Domino

I had one of those nights where the brain would climb up the ladder to overthinking and fruitless contemplation- those that only lead to dead ends with no apparent solution.

Even in the midst of slumber, the revelations of today still resurfaced- abruptly and without the slightest provocation. The vault, as Dr. Murphy had put it, requires coaxing from an as of yet unknown catalyst just to pry it open. I don't know what lies ahead or if it's even worth the trouble, I honestly haven't really thought beyond that point yet, but the dream is to throw this tiny metaphorical candle with its tiny metaphorical flames licking the air into the eternal metaphorical darkness so I could at least stomach madness.

And so, I let the mind wander, but not too much, just enough to get myself lost in the voice of the unreasonable yet still be sane with the incoherence and ambiguity that comes with it.

I heaved a heavy sigh and opened my eyes to the ceiling. After a few seconds of adjusting to the room devoid of light, the darkness lifted to a dim and vague shapes of the night uncovered itself. I lay still in bed, not stirring even when my casted leg began to feel the tiny pins and needles inserting itself on the patches of skin underneath the hard plaster. I blinked a few times, clenched and unclenched my fists, focusing on the sensation as it travels up to my shin and calf, then to my thighs, until my whole leg felt like it was pulsating fire.

It was unmistakably painful, but it's the type of pain that I didn't mind, or at least not in the moment. I actually wanted to drown in that fire.

I hoisted my leg up and sat. Still in the dark, I felt underneath the bed until my finger brushed up against the cool steel of my walking cane. I fished it out and stood up, pushing most of my weight down the rod as I wobbled over across the room towards the window sill where I left Erin's shoebox. Drawing the curtains back with my free hand, moonlight began pouring through the window pane from the star-dotted eventide outside. With the increment in brightness, I grabbed the shoebox and made my way to the hospital's corridors.

I wasn't one to track the days, but I am somewhat aware that around a week has elapsed since my hospitalization, three if you count the time spent being stuck in coma- to which I don't- and for the duration of those painstakingly dragged out hours I found myself gradually getting more and more accustomed to the setting; the sterile environment; the cold tiled floors against my bare feet; the lights which appeared to be constant but look at them long enough and they begin to waver and dim, and you're left to rack you head over whether it was a trick of the mind or it's just innately faulty; the medicine food; the monotonous colors; and most especially the people working here.

I've observed numerous personalities, all encompassed under the tidy ivory-white button tops and skirts of the female nurses, from small idiosyncrasies like how they tuck loose strands of hair behind their ears to their inflections to how they place my food at the small table near the head of my bed, these attributions along with the flawless classification system I've developed helps me to build a groundwork for what kind of person they are even with minimal interactions. Quite impressive, if I'll ask myself.

I looked around the immediate vicinity and took in the stillness of everything. The hallway was empty and not a single light came from the small rectangular windows on the doors of the adjacent rooms. It might've even felt like I was in an eerily surreal photograph of a lone hospital corridor if not for the distant clamor of hushed conversations and shoes clicking on the tiled floor grounding me to reality.

Before I could take my first step, a nurse, Rachel, which I have deemed the nicer of the bunch because of her gentle voice and loose bun, spots me at the corridor's end where the path splits into a T and briskly starts walking in my direction. She flashes me a quick smile before touching my left hand which was still holding on to the cane.

"Where are you going, Jaylen?" she asked.

I nodded, my head still coming down from the clouds.

"Um, couldn't sleep?" she asked. Rachel looked over to the shoebox and arced an eyebrow.

"Oh! Yeah, right. I wanted to read this box of letters that my… friend gave me." I jotted my thumb and pointed over to my room. "Somewhere that isn't there."

"I really think you should be resting," Rachel pursed her lips and thought for a moment. "But sure, how's the lobby sound? It isn't too busy during these hours."

"That's good."

Rachel's teal eyes surveyed the cast on my leg. "Wait right here, I'll go get a wheelchair- "

"No, it's okay. I want to walk."

"You sure?"

"Yes. The least bit of exercise helps, that's what my therapist said." That wasn't what she really said.

