Song: What if I Told You That I Love You by Ali Gatie
MY HEAD. My head is fucking killing me, was Chidinma's first thought when her heavy lids raised open to the extremely bright light. Shakingly, she raised her hand to her head, the limb heavy from no use. The raging, ear-splitting headache she was feeling was extra stellar and Chidinma had never experienced a headache this bad before. She tried to breathe through her mouth but started choking at the tube down her throat
A moment later, Chioma appeared at her side with a shocked gasp, and suddenly, she started sobbing, "Oh my god... you're a-awake. Chidinma, m-my God,"
Furiously, her little sister pressed the help button, her honey orbs glazed with tears. Chidinma reached for the tube stuck down her throat and pulled it out as gently as possible, her throat feeling sore. Reaching for the button that operated the bed, she moved herself to sit up, resting her pounding head on the fluffy pillows.
"My... head," Chidinma groaned in pain and next to her, her mother and Imani stood patiently.
Imani reached for her best friend's hand in concern, "Are you okay, C?"
Chidinma tried to sound empathetic, but somehow, she just did not care enough to not make her voice sound dry, "I'm in the hospital, what do you think?"
Imani's brows flew up and she smirked, "Nice to see you're still a bitch,"
Something only her best friend would say after all. Imani shook her head and went to sit down on the plump couch. Chidinma took a look around the room and noticed the Victoria General logo floating on the doctor's computer screen. The room was grand, with a flat-screen TV, two velvet couches and more than enough room for one patient.
This was the President's Suite. But why was she in it?
The wooden doors opened up to the doctor and two nurses. Chidinma looked up to see Dr. Havenbury, the Chair of the Neurology Department and Dr. Jasdeep, her gynecologist. Dr. Havenbury approached her just as a resident doctor checked her vitals, "Dr. Deliano, you took quite the fall, no?"
Chidinma was not even thinking when she answered, "I wouldn't say quite the...wait," Then, what the elderly doctor said registered in her brain, "What did you call me? I'm Dr. Ndidi,"
The doctors exchanged a panicked look with each other and turned back to Chidinma. Dr. Jasdeep inquired, her South Asian accent prominent in her words, "What is your name?"
Feeling herself get agitated, she retorted, "What kind of idiotic question is that? My name is Chidinma Adaobi Ndidi,"
Now, even her own family was shocked at her response. Dr. Havenbury followed up, "And what happened to you?"
"I fell-" A sigh of relief rang through the room, and Chidinma finished, "-in my house,"
Chidinma did not understand why they looked so panicked. That was what happened, no? She fell down her stairs, hit her head and fainted. That was why she was here. So, why were they acting like the complete opposite?
"Look, can someone explain to me what the hell is going on?" Chidinma stated blatantly and one of the residents spoke up.
"What is the last thing you remember, Dr. Ndidi?"
Chidinma thought of Imani and Fatima's concerned face over her. She remembered her flight from Nigeria in the morning and remembered Timothy cancelling their wedding and announcing that he cheated on her with Harlina. But, she noticed that any emotions or pain she usually had when thinking of that asshole was gone.
"I remember coming back from Nigeria after my engagement. I remember Tim cheating on me, I remember falling down my wooden stairs. Are we done with this?" She regurgitated coldly, face blank with no emotion.
But, Dr. Havenbury was concerned for a different reason. When he had seen Chidinma around the hospital, she was always bubbly and her eyes always told her emotions. But, now, she was like a different person. Her words had no emotion or feeling and she looked cold and blank. He needed to get her in an MRI machine at once because if it was what he suspected, it could be detrimental to her and the baby.
"And what date did that happen?" The resident continued and Chidinma answered nonchalantly;
"July 21st, 2018,"
Chidinma's mother let out a heartbroken wail, and Chidinma cringed at how it reverberated through her skull in sharp painful stabs. She turned to her mother coldly, "I would appreciate it if you would stop yelling in my ear, please,"
At once the wailing stopped as her mother looked at her daughter in absolute shock, her expression slowly turning into anger. Before Chidinma's mother could land her daughter the hardest slap she could muster, Imani jumped in the way of the two and threw her hands up.
"Dr. Havenbury, I think we need to get Chidinma in for an MRI. Immediately, please," Imani exclaimed, persistent. Chidinma shook her head, just wanting to leave the hospital at once. She didn't even know why her mother was here, they had just seen her in Nigeria. She knew her mother was protective, but it was just a small fall. There was nothing to worry about.
Then, Chidinma reached for the part of her head that seemed to radiate the most pain and touched sutures, the plastic material foreign to her touch. How hard did she fall that she needed sutures, not stitches? Sutures were used in medically invasive surgeries, not minor cuts.
Before she could blink, the residents rolled her bed towards the neurology department's MRI machine, taking her IV along with her. On the way, one of the residents removed her G feeding tube, one she was not even aware she had. There was a slight hole called the stoma which was actually leaking fluid from her stomach and the resident applied zinc oxide to the site and covered it in gauze.
"Can someone tell me what is happening?"
