Only You Know

"You're finally awake."

The young girl lay in her bed. The world around her was spinning. Her head was throbbing. She moved a cold hand to her forehead as she glanced around the room. A woman in white clothes stood to her left, a clipboard in her arms, a contempt smile upon her lips.

"How are you feeling?" the woman asked looking into her eyes with dark brown coloured ones.

"I...I don't..." the young girl stuttered as she tried to think.

"You don't remember?"

"I..."

The woman beside her was still smiling, even when the girl turned away.

“Don’t be afraid.” The woman spoke in a calming voice. “It’s natural to not remember some things after taking a hit like that.”

The girl turned back; her eyes widened in curiosity. “Hit?”

“You don’t remember that either?”

“I don’t remember anything; wait-“ the girl sat up suddenly as realization dawned across her face. Turning to the woman beside her she asked, “who am I?”

The woman, who identified herself as Nurse Shannon, stood outside the room. She already explained the situation to the girl the best way she could; apparently her name was Chloe, and she had taken a heavy hit to the head while playing sports. Now she didn’t remember anything, not her family, interests, friends, even her own name she had forgotten. The nurse was very patient with her as she tried to remember.

“You don’t remember anything?” she would say calmly; to which Chloe would shake her head with sadness.

Now Chloe lay upright upon the hospital bedding. The nurse was outside informing several people about her condition. Amnesia. That was the word she used to describe her memory loss.

The door opened and the nurse came back in, followed by three other people. They each identified themselves as the Chloe’s brother, a friend from school, and someone who was her lover.

“You were always doing stuff in your room; almost as if you were trying to work harder than I was.” The brother would say with a calm expression.

“We always loved how athletic you were in sports.” The friend would say, with reassurance in her voice.

“You almost never smiled when we were together,” the lover would explain “it was as if you were unsure of something.”

“Amazing,” Chloe would think to herself. “Three different people, and three different personalities to who I was.”

They would sit together in the hospital room for hours every day. Each day brought new information about who she was from the perspectives of those around her.

She learned that she was passionate about her studies and was well liked by those at school. She had an image of success wherever she walked.

Yet she was also anti-social towards her family, often secluding herself within her room, cutting herself off from the outside world.

She would have no difficulties expressing herself to others at times, yet when it was with her boyfriend, she was silent, as if always thinking deeply to herself.

For several days this pattern went on. With little success. Memories of who she once was were not coming back to her. Even with all these stories about who she was, she felt uneasiness swell within her. The person in the stories just didn’t feel like her.

Looking back over the notes the nurse had written for her, based on the stories she was told by those who visited, Chloe began to feel more lost than ever before. She wanted to return to who she once was; but one question continued to rage within herself.

“Who is the ideal me?”

Looking over the pages in her hand she perceived multiple versions of herself.

“Which of these is the ‘true’ me?”

Letting the pages fall upon her lap she sits against the pillows. Twisting she stares at the device her brother had brought her. He called it a projector. Reaching forward she grabbed the object off the table and placed it against her lap. Clicking off the lights with the controls on her bedside remote, she clicked the projector’s switch.

Stars filled the dimly lit room. A deep interest in space had apparently been a powerful interest of hers. According to her brother, when she was alone, she would gaze towards the stars, as if searching for something among them.

It was ironic. She had apparently been searching for something she once knew about. Now she was searching for something else, yet she did not know what she searched for. She turned to look back over the pages in her legs.

“Who should I become in order to continue living my life?” Closing her eyes Chloe drifted off into a quiet sleep among the stars.

“Um…maybe there are photos or messages in your phone?” Nurse Shannon suggested as she took Chloe’s breakfast tray away.

“I tried looking, but it’s locked and needs a password. See.”

“Humm…It will be difficult to figure it out without some kind of hint.”

“You’re right.”

“Well, it hasn’t been long since you regained consciousness, please don’t feel like you have to rush it.” Nurse Shannon said as she turned to depart the room.

“Even now, I still want to stay by your side Chloe,” her boyfriend said to her. “You don’t need to change anything about yourself, go on as you are. I only want to be the one by your side.”

Chloe’s face turned back to sadness as she spoke her next words, “right now I don’t know who I am myself. I feel as if I have to choose who I want to be from here on out, yet I don’t know how to go about doing that. I have no memories after all.”

That night Chloe lay down on her bed with the covers over her entire body. Trying to think about who she was, who she is. No memories about who she once was were returning to her though. She felt so lost as waves of uncertainty shot through her body.

“Nothing new today huh?”

Chloe shook her head as the nurse came to check on her.

“I’m… afraid. Afraid of not knowing who I am. Of knowing who I was.” She turned to look at the nurse’s surprised, yet still calm, face. “What kind of person was I before?”

“I don’t know.” The nurse replied.

“You don’t know. Then what should I do?”

The nurse’s smile returned to her before she said her next words.

“You have heard many different things about yourself from those who visit you. So much so that it is more painful than helpful. You may feel like you have to pick one personality among so many; basing that person only on the stories you hear.”

Chloe hung her head, “If that’s true, then how do I choose?”

“Is there really a need to make that choice?”

Chloe raised her head to stare back at the nurse.

“I don’t know anything about you, other than the interactions we have had here. But, I think that through these I have learned a great deal about you.”

“You have?”

“I know what books you enjoy reading; what kind of music moves you, even what kind of flowers you like. And I think to myself, “I don’t know anything more about Chloe than the person who is ‘Chloe.’”

“But…I have to choose someone to be, don’t I? Because I have no memories.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“But…don’t you think all the interactions you have had since you woke up; can’t those help you shape the person you want to be?”

Chloe’s eyes widened. “The person I want to be?”

“You don’t need to be a person who is solely based on past memories, who is the person you want to be here and now?”

Chloe stared for a moment as she considered the nurse’s words. Then she put on a calm smile. “I want…I want to be myself; I want to learn about myself from my own experiences. I…I want to make new memories.”

The nurse smiled back at her. “That’s good Chloe.”

“But where do I start?”

“That’s something only you can know.”

The nurse got up and left the room. Leaving Chloe alone with the one and only person who could tell her who she truly was.

Turning on the projector, she stared at the starry sky.

"Only I know...huh."

She smiled, as the memory formed within the stars.