Goodbye, Partner

Chapter 12: Wake Up

Kageyama woke up. He was naturally confused because he had just woken up, but he became even more confused when he realized he couldn't open his eyes.

He didn't give it much thought, he was sure it was because he wasn't completely awake yet. He decided to rest for a bit longer, as he was unusually tired.

He felt as if all his energy had been drained from him. He couldn't move a muscle and his whole body felt numb. He heard the familiar beeping noise, but this time, it was much louder, like it was right next to him. His mouth was dry and his head hurt. He felt something on his face. He tried to move, simply lift his index finger, but it was as if his body was refusing to listen to him.

He was a bit taken aback by this, so he opened his eyes to see what on Earth was going on. Except he couldn't open them at first. It felt like his eyelids were glued together. He managed to open them a little. The room was dark enough, but the light still hurt his eyes. He silently grunted and tried to lift his arm to rub his eyes, but all he managed to get was a flinch. He opened them up again, let them get used to the light and then tried to look around. Everything was really blurry, but he managed to see shapes and colours. There was a dark white ceiling above him. When he looked down, he saw light blue walls and a rectangular white shape. When he looked further down, he saw his legs covered with a white sheet. All this made him realize he indeed wasn't in his room.

He frowned and stared at his legs, waiting for everything to become clearer. He then noticed someone sitting beside his bed. He looked at the face and focused his eyes, and then he managed to recognize the person.

„Mom...?" he mouthed. He was surprised at his inability to speak. His voice was raspy and almost inaudible, it sounded more like a grunt than a word. But he still made a sound.

His mom turned her face and looked at him, his vision cleared and he was almost able to see normally.

He saw his mom's eyes widen. His eyes would do the same, if they could.

„Why are you here?"

This time, his voice sounded a bit better and his words were more or less understandable, but his voice was still weak, quiet and raspy.

His mom jumped on her feet and put her hands on Kageyama's face.

„Tobio! You're awake!"

She was smiling and her eyes watered, but then she turned around, said something, went somewhere... Kageyama wasn't sure about what was happening. The last thing he remembered was packing up the last bit of things and going to sleep in his bed. He was very confused, almost to the point of panicking.

Where am I? Did I just sleep through the entire moving process and now I'm in our new place? And why is mom here, all the way from Fukuoka? Why can I barely speak and not move? What the hell is going on?

In this time of thinking and confusion, he noticed a few things. There was another person in the room and it was his sister. Mom told her something and quickly left the room. He also noticed that he was in a hospital bed. There was a tube on his nose and an IV stuck in his hand.

Because of all of the commotion, confusion, noises and movements, this was all he managed to catch before someone else burst into the room, stealing his attention.

It was a doctor, followed by his mom. The doctor swiftly came to the side of Kageyama's bed and looked at a chart he was holding.

Kageyama was confused and beyond, but he had no time to think about anything and soak in what was happening.

„Can you tell me what your name is?" the doctor asked, holding a pen on the chart, ready to write something down.

„Uh, Kageyama Tobio," his voice was still a bit raspy, but much better.