"Okay then. I'll just help you to the elevator. Here, let me carry that for you," she said, reaching for the shoebox.

"It's fine, it literally doesn't weigh a thing."

Rachel laughs and takes the box from me anyway. "Relax, you're a patient here, and I'm a nurse, this is my job. It's okay to get help from time to time, even if that doesn't really do much, just take it as a token of sorts, something to remind you that people care."

"Okay," I said, "Uh, thanks. I'll accept your help then. "

"No problem."

We walked silently to the elevator on the hospital's opposite wing, which was just a few corner-turns from my room. We entered the lift and punched the first floor. Soft jazz started playing from the speakers as we descended.

"What kind of letters are these?" she asked, eyes trained on the shoebox

"Just some… uh, just the kind of letters one would typically receive. You know, after coma and all," I mumbled.

Rachel turned and smiled at me, the harmless gesture gave me so much unease and unexplained perturbation. "I've been meaning to ask, if it's fine with you, how's it like being in coma?"

I paused and gazed at my image reflecting from the wall's luster. I locked eyes with Jaylen for a second before having to look away, the odd sense of déjà vu creeping up from the small of my back.

"You can't really describe it," I began with my usual response, an effort of placating any preemptive expectations and assumptions about myself and coma while simultaneously imparting my lack in skill of explaining thereof.

"It's kind of like, see, dreams. Just a lot of them, over and over. But you're not really aware that they're dreams but in hindsight they are cause what else could they be, and these just play around in your head and you don't really know what they are but they somehow make sense- I can't really say that with conviction but there's this feeling in my gut that's telling me it's rooting from somewhere concrete, somewhere real- so these dreams keep playing and there's nothing I could do about it. Do I make sense?"

Rachel nodded slowly. "Yes, please go on."

---

Fragment 6: June 11, 2017

"I can't."

We walked under the leaves of the swaying birches- the tiny tufts of grass grazing our feet from the open sandals we wore- but the noon sun still emanated its presence through the shades. I averted my gaze from the dangerously-close-to-melting-asphalt, and towards the back of Cinelli's head, her auburn hair tied in a tight pony tail revealing the glistening sweat on her neck.

"I need a break. It's so damn hot," she continued.

"You should've brought an umbrella or something," I said. I tugged my shirt and lifted it enough so that air could pass through the fabric.

"This must be the single hottest day in June."

"But there's about twenty more days of it."

"This must be what hell feels like, don't you think? If there even is one," Cinelli looks at me and crunches up her face. "Why didn't we take the bus?"

"I have no cash to spare and you couldn't be bothered to share yours. We could've used our bikes but turns out yours has a busted tire. So, tell me, why didn't we take the bus?"

"Jesus, you don't have to be so derogatorious about it."

"I don't have to be so… what?"

"Derogatorious," she said, possessing all the firmness in the world.

"Ninety-nine percent sure that isn't a real word."

"But that's just your opinion, I'll Google right now to prove you wrong."

Cinelli slowed her pace so that she was beside me, our shoulders almost touching, as we trekked down the ragged dirt path between the road and the forest floor shrouded by dense canopy.

"I'm surprised you have reception," I said. I saw Cinelli type in the fictitious word on her browser.

"So…" I waited as she thumbed through the list of results proving my point right.

"Never mind that." Cinelli tucks the phone back into her pocket.

I scoffed. "Bested yet again."

"Chill, I just haven't played Scrabble in a while."

A sudden gust of wind blew past, it brought relief from the sweltering heat for however brief it lasted.

"We should've rode on your bike," she added a few seconds later.

"No way I'm hauling you all the way to Westwend," I replied.

"But it's only like eleven minutes away."

"That's if we're on a bus, but we aren't, so be quiet." I pulled out my own phone and skimmed through the texts I received from Josh. Cinelli peered over to the messages and nudged my side.

"What'll we be doing?"

I squinted at her. "What?"

"What'll we be doing? In Joshua's house?"

"I already told you, it's a movie marathon, like a chill bro session- or at least that's what it was originally supposed to be."

