Why?
Why am I here?
Where am I?
Who is this woman who’s stroking my hand, smiling?
Who am I? What’s happened?
I feel my head is wrapped in bandages, needles are in my arms, connected to small, transparent tubes coming from flasks full of liquid that is flowing down, instilling itself into my veins...
I still can’t see what’s around me, everything seems foreign to me, far away...
I'm confused, I can’t remember anything, not even my name...
Something is happening around me, people are moving around my bed, they’re talking excitedly, but I can’t understand a word of what they’re saying ... it seems something extraordinary is happening, but what?
I'm scared, fear takes hold of me, I try to hide myself, lowering my head down under the white sheets What do all these people who are smiling at me want to tell me? Words I cannot understand.
‘... she’s conscious!'
'... alert and responding to stimuli!'
Now I’m starting to feel pain - pain so real and tangible that it can be seen as a dark presence always with me, a black alter ego that holds me back each time I try to move my head. I’m crying, even though I do not know why.
Days go by, I get a few visits, people I can hardly remember, except that I’ve seen their faces before. One of them, who seems particularly moved at seeing me, says her name is Frau Helga. She kisses me on the forehead, I smile at her. I would like to ask her who I am, what has happened, but I cannot speak, only a groan comes out of my mouth, then a tearful cry. A young man, he says his name is Stin, squeezes my right hand in his, I see my reflection in the lenses of his glasses, my head is all wrapped up, where is my hair? He has brought me a bunch of red roses.
Their visits are brief, I get too emotional, but I look forward to the next one ... I wonder if I can sort out the tangled skein of my memories ...
After I’ve stayed in my bed for a long time, I’m allowed to sit up. Today I’ve started taking my first steps. I feel uncertain, as if I’m walking in the dark, I carry my legs forward dragging my feet on the floor. I stop, holding onto the arm of the nurse who’s accompanying me. Even my efforts to re-learn words is bearing fruit, I can ask for water if I'm thirsty, I can greet those who come to visit me. I ask the doctors who I am, they say that my name is Gabriella, but I seem to have had a different name, it seems to me that it was Juliet ...
I ask Frau Helga, to confirm what the doctors have told me. She tells me it's true, for a short time I was Juliet, but that was in a ballet, my real name is Gabriella - or Gaby, as she calls me she. She has brought me some photographs taken during the show: ye, it's me, dressed in white veils, dancing on the stage of a theatre. She has also brought a strange box, from which comes music ...
And a miracle happens: as if a light had been turned on in a room, a dark room, memories are flocking to come out of the shadows in which they’ve been hidden. Here he is, my love, on the ground, dead, I don’t know how ... it's Vio, that’s what he’s called!
I try to get up, the music calls me ... yes, I’m walking on tiptoes, like I did when I was a child whenever I heard music, without shoes – but I slip disastrously, Frau Helga just gets to grab me before I hurt myself by falling.
Tonight is the night when memories emerge from the past ...
I am very agitated, perspiring, moaning in pain. The nurse who is my guardian angel is watching me, she does not abandon me for a moment. Little by little, like in a painting on an artist’s canvas, a jigsaw puzzle, my memories, my life is put back together in my mind - but with some confusion, I still don’t recognize certain figures that keep appearing in my memory ...
Today is the day of truth: I will have to look in the mirror...
Carefully the doctors remove the bandages from around my head, an operation that they have already done several times since I regained consciousness, but they have never allowed me to look at myself. They check the condition of my injuries, it seems that everything is as expected. A psychologist is by my side, she gives me the mirror, the beating of my heart is in overdrive, I see a face framed by arabesques of curving, entwining red lines, on the scalp of a skull without hair. It is as if my face has been removed and then attached to the bone. My heart pauses, I seem to faint...
Yes, but I recognize myself, it's me. I turn away from the mirror. The psychologist smiles at me, it seems these surgeons have done a good job. It is difficult to accept such a radical change, but over time, when my hair can regrow and mask the scars it will be easier. The features of my face - my eyes, nose, lips, all seem intact. I’d feared worse. The psychologist comforts me, everything will return as it was before, the most important thing is to retrieve the sense of balance that I still lack. I often tumble to the floor, as if I am no longer able to control my legs.
Now I shall have to leave this hospital, the emergency is over, I will complete my rehabilitation in a clinic. Unfortunately it is a long distance away, which will prevent me from having close by those people who have never left me, a reason for further anxiety and pain. I don’t want to think about my past as a ballerina any more, in this condition I shall never be able to dance again, but the important thing is that I am still alive.
One thought still torments me, a question I cannot answer: 'Why?