The remote was so close but yet so far away. Tyler had forgotten to tell Donna to turn on the TV before she left to clean out his dorm room and run some other errands. It was quite clear that Tyler wouldn't be returning to the college anytime soon, if ever, so there was no use for his belongings still to be there.
It wasn't like he was actually keen on watching anything, as the constant dull ache throughout his body coupled with loopiness from pain medication made it impossible for him to focus. But at least turning on something mindless would distract him slightly from the reality of being strapped to a hospital bed for the foreseeable future.
Using all the strength his mangled body could muster, he reached his right hand toward the remote on the bedside table. His whole body hurt from the exercise, as nothing seemed to be in the right place anymore. But he pushed through, closing in inch by inch, and eventually, he triumphantly held the device in his hand. Victory! A small one, but still.
He picked up the remote, and it promptly fell to the floor. In his weakened state, his fingers couldn't keep a steady grip. "Damn it," he mumbled, unable to do anything but watch it bounce away underneath the bed. Once again, life had served him a bitter defeat, and he could do nothing but lay there, staring at the ceiling--because he refused steadfastly to look down toward his legs--waiting for someone to enter the room and break the monotony.
Luckily, he didn't need to wait long.
"Hi Tyler," Shruti greeted Tyler as she walked into the room. With a warm smile and assuring demeanor, always telling her patient exactly what procedure she was performing and when something may hurt, she had skyrocketed to the top spot of Tyler's nurse ranking. "I'm here to redress the bandages on your leg again."
In the days that had passed since Tyler awoke after the accident, a lot of doctors, nurses, and attendants had passed through his room. He couldn't remember the names of all of them but he remembered the long list of injuries they rattled off from his chart: concussion, neck contusion, left shoulder dislocated, several broken ribs, a punctured lung, right ankle fractured in several places, left leg amputated below the knee. They read it like it was a damn grocery list, instead of permanent marks on his body.
They often ended their rounds by noting how lucky he'd been. They didn't say it to him but they said it to each other. "That boy could have been so much worse off. I can't believe he even survived that fall off the bridge."
Well, Tyler didn't feel lucky. He wasn't quite sure what he felt yet. Mostly, he was confused and overwhelmed.
His body didn't feel like his anymore. It seemed to belong to the hospital staff, constantly tending to him in one way or the other. Chest drain tubes, IV infusions, and cords that monitored his breathing and heart rhythm. So many bandages, casts, and splints. He wasn't even sure where his own body ended and the hospital equipment began.
That his lower left leg was gone, making him disabled, hadn't quite landed yet, as it wasn't like he could rise from the bed anyway. But sometimes, late at night when pain kept him awake, the realization hit him, making him break out in cold sweats as waves of panic rose in his chest. Nothing would ever be the same. He did know that. But he didn't know what things would be like. He didn't know that things would be alright. No matter how many times people assured him that the prosthetic technology had evolved rapidly in the last few years and that he would be running again before he knew it.
"Is there anything you need before I start?" Shruti asked, walking up to the side of Tyler's bed. "Are you comfortable like that?" She fluffed up his pillows a bit, making sure his neck was properly supported.
"Can you maybe turn on the TV?" Tyler asked, pointing toward the floor. "The remote... fell."
"Sure," Shruti replied, not questioning why the remote was underneath the bed. Tyler wagered that she probably had figured out the reason but she was tactful enough to not rub in his shortcomings. "What do you want to watch?"
"Just put on some cartoons," he said. "Like the kid's channel, I guess." It felt a bit embarrassing to make that request but he'd realized that a lot of the content on the other channels was triggering for him. Watching soccer, which he would with certainty never play again, was a no-go, and his usual second choice sport, Formula 1, with screeching tires and crinkling metal, wasn't advisable either. But just turning on whatever was airing at the moment wasn't a good idea either, since a harmless sitcom quickly could change into a harrowing hospital drama. So cartoons were the safe choice.
When Sponge-Bob appeared on the screen, Tyler gestured to Shruti to put down the remote. He still wasn't particularly keen on watching anything but underwater adventures would do nicely as a distraction while Shruti worked on his left leg.
