A Novel
By
Sauparnika
Chapter 1
The
Concussion
While trying to put the pieces of incidents together on that
dimly lit street, she was just weakened by the pain from the abraded shin. The
sweat pants were grazed with dirt and blood, her helmet slid over the left ear,
scraping the ear lobes over the Velcro.
The bike was about two meters away with one wheel bent
towards the center, and the handle bar trapped inside the side of the parked
car.
There was no clue…
May be a passing truck side-swiped or hit on the open door
of the car. No one was around. The side streets were empty, except some steam
coming out of the manhole covers.
Oh my samples!
Yes; she was carrying them in the small tote bag, which was
fortunately there, being tangled up in the handle bar. She dragged her body
toward the bike as the left knee refused to extend. She felt pain radiating
along her back with every move. She had dried up leaves inside her jacket which
made uneasy noise rubbing against the fabric. She put her hand inside the
jacket pocket to search for the tissues to wipe her nose, which felt like
running. She pulled the tissue out, removing it from the grips of her key chain
tangled with it.
She wiped her nose while slightly blowing. There was blood
on the tissues. She wished that it is just her blood, not the samples she was
carrying on her shoulder previous to the fall. She had to make sure the samples
were safe indeed.
That was her mission. Now she remembered vaguely.
It was around 9:45
PM, she realized that the PCR would have been over and done in her lab. She
just came to the apartment to do the laundry and then decided to cook a dish.
After cutting the vegetables and putting it on the pan in simmer, she ran to
put the clothes in the dryer.
In the night, the basement was empty.
Looking around, she slowly opened the storm door and climbed
up steps. She put the hood of the jacket over her head.
Outside, the dogwood trees were swaying in the chilly autumn
breeze which blew all the leaves to the edge of the door step. In the
courtyard, there were multicolored mums interspersed in green juniper bush and
brownish red mulch.
She had time. She went back to apartment and finished
cooking, switched off the exhaust fan and took a portion of food in a hand
crafted dish she had bought from Pottery Barn.
She placed it on the table over the orange black bamboo mat
nicely. She then realized that she had promised her friend in Seattle to send
the recipe. She enjoyed doing it. She took her camera from the closet in the
bedroom, brought the reading light from the office table and strategically placed
it next to the dish to focus light and took pictures.
Yes; Cilantro.
She remembered that she had some left over in the chill
cabinet in the fridge. She carefully plucked out the brownish leaves and put
the rest strategically in the middle of the dish. She did not want to delete
the previous pictures, but clicked more. It looked very good indeed.
What next?
She had still time, before the clothes got dried up. She
could go to the lab and put the samples to get the fibroblasts and check on the
status of the PCR which was running since she left in the evening.
She remembered putting the tubes of blood samples in the
polystyrene box with bubble wraps.
Then what actually happened? She could not put anything
together after that.
A chunk of her memory was missing.
She felt slightly dizzy as she tried to stand up holding to
the backdoor handle of the car. She felt like violated. Her shirt underneath
her jacket was all soggy and smelling the road trash. She gathered her
belongings from the street sitting down.
It then started
raining slightly.
She was still puzzled by her accident. It might be that she
suffered a concussion. She was not sure.
Did someone hit her?
She had more questions than answers. She always had a
nightmare about a bike wreck. It was so common, that many of the college kids
got knocked down by fast moving vehicles which never cared for the people on
two wheelers. There can also be occasional traps when you negotiate through the
gaps between lanes, someone swerving to side or just opening the car door.
Now it was her turn. She was almost sure that she did not
break any bones. However there was some graze over the left knee, which hurt
like hell.
She managed to get up finally. Then she dragged the bike
out. It is not moving when she pushed as its front wheel is bent and got stuck
between the front forks and the mudguard. The brake paddles also came out of
its fixture.
Now she has to throw this bike away. There are no shops
which fix the bikes as far as she knew. Either she needs to check in the local
newspaper for any sales or go to the Superstore to get another one.
She pulled
the bike to the bike path and leaned it against the bushes.
Then she noticed one important article missing.
Her lab record.
A chill came to her spine.
(To be continued…)
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