Then, Chidinma noticed a slight bump in her stomach.
Then, she began to freak out, when she noticed how hard to touch it was. Her breath sped up as she panicked at what it could mean. Her hands began to shake as she hyperventilated, the series of actions causing the residents to stop her bed in confusion.
"Chidinma," Dr. Havenbury pleaded, "You need to breathe,"
One of the residents with the blood pressure machine looked up from the heavy machine, "Her oxygen is dropping and her heart rate is rising. Fast,"
Dr. Jasdeep muttered furiously to a resident, "Pump 25 millimetres of propofol,"
Before Chidinma knew it, she felt the cooling sensation of the sedative filling her veins and her eyes drooped in sleep. When she awoke, her limbs felt drowsy and she was back in the Presidential Suite. But, this time, there were a lot more people gathered around her, most faces familiar.
In the mass of faces, one face stood out, one that caught her eye. It was not his sharp, stubbled jaw, dark, raven curls, sculpted physique or body filled with intricately designed tattoos that caused her to blatantly stare, but his alluring grey eyes, which seemed to glaze blue with every passing second. They whispered secrets and shouted orders and drew Chidinma deeper within their bottomless depths.
And a pull in her gut told her that she knew this man.
The two individuals observed each other for what seemed like a lifetime, until he broke his stare and looked away, jaw clenched shut. Chidinma spoke up emotionless, causing the room to quiet at her words, "I know you,"
The man looked up once more, hope filling the windows to his soul. His Adam's apple bobbed as he harshly gulped and when he spoke, his voice was sultry and low, and told every bit of the gut-wrenching emotion he was feeling, "You... do?"
The sound caused a shiver down Chidinma's spine. She tried to remember where she had seen the man from, brows furrowed, and finally, she got it, "I saw you in a magazine, a magazine that Imani showed me. And then, I ran into you outside of this room, last week,"
And a single tear rolled down the man's face and his breath hitched.
Then, her eyes met those of the breathtaking individuals around the man, and suddenly she blurted, "And all of you. I saw you all in this room," She pointed at one man in particular who had a young girl on his hip, "You fractured your arm in a bike accident and I was your doctor. What are you all doing here?"
Dr. Havenbury stepped up with a grim expression filling his elderly face as he put MRI images up on the doctor's computer, "Chidinma, I'm sure you know what a normal MRI scan of the brain of a 27-year-old woman looks like and here is the hippocampus," The middle part of the brain, "-the part of the brain that controls cognitive and declarative memory,"
Everyone in the room looked towards the screen with curious expressions on their faces, as Dr. Havenbury continued, "And I'm sure you recognize the limbic system, and its parts, responsible for your emotions,"
The system is located in the lower part of the brain. Then, he put another MRI picture up next to the last one and one look at it and immediately, the medical professional in Chidinma's head knew something was wrong.
"Here," he pointed to the middle part of Chidinma's brain which had what looked like sparse air bubbles in that part of the brain, "-is your hippocampus, Chidinma,"
Chidinma's jaw clenched tightly.
"And here is your limbic system-" More sparse air bubbles.
Chidinma muttered bitterly, tongue hitting the roof of her tongue, finishing the neurologist's sentence, "-both showing limbic modulation, damage to my insula and active retrograde amnesia,"
At the word amnesia, the mood of the room seemed to dampen as Chidinma scoffed. Then, she turned to Dr. Havenbury, looking down at her bare nails, and coldly stated, "Please explain to them, what this means?"
"Chidinma took quite the fall. She fell 60 flights of marble stairs and fractured her skull. The fracture caused temporary memory loss and... she has developed alexithymia," The elderly doctor explained, and Imani began to cry at the medical term, "Which means that she will have trouble feeling, showing and understanding emotions, like... love, hurt happiness..."
At this, the grey-eyed man just walked out of the room, slamming the wooden door behind him, leaving everyone confused. Dr. Havenbury took a breath and finished his sentence, "-or understanding basic social skills and she may also seem apathetic at most-"
Chidinma interrupted him sharply, looking up from her nails to view the individuals, expression blank, "-but, what I would love to know, is what exactly I cannot remember?"
Dr. Jasdeep took a deep breath, and announced, looking down at Chidinma's file, "The date is December third, 2020. Your legal name is Chidinma Deliano, you are married to Xante Deliano and you are approximately 3 months and a week pregnant,"
Silence filled the room and Chidinma scoffed, brown eyes furious and tone frigid, "You. Are. Wrong. So, I want you to re-diagnose me. Now,"
"So... according to every single doctor at this hospital, my diagnosis is correct," Chidinma stated, to the man sneaking into her dark room, as she kept her vacant gaze on the television playing Law and Order: SVU reruns.
She looked up at the stoic man, who put his hands in his pockets and released a sigh, "I thought you would be asleep,"
Chidinma looked up at the time above the television. 12:49 PM. She shrugged, staring into his blue orbs, "I have been asleep for a month. I don't think I will be sleeping for another 10 years at most. Your eyes were grey, now they are blue. Explain,"
The man looked taken aback at her bluntness and furiously gulped, "I... don't know why that happened,"
You do know. Chidinma bit her tongue from blurting out the only response to her question, trying to remember how to be empathetic after she had caused her mother to burst out crying at her tone, "Why are you not asleep?" She inquired curiously.