He hadn't looked at it yet, the stump or whatever you called it. He feared the wound would be too gruesome to take in.
"You all good?" Shruti asked, pressing the button on the bed that lowered his legs. The nurse's infectious smile, dark eyes, and long curly hair reminded him of Sarah. He wondered if she and Hernan knew about his accident. Perhaps everyone from his high school whispered about the poor former soccer star who had his leg cut off by now.
"I'm good," Tyler replied, although he didn't really feel good at all. Considering the circumstances though, he supposed he was as good as he could be. He took a sip of the milkshake-like drink beside him to showcase his alleged comfort.
Eating solid food was still an effort for him. The feeding process in itself felt demeaning, as he had to be spoon-fed like a damn baby bird. On top of that, his throat still felt raw from the tubes that had been inserted to help him breathe and his stomach felt queasy from the pain medicines and other drugs pumped into his system. After he'd spitted out the supposedly nutritious broth they had brought him, blaming the bitter taste, one of the kind nurses had instead brought him a cup of sweet thick liquid tasting of strawberries and cream. The drinks had become his main joy in the monotonous hospital life. Once the nurses had put it in the cupholder on the fold-out tray in front of him, he could guide the straw to his mouth with his right hand and ingest the beverage on his own accord.
Those kinds of small victories were what kept him from falling into a pit of despair.
"How many of those have you had today?" Shruti asked, raising an eyebrow. "You know those are usually for kids? We give them to children who are underweight, to pump them up with nutrients."
Tyler shrugged, well, as much of a shrug he could muster at least. Which was more a light shake of his right shoulder. "Four... or maybe five," he admitted, taking another sip to showcase his fondness for the sweet delight. He didn't care one iota who they were originally made for. He needed to be pumped with nutrients too, and he preferred them in sweet strawberry form.
Shruti raised both her eyebrows even higher, so they disappeared underneath her thick bangs. "You must have really charmed the other nurses if they keep serving them to you, considering they have to walk all the way to the children's ward to get the mix."
A gurgling noise came from the cup in front of Tyler, signaling that the current beverage was almost out. "So you won't get me another one then?" he asked, tilting his head slightly, which was difficult as the neck brace impeded his movements. At least the doctors had changed the rigid plastic one for a softer foam collar yesterday.
"We'll see," Shruti muttered but the smile on her lips told Tyler that the answer was definitely yes.
It was a pity he wasn't into girls, considering how easy it was to charm these nurses to do his bidding. Although that may rely more on maternal instinct than attraction. Not that he was particularly focused on his dating life anyway, as cute boys were hard to get by when you were strapped to a hospital bed. And he couldn't really imagine anyone would find him appealing in his current state.
Maybe he should set up Shruti with his cousin Lance though. He needed someone to care for him.
"Do you have a boyfriend?" he blurted out. It may be the pain meds loosening his lips, although thinking before speaking had never been his strong suit.
"Are you hitting on me, Tyler?" Shruti giggled.
"No, I'm too..." gay for you, he almost said, but he settled for, "young, for you. But my cousin Lance is around your age. He's in the army but he'll come visit me once he's on leave."
He'd talked to Lance briefly on the phone, and his cousin had promised to come around as soon as he could. But the army wasn't generous with leave on short notice, so it could be weeks or even months. The notion that Tyler may still be here months from now was dreadfully depressing. Stuck on this bed, disabled and in pain, while life went on outside.
"You know this is a workplace, not a dating show?" Shruti asked, sitting down by the foot end of the bed.
"It's not my workplace," Tyler countered, "and I'm bored. I mainly see you nurses so I figured I could just as well play Bachelor with you."
Shruti sighed and shook her head, putting out the instruments to redress his leg on the bed beside her.
"So are you interested?" he asked again, hoping to delay the painful process that was to come.
"I told you this is not a dating show," she muttered, perhaps tiring a bit of Tyler's shenanigans. She hadn't said no though so Lance totally still had a shot.