"I remember, that's why insisted on coming," she said, "that is… true."

I grabbed my face towel and wiped the sweat streaming down from my cheeks.

"Were you ever going to tell me about this Joshua person?"

"What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"I mean," she began, "Not quantifying here, but we've known each other for how long? Eight or so years? And you haven't mentioned him, not even once."

But she did quantify and I did mention Josh's name a few times, albeit in passing and/or in vague implication, I'll resort to digressing for now.

"Probably because he wasn't such a big deal," I said.

Cinelli bit her lower lip and snatched the phone from my fingertips.

"Hey! Give it back I was searching for the directions- alright, never mind."

She puts her finger on the screen and rapidly scrolls through our conversation. "But it seems like you two have been best pals forever."

"We're just trying to catch up on each other's lives," I explained. I looked back at Cinelli who was still scrolling. I put a hand to my chin and assessed her sudden curiosity for Joshua.

"I was this close," I said, using my thumb and index finger to measure out the hypothetical distance, "This close to forgetting who Josh was, and when I saw his face, that damned face during that eventful and bright and sunny Monday morning, the memories just came rushing back. It's actually so strange, when you think of something and that thing leads to other things which lead to more other things. That's what happened. It's just all of a sudden he's here and I guess I just want him to be a part of my life again."

There was a lull in the conversation, when neither party knew what else to say or were too in their respective thoughts to communicate. I was about to ask her about how the writing club situation is working out for her just for obligation's sake but Cinelli surprised me and decided to pursue the topic further.

"How'd you meet in the first place?"

The question has been used too many times, and each time you'll ask me that for some random acquaintance I'd tell you that I had no idea. As an example, I didn't know how Peter and I specifically met, I only remembered we were having a conversation one day and we somehow clicked. What one could probably take from this is perhaps when you really enjoy spending and investing your time with someone, you'll be too focused on the present rather than preoccupying yourself on how it all started.

I tried and sought the sky for answers, my mind recollecting back several years until I found it, tucked behind a crevice, oddly vivid like it happened only a few weeks ago.

"Funny story. It was in preschool I think and we sat across each other during recess. So, there I was, nonchalantly pulling out my Han Solo action figure we bought the other day, and from the corner of my eye I see him smirk at me, and then bam, he pulls out the exact same figure from his backpack. The rest is left to history."

Cinelli nodded in approval, or was it satisfaction? The temperature was too high for me to care enough.

"That's actually pretty cool. Milwaukee's too far away from here and you two just get to reunite like that?"

"I moved from Minnesota," I corrected.

"Isn't that what I said? Minnesota?"

"You said Milwaukee."

"Minnesota."

"Yeah, sure, you said Minnesota and I'm just insane."

"You two are kind of like destiny brothers or something. Seemingly separated by hundreds of kilometers but the next thing you know you're in the same school sharing the same homeroom smack dab in the middle of nowhere. What could possibly be the odds?"

"Give me my phone back and I'll tell you the odds," I said. I quickly returned the phone to the safety of my jean pockets after Cinelli handed it to me.

"Life keeps throwing these curveballs, you know? But I think that's the magic to it, it keeps you guessing. You never really know what's ahead," she said.

"Well, that's true. After seeing Josh in the classroom for the first time, it really hit home the fact that it's only going to get more and more difficult trying to figure out the future."

"You should never try figuring out the future, 'cause then you'll just be fathoming the uncertain, and everyone knows that's a big waste of time. Stick to something reasonable, like planning your college or something."

"Yeah, it's just- I can't help it when I see Josh. He's like a window to the world I could've very possibly lived in. And I begin imagining if my father hadn't taken the job and made us mover here, what kind of person would I have become?"

"Huh. Kind of like a domino," Cinelli said.

"What?"

"A domino, the ones with the dots and- "

"I know what dominoes are. I was asking about the analogy you're trying to make."

"See in a domino where you line up the bones vertically in a line, if you push one at the very end, it all comes toppling over continuously until there's nothing left to topple. It's reactionary, without the single bone at the end toppling then the whole chain of reactions would have never happened."