The man crossed his tattooed arms and smirked, "Insomnia is a bitch,"
Chidinma observed him starkly for a couple more seconds, then turned back to her show. Trying not to blurt out the last, extremely insensitive question on her mind. For a couple of seconds, they both watched the show, until Chidinma could not fight the urge anymore, "So, you are my husband. Xante. How did that happen?"
She turned to the calm man, who bit his bottom lip as his blue eyes lightened into a stormy, silver gray. Just as he was about to speak, she interrupted impassively, "And, for the sake of my intelligence, do not tell me the bullshit story my family has been feeding me for the past 6 hours. I have seen more photo albums than I can count,"
Xante had an amused expression on his face as he answered in the same impassive tone, "I needed a wife and you wanted a wedding,"
There it was. Chidinma nodded, and let out a nonchalant chuckle, "I always knew that crazy dream of mine would cause me some problems one day,"
A flash of hurt passed over the man's face briefly. But, Chidinma could care less, rushing to ask her next question, "Every part of me is saying that is situation is absolutely shit. Before I get any more information, I just want to know, in our marriage, were we the complete opposite of my parents?"
And for some reason, her breath reduced to less than a whisper and her heart rate skyrocketed. Did her childhood cause her to feel afraid or hurt? Was that what those emotions felt like? She felt confused at what she was feeling, her emotions jumbled up into a mess of colours, shapes and lines her mind had no desire to untangle.
Xante observed her for a moment, the silver window to his soul tormented with emotions, and he gave her a shaky nod, "We were the complete opposite of your parents. Never, have I or will I ever laid a hand on you in anger, nor will I ever use you for a gain of any kind,"
Chidinma shrugged, indifferent, "You just said you needed a wife, a gain. And you also said I needed a wedding, also a gain. How are we any different from my parents, who got married for personal gains?"
An uncomfortably pregnant silence filled the room and Chidinma felt something like panic lick in her veins. Xante's long lashes lowered and when he answered, his voice was a low whisper in the dark, serenading her hearing, "Because we loved,"
He continued, slight anger and wistful dreams seeping into his tone, "So much that it became our absolute ruin,"
Chidinma's heart rate slowed, and her panic reduced. She turned back to her show, watching Olivia Benson chase after some pedophile, uncaring about the man seated on the couch who was currently battling with his internal demons. Tomorrow, she would go to that house, pack all of her belongings and start again. As much as everyone claimed this man was her one true love, she did not trust men as far as she could throw them. She refused to be like her mother, weak, naive and fragile. The delicate prey.
"Since you should know me so much," Chidinma began, raising a brow, gaze never leaving her show, "-what is my favourite colour?"
The right answer: She didn't have one because she looked good in everything.
A small smile grew on the man's face, causing his cheeks to indent as his dimples popped in the crevices, "You don't have one. You always said you looked good in everything,"
She took a small sip of her iced water, "And my favourite movie?"
Answer: The Wedding Party when she was feeling homesick and Harry Potter when she had free time.
"When you miss Nigeria, The Wedding Party 1 & 2. When you have a day off and want to binge, Harry Potter, your favourite of the movie series is The Goblet of Fire, because of Cedric Diggory," Xante replied with a raised eyebrow and a devilish grin, daring her to question him. Feeling surprised, she turned to him.
Chidinma felt her heart rate increase slightly, but not in the panicked way it did before. The feeling was almost soothing, and peaceful. So, this was not fear or pain. Then, what was it?
"Favourite food?"
"Jollof rice with a perfectly cooked drumstick, coleslaw, and a chilled bottle of Malt,"
"Comfort food?"
"Chocolate ice cream, with fudge stripes and chocolate chunks,"
And for the next 2 hours, Chidinma threw random questions at the complete stranger in front of her, who answered them flawlessly, each smooth answer causing her heart rate to rise and skip a beat.
POSTED ON: FRIDAY 31 MARCH 2023
(gif: ladies and gentlemen, the weekend)
anyways, chidinma is awake and has alexithymia?? sounds serious. if you still have no idea what it is, google it. it is a condition often associated with autism, and can often be genetic.
(did you see what i did there with the bold font? that was a hint to something)
some folks have been asking "where is chioma's book?" and chioma's book will be called (for now) Choosing Chioma. it will be in my next series coming out, The Ardent Lovers Trilogy, which contains the following books:
Book 1: Finding Imani = imani & vladimir
Book 2: Choosing Chioma = chioma and emiliano (not matteo *winks*)
Book 3: Loving Fatima = fatima and omarion
anyways, sorry for the long author's note. see you when i see you.
gonna go put on my helmet of salvation and watch spiderman just for tom holland,
(lmaoooo if you got that reference, you are elite🤍) ada