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The sound of monitors beeping continuously woke him from his deep induced slumber. He opened his eyes and tried to move his arms, but found that they were restrained to his bed. The beeping noise of the machine started to blare as his heart beat began to beat rapidly. He was panicking, he didn’t know where he was, why he was there, and who was keeping him there.

An older man then approached him, a clipboard in hand. “Now don’t struggle Alex, you’ll only make the restraints tighter. My name is Dr. Seid, do you remember me?”

AJ stared at the man long and hard. “Yeah… you were that bitch that sedated me.”

Dr. Seid’s eyes widened in amusement. “What’s with the foul language? I will release you from these restraints, only under one condition.”

Things fell silent, and AJ just stared at him. “Yeah? And what’s that?”

“You won’t try another great escape… your body is in absolutely no condition to be doing the activities you were trying to perform earlier.”

AJ had let himself fall back onto the bed, relaxing. “Okay… I’m calm, I promise I won’t do anything, can you just get these damn things off my arms?”

Dr. Seid nodded and placed his clipboard down at the foot of AJ’s bed. He walked to one side and unfastened the leather belt that tied his arm down, and then had walked to the other side to unfasten the other restraint. Once AJ was free, he brought his hands in front of him and began to clench and unclench it, making the blood pump through his veins and gaining feeling in them once again.

Dr. Seid grabbed a chair from the corner of the room and had sat himself down in front of AJ. “Well, since you were sedated, we were able to perform a cat scan on you and get the information we needed. There’s good news, and bad news.”

“What’s the bad news?” AJ immediately asked.

“Well,” Dr. Seid said with a sigh. “The bad news is that you have a mild case of amnesia. The good news is that you should gain your memory back… all in due time. You see, from what we observed from your brain activity, it seems as if your memory will serve as a TV show.”

AJ stared at the doctor as if he was crazy. “A TV show? Look, I don’t understand all this fancy… medical lingo!”

Dr. Seid chuckled. “It’s not medical terminology, it’s a simile, figure of speech. It’s as if your brain is now a TV, and your memory is a TV show. TV shows normally consist of episodes, it’s not one solid film, it’s broken up into different parts so it can be viewed or displayed at different times. Well, that’s exactly how your mind if working now. Like I said before, your memory will come back to you, all in due time, and the way it will come back to you is in episodes. With the help of different objects or things, it should help bring your memory back to you. You won’t remember everything at once, some things will come back to you, and though some of the memories will be incomplete, another episode of your memory should solve the puzzle. Just, don’t force yourself to remember everything at once… that process can become extremely painful, even lethal. Just allow your brain to process your memory as it will, and go along with it.”

“So…” AJ slurred. “What your saying is that my memory can come back to me at any time, in any form, but it’s not as if I will gain my full memory back just like that?”

Dr. Seid nodded. “Exactly. Would you like to know the condition your in?”

Ever since he awoke, he felt a terrible stabbing pain in his abdomen. “I was going to say no, but this pain in my stomach is telling me otherwise…”

“Well,” Dr. Seid said with a sigh, “You suffered a couple of broken ribs, they were healing quite well until you decided to jump out of your bed and fight us like a mad man. What I’m surprised you don’t feel is any pain in your leg.”

AJ rolled his eyes, “Oh I feel it alright, I was just getting to that pain!”

“That pain is due to the fact that your tibia in your right leg, that too was healing quite well, but you decided to walk… I should say limp on it. One of your broken ribs had punctured your lung, but we were able to repair that and control the eternal bleeding. Your mother was gracious enough to donate her blood to make up for the amount of blood you lost. Your left shoulder was indeed dislocated, but it seems as if your doing fine with the movement and rotation of your arm, don’t be alarmed at the discomfort, nothing rehabilitation can’t fix.”

AJ’s mind all of a sudden went blank. His heart rate began to increase, the word ‘rehabilitation’ had struck something deep within him. Flashes of images appeared in his mind, empty bottles of Jack Daniels, cocaine substance in zip block bags, his temper was out of control, especially when he was drunk. His grandmother had died, the cause of his depression and anxiety attacks, driving him deeper into the bottle. He could taste the bitter liquid filling his throat, burning and suffocating him. He admitted he had a problem, he went to rehab. Many endless nights were spent sitting up in his room alone, he was silently battling his demons by himself, facing his alter ego for the first time.

“No!” he shouted. “I don’t want to go back to rehab… don’t make me go back there!”

Dr. Seid stared at him, amused with his response. “That, Alex, was a memory episode. The word ‘rehabilitation’ brought back the memory of you going through rehab when you had your drug and alcohol addiction. Not to worry though, this isn’t that kind of rehab, you can believe me on that. The rehabilitation center I’m requiring you to attend is a physical rehabilitation, to help you gain full use of your left arm and right leg again. A couple of exercises, and you should be back to dancing in no time, without the feeling of discomfort. Now, the mild case of amnesia was caused from a deep laceration in the back of your head. We stapled it shut, and for the next couple of days, maybe even weeks, you will suffer from severe headaches, I’m not going to lie, but we have you on morphine to help dull the pain and discomfort.”

AJ fell silent for a while. “There was a man… that came in to see me…”

“Do you remember who he was? His name?” Dr. Seid asked him.

“Howie…” he replied softly, not looking up to look Dr. Seid in the eye. “His name is Howie… he was and still is my best friend.”

Dr. Seid nodded. He grabbed his clipboard off the foot of the bed and was about to make his way out, until AJ called him back.

“Doctor!” he called out. “Do you know where he is?”

“He’s in his room, both he and Brian are sharing a room together.”

Who’s Brian? He thought to himself, but he couldn’t think about too many things at once. Right now, he was thinking about the whereabouts of Howie. “Could I… see him?”

Dr. Seid sighed, “No…” AJ’s face fell. “But he can see you.”

AJ looked up, his lips curved upwards, slowly revealing a grin. “Thank you.”

Dr. Seid smiled as well, opening the door and walking out. As soon as he closed the door, he stood there for a while. He chuckled and shook his head, maybe AJ wouldn’t be a lost cause after all.