Alpha Hero - Hope Ford

1

Mack

Blind. I can’t see a thing. I’ve lain in this hospital bed for four days now and still no answers. Pain fills me and I grab my temple. But it’s not just my head; no, I feel like I’m about to lose my mind. I have no clue what happened. We were working a job. Something we’re trained to do. We answered the call just like every other call. We’re trained firemen—heck with that, we’re experienced, elite firemen. We’re the ones you call when shit’s really bad. I still have trouble remembering everything that happened or how it went down. All I know is what they told me. I fell and hit my head and didn’t have my helmet on. What the fuck I was doing in an open fire without my helmet is beyond me.

All my brothers have been in to see me and right away I knew there was something fucked up about the situation. It wasn’t until my second day here they finally told me. My best friend, Allen, died in that fire. I ended up missing his funeral. Damn, not that I deserved to go. It’s my fault he’s dead. It’s my fault… well, for everything.

“How you doing today, Mack?”

I recognize the voice. It’s the head doctor. The one that can’t figure out what’s going on with my eyesight.

I can’t fucking see. How the hell do you think I’m doing? “Not good, Doc. I still can’t see.”

I can hear his grunt as he approaches the bed. “Yeah, well, we’ve checked everything. Your blood work, all of your scans… there’s nothing we can find that is causing the vision loss.”

Unable to hold my frustration back, I ask him, “So that’s it? I’m just fucking blind?”

He ignores my outburst. “The swelling of your head makes the MRI inconclusive. I’ve talked to your other doctors and we are releasing you. We will have you scheduled for another MRI in seven days.”

I throw my hands up in the air. “So I’m going home like this.”

I can hear the whining in my voice and it pisses me off even more. I’m not a whiner. I take care of shit. I get it done. But damn, this has fuckin’ rocked me.

“Yes, but you can’t let this…”

I stop him before he tries to feed me a line of bullshit to not let this get me down. I’m blind. My best friend is dead and the way it looks right now, I’ll never fight fires again. “Yeah, Doc, I got it.” I don’t want to listen to his motivational crap right now. I pull the blanket off and stand up, grabbing the side of the bed. I’m already fully dressed, have been all day. I’m not the type to sit around in a gown.

“Woah, woah. Not so fast. We have to finish your paperwork. Plus, we are having a home health nurse assigned to you. Your captain has already set it up.”

“I don’t need a nurse,” I tell him grudgingly. I mean, I probably fucking do, but I’m not going to tell him that. I’ll make do. Some fuckin’ how.

He doesn’t say anything. And it pisses me off I can’t see what look he’s giving me. Automatically, I feel like he’s pitying me and well, I can’t stand pity.

“I’m leaving. Five minutes, Doc.”

The sound of footsteps and a knock on the door jerks my head to the side, but I can’t see who it is.

“He giving you problems?” I hear Terry, my friend and fellow fireman, say.

Relief hits me. I don’t know if it’s because I can’t see anything but right now, I need something or someone familiar to be surrounding me.

Even though I know it’s him, I still ask, “Terry?”

“Hey, brother. I hear you’re getting out?”

“Oh yeah,” I answer him and then say to the air, “Whatever happened to patient confidentiality rules?” I’m pissed off and I know I shouldn’t take it out on the doc, but fuck, I need to know when I’m going to get my sight back.

The doctor clears his throat. “I’ll uh, get the nurse on that paperwork. We’ll have you ready to go shortly.”

I start to walk and run into something. Terry reaches out and grabs me before I fall over. “C’mon, brother, let’s sit you down.”

He starts to back me up, but I throw my hand up. “I’m not going back on that bed.”

“Fine. Fine.” He leads me across the room slowly. “Here’s a chair.”

I sit down in it and barely get comfortable before I’m asking him, “Have