"Huh?"

"Try to keep up, I'm in the middle of a breakthrough here. I don't believe in fate because it's dumb and arbitrary, but for the sake of argument, what if it's true? We're having this conversation because of a series of occurrences that only happened because an event prior has triggered it, and then that event only happened because another event has caused it to happen and so on and so forth. We're led to believe that this whole chain of events happened because of our conscious decisions, but with a streak of probabilities like that who's to say life isn't purely accidental?

"Your father could have very possibly never gotten the job and you never moved away from Milwaukee- that's a whole different set of circumstances. The domino chain of you moving to Dawsbury, enrolling in DSHS, meeting Peter, Adams, Erin, the others… hell, becoming my annoying neighbor, those would have never happened because the bone of your father getting the job never toppled, the same would go for me, if my father didn't get himself kicked out of the family, he would've never married mom and just like that I don't exist anymore."

"So, you're saying everything's predetermined and things happen because they just do?" She isn't wrong, fate is dumb and arbitrary.

"Everything's destiny! Kind of, at least in theory. So that's why you should just be content with the way things are. And as the Buddhas and my mom would have said, 'Think too far ahead and you risk losing yourself in the now.' Wise words, I tell 'ya."

I nodded. "Sure." And we remained like that, the two most unlikely people in the world sharing a somewhat interesting and existential moment while walking over the line where the dusty soils met the Aeston Freeway with the passing buses (which we could not afford) and the chirping finches audible from the treetops acting as supplementary music.

---

"My therapist discussed something with me earlier, a lot of concepts were thrown around actually, but one of the topics we brushed upon and the one that stood out to me was the prospect of memories being very malleable."

Rachel and I ended up sinking next to each other on an old rickety couch, the cushion seats had long caverned into the frame due to foam loss from the burst seams of the sofa arms, my good foot barely touched the floor.

"Malleable? How does that even work?" she asked.

"Memories are malleable, like, they aren't set in stone, they aren't definite. Turns out emotions play a huge factor on how we see and henceforth remember certain things. Tying emotions to events invites a higher level of value or uh, significance that isn't typically present with average everyday happenings like what you ate for breakfast or what the weather was like just a few days ago, which is probably why we don't tend to remember those things."

"Well of course, if a memory has emotional attachment, you wouldn't just go on out and forget it."

"That's true," I said. It was painfully true.

There was silence again, the same silence that accompanied me when I'm alone, in my room, in my thoughts. The omission of words, the sound of nothing, the music of the deaf, it was that same silence yet it was still different somehow, like it was full. It could have been the gentle humming of the vending machines adjacent to us, I don't know, but I then made the sudden realization that it was impossible to achieve complete and absolute silence. There was always something there, the birds, the bed creaking. every complacent breath I took.

I never noticed until now, but I'm thankful it finally happened. This silence was full, meaningful. I'm satisfied with sharing this quiet with Cinelli.

Rachel.

"We had this dog once," Rachel said after a couple of minutes, "her name was Sugar and she was the most adorable mutt ever. I found her as a puppy back in elementary, behind some dumpsters tucked away in a dirty paper bag. I wasn't even supposed to be there in the first place, I remembered I had just the most terrible day and I wasn't really up to talk to anybody, now I can't imagine what it would have been like if I didn't go down there. It was truly lucky.

"I decided to take her in and I prayed and prayed and prayed that my parents would let me keep her. But surprise surprise, mom and dad were actually planning on getting me a dog for my birthday which was the week after. Growing up with Sugar, she thought many things. Taking care of dogs, for one, but I also learned to take care of myself. I made a promise to Sugar the day I rescued her that we would be better versions of ourselves with each other, and comparing myself to when we initially met, I could say I fulfilled that."

I didn't know what else to say to her opening up to me, and the way she spoke in past tense gave off a foreboding tone. I braced for whatever comes next.

"This dog, where is she now?" I asked.

At first Rachel didn't say anything, she merely smiled and looked blankly ahead to empty space. I couldn't help but rub my forearms as the dismal reality unraveled itself. I answered my own question, Sugar is dead. Present tense.