Shruti started unwrapping layers upon layers of bandages. The leg was encased all the way up to his groin since bruises and cuts covered the skin. Perhaps if he'd been straight, he'd feel awkward about a pretty girl touching him so close to his private parts. He probably wouldn't have cared if it was a cute boy either though, because nothing about his body felt private anymore. It was everyone's property but his own.
Tyler focused on SpongeBob SquarePants on the screen above him while Shruti removed the plastic knee brace that kept torn tendons in place. "Keep the leg still now," she ordered him, probably fearful a hasty move would bust up his leg further.
Tyler grunted affirmatively in reply, steadfastly not looking down. It wasn't like his limbs cooperated with him very well anyway, so he wasn't about to try to kick off from the bed.
Every light touch from Shruti's skilled fingers, removing the final layer of gauze closest to the skin, felt like a stroke of fire. He squirmed impatiently, trying to not reveal to his nurse how much pain her gentle care caused him.
"Where does it hurt the most?" Shruti asked, not fooled by his charade.
"My toes..." Tyler mumbled, knowing the answer didn't make sense as he no longer had any toes on his left side. Nor did he have an ankle or foot, but those also appeared to be consumed by flames.
"Phantom pains are unfortunately very common for amputees," Shruti explained patiently, while skillfully unraveling the last layers of bandage.
People kept using that word to refer to him. Amputee. Someone who had lost a limb. But he couldn't identify with it. That he, Tyler Caster, was an amputee. And that designation now seemed to trump everything else he was, or at least had been. An athlete. A student. A brother. A gay person. No, he was just an amputee now, stuck on a hospital bed, where he was being poked and prodded while people looked at him with pity.
"It's the cut-off nerve ends still sending signals to your brain," Shruti continued, enthusiastically gesturing as she talked. "Hopefully, once nerve ends get used to their new trajectory the pain will go away."
Tyler had heard the explanation before. He just couldn't quite wrap his head around it. Because the pain felt so real. It felt like his toes were still there, constantly burning. And the reality of them no longer being attached to him didn't make sense at all.
Sometimes, during those angst-filled late nights, he just stared at it. At the absence of a leg. It just looked so odd. His brain was unable to take in that it was his own body he looked at.
Gritting his teeth through the agony, Tyler suffered through the remaining unwrapping. Once all gauze was removed, Shruti paused for a moment, seemingly inspecting his leg... stump, or whatever you called it.
"Does it look really... disgusting?" Tyler asked with his gaze focused on the cartoon.
Shruti shook her head. "No, your residual leg is actually healing quite nicely."
Oh, that must be what you called it! Residual leg. A lot better than "stump" at least. He could work with that.
"I just need to get some more gauze," she said, walking over toward a cupboard.
As she turned her back, Tyler couldn't help it. He looked. Despite not really wanting to. But curiosity took overhand, making him peer over at his exposed residual leg for just a second. He supposed he would have to look eventually anyway, as he would have to live with it for the rest of his life.
It didn't look as scary as he'd feared. No blood gushing or pieces of bone sticking out. Just neat stitches on bruised skin.
He diverted his eyes again when Shruti turned back, pretending to be really focused on Sponge-Bob. He didn't want her to notice him peaking. He wanted his discovery of his changed body to be his own, without prompting or encouragement.
It still hurt when she dabbed the stitches with some kind of cleaning solution, applied layers of gauze, put on the knee brace, and then swaddled the limb with clean bandages again. But it didn't hurt as much. Perhaps his brain had started to accept what had happened by getting a glimpse of the injury, or perhaps it was just a coincidence. Regardless, just that fact that he'd peaked at his leg and not found it revolting was a small victory and he desperately needed those right now.
Life was up about 1000 points on him right now, but if he kept scoring small victories maybe he would one day, in a distant future where hopefully things would feel alright again, claw his way to the top again.
Author's Note: I was going to go back to the present for this chapter but as I started writing I just couldn't leave Tyler in the state he was in the last chapter, so I decided to stay with him at the hospital for a bit longer, to let him and the readers process the situation before jumping back to him being happy and in love. And it's part of the story he never really talks about much in SLB, so I found it interesting to explore here.