Seeing Clearly

Chapter Three

“ She sees the truth behind the lies” -Angel of Harlem (U2)

“Now?”

Alaya felt razor-sharp needles pierce her head as the doctor spoke softly.  She inhaled, holding back a scream, and responded to the doctor’s question with the same answer she had been using for the past five minutes.

“No.”

After a quiet click, Alaya felt Doctor Gilles step away from her. Alaya guessed that he had switched off the flashlight he had been using to check out her eyes.

 A small sigh came from the direction of the doctor. Alaya knew that sigh. It was a sigh that said ‘She’s not getting any worse, but not any better either’. She had heard it from two other doctors already this morning.

The physical therapist had sighed and said that her internal bruising was healing nicely, but that her lungs were still “a cause of concern”. The neurologist had sighed and said that the stitches on her head and neck had healed perfectly, but that the brain scan revealed the same thing it had when she first did the test back home: the nerves weren’t healing. They hadn’t yet reconnected themselves with the other nerves in her brain.

Alaya waited for a count of three seconds before the eye specialist began her final diagnosis. “Well Alaya, your eyes are still showing high levels of melanin, which is what’s responsible for making one of them blue and the other green… And, judging from the test results, it seems that your vision spectrum remains blank.”

“Thank you Dr. Gilles,” Alaya whispered robotically. She heard a quiet shuffling, and then the sound of a door opening and closing.

Her lungs were still a cause of concern, the nerves in her brain refused to heal, and her sight wasn’t showing any signs of returning anytime soon.

And school starts tomorrow, Alaya thought to herself as she ran a hand through her thick hair. She went through the list of tests she had done today while she stretched her tense muscles. Alaya recoiled as a flare of pain shot through her hips and traveled up her stomach.

A brain scan, three blood tests, and two MRI’s. But the torture has just begun.

The door opened, and then closed again. “Ready to go Aya?” Lily’s overly cheery voice asked. Alaya pursed her lips.  Lily’s voice brought back memories from her dream last night. After Lily had found discovered that Alaya’s sight was gone, she spent weeks talking in that tone.

Alaya took a deep breath, blew out her air, and nodded, sliding off the examination table. She let her her feet hit the ground with a slap. Lily’s arm instantly wrapped around her waist, and then they were moving. Voices mingled around her as Alaya walked out of the doctor’s office and into the warm September air. A small breeze blew through her hair so it covered her face, blocking her line of sight as they moved down the steps; good thing it didn’t matter.

Alaya could make out the sound of cars rushing down a busy road nearby. Two angry honks started her head pounding. With Lily’s help, Alaya settled into the passenger seat, the door closing shut with a loud slam. She pulled her dark sunglasses that sat atop her head onto her face.

I really need to remember to wear them more often, she thought.

She reached her hand over to her right and felt around for the seatbelt. Her hand had just grasped the cold metal part, when the door on the other side of the car opened. The car shook slightly as the Lily sat down.

Alaya finished buckling herself in just as the car started. Soft jazz filtered in from the radio. The two rode home in silence. Alaya used this time to think; she replayed the doctors’ words in her mind. In all honesty, Alaya didn’t care about the state of her lungs, or how well her stitches were healing. All she needed to hear was that her sight was returning.