"I'm sorry- "

"Don't be, I've already come to terms with it. Before studying medicine here in Bayshore I had this whole living arrangement of sneaking her into my apartment, but shortly after graduation I noticed something wrong with her. She was barely touching her food, I tried everything- I handfed her, cooked homemade meals, but she just didn't have it anymore. She was fading. We decided to take her to the vet and… I knew Sugar didn't deserve suffering like this, it was ultimately up to me."

I looked at Rachel again but she was already looking at me.

"She was an old dog Jaylen, it was inevitable, and by the end of it all she achieved the absolute best version of herself, she fulfilled more than what a puppy stuck inside a paper bag could've ever hoped to achieve. We all go through so much, but what's important is that we eventually pull through, however long it may take. She gave me a sense of purpose at a time when I badly needed it, I hope you find yours too."

I nodded, not entirely sure what that meant.

"Anyways," she said, clearing her throat. She stood up and faced me. "It's been fun chatting with you, Jaylen, but my shift's about to end. Maybe some other time?"

"Sure," I said. But it occurred to me that I never really knew what her last name was. "But before you go, why don't we formally introduce ourselves?" I had no other idea of going about this any other way.

Rachel lightly chuckled before extending her hand in the most dramatic way possible. "I'm Rachel Hensley, you really don't remember?"

"Remember what?" I said. I shook her hand, which felt like ice against mine. "I am Jaylen Harper."

"Never mind that. Nice to meet you, Jaylen Harper." And with a nod and a wave of the hand, I watched as she walked away, disappearing behind a corner.

I sat still, enjoying the awful couch for what it's worth, and ran the events of the past few minutes in my head, assessing myself for what emotion I managed to possess during those moments. I pushed myself up to a more comfortable position, my elbow hits the shoebox and I remembered what I originally went out to do.

I grabbed a handful of letters and stared at them, unopened, in my palms. I thought for a good while until I decided to start with the one that genuinely perplexed me the first time I read it the other day. I went back into the box and shuffled around the slips of papers until I finally found it. I pulled out the yellow stationary and unfolded it.

I began to read, again and again. But I did not feel the sense of urgency I know for a fact I should've felt.

          Dear Jaylen,

          I don't know when you'll be reading this, or how much has changed since then, but I hope you are receiving this in the best regards- is that how you use that? Best regards? Anyways, I really hope you aren't getting this letter in the distant future, in a flying taxi zooming over The Chain which by then is actually a sprawling metropolis and you are currently en route to visit us in our retirement homes- or our graves- one or the other. Imagine seventy-year-old me barely recognizing you because of how soggy and wrinkly your face has gotten. That won't matter, I'll still recognize your handsome looks anywhere, or anywhen.

          God, coma freaks me out a lot. But never mind that, I hope this letter did reach you, and I hope that you are okay.

          What can I really say? Wait, that isn't right, I have tons to say but I'm not really sure how to, this ballpoint pen isn't really translating how I feel in word form. Maybe Erin can, but I doubt even a writer extraordinaire like her can describe anything that's happened the past week. It was all just too fast and I think not one of us had nearly enough time to process things.

          You know I suck at letters, sincerity, and basketball, among other things. I was debating about actually writing one but at Erin's insistence I finally gave in. I'll try my very best to fulfill at least two of those things.

          It's been a few days and nothing's really the same anymore. It's like everyone's drifted farther apart now, almost like strangers, we're dangerously close to that now, almost like the friendships we built never existed, and it's getting harder and harder to talk to the others, hell, we haven't really talked about it, about what happened. And at this rate I doubt we ever would. You being in coma didn't help. We really need you right now, I need you.

          God, I miss you so much. This is an exception and I'll never say this to your face my whole life, but I love you. That would normally sound gay but I can't help it, you've put me in a position that warrants the gayest thing to have ever come out of my mouth. I love you, Jaylen. Your parents, your friends, we love you.

Even if right now is looking like complete s**t, I'm hoping everything will be okay soon. Come back to us Jaylen.

          Sincerely,

          Peter Suptic