly on the back until Howie finally pulled away.
“What was that for?” he laughed slightly.
“Sorry.” Howie smiled sheepishly. “I just... well... like I said... you scared us, Nicky. It’s good to have you back.”
Nick smiled blankly and nodded. “It’s good to be back.”
***
