Unsolved

But my noblest desire lost against the cowardice of flesh. I woke up, gasping for air, my head in a splitting pain worse than any other. Ever the shameless animal, my body clung to the very life for which I had the utmost indifference. My vision blurred, distorted by the refraction of bright sun rays through my welled-up tears. Wiping them away with the back of my hand, my wrist touched a thin hose attached to a nasal cannula on my face. Latching onto that sensation of plastic against skin, an unfamiliar room finally came into focus. The walls, my bedsheets, and the young doctor’s coat were the color of bleached white bones — of sterility.

“It’s good you’re finally awake, Mr. Jones.” The bespectacled woman speaking with a slight Quebecois accent looked up from her clipboard and nodded curtly. “Dr. Gagnon, respiratory science. How are you doing?”