Coma

It is amazing how fast something can happen.

Dale had pulled into the tiny little coffee stand, got a $4.95 double chocolate flavored java, tipped the scantily clad server.

It was a Friday night, his work week was done, Dale stopped every Friday night for a coffee.

He took a sip, it was very hot, so he reached out and set it on the dashboard, reached over and lifted the center console on his Impala Super Sport to get his coffee cup sleeve, it was one of those reuse over and over kind, heavily padded.

Much better than the paper ones the coffee stand placed on the hot drinks.

He was rolling towards the street slowly, in that exact moment of inattention, the coffee cup began to slide.

Dale leaned forward to grab it before it could spill and his right foot pressed on the throttle.

There was a flash of light and something hit the driver's side door, that was the last he remembered.

+++

Dale opened his eyes, the light was blinding but blurry. He tried to blink but could not.

"Oh my God, he is awake!" Someone cried out, then there was a flurry of activity.

After quite some time, he heard a male voice.

"Just a reflex, we still have almost no brain wave activity". Whoever it was said.

That was odd, Dale felt perfectly normal except for the fact that he could not move.

His wife Janet came in not too long after, he could see her face as she leaned forward to kiss him.

Something was wrong, it took him a minute to realize.

Her hair was too long, and the color was not Sandy blond now but an impossible shade of red?

He remembered seeing her just that morning.

He saw rather than felt his eyes close again, he knew because he could still see reddish light through the flesh of his eyelids.

Dale tried to open his eyes but try as he might, they would not. He tried to call out, say something, but nothing happened.

"God, when I got your call, I was hoping...." Dale heard Janet say.

"False alarm honey, sorry." A woman said.

"This is terrible, it goes on and on. Ever since we took him off life support, and he breathed on his own I have been hoping..." Janet's voice broke, went into sobs.

Life support? She had them take him off life support? But, Dale wasn't dead, he knew very well he was not.

He just couldn't move for some reason.

"Come on Janet, let's go down and get some coffee, I will try to explain what is happening." Dale heard the man's voice, then they were talking as their voices faded away.

Suddenly tired, Dale felt himself drift into sleep, even though he tried not to.

+++

Dale walked over to the machine, the steady peeping sound was driving him crazy. He reached out and pushed the button that shut off the monitor. The sudden quiet felt good.

Then he realized, he was standing up? Glancing at the cot, he saw the form lying there motionless. He walked over to the edge of the cot, looked down.

With a shock, he realized it was himself lying there! Just then a nurse burst in, hit the lights and went over to the monitor.

"Damn cheap Chinese made shit!" She mumbled. She stood there and studied the machine for a few moments, then walked out of the room without giving him a glance.

That was strange, he was standing right there in plain sight. Then for a moment he felt dizzy, his eyes opened again.

The lights were blinding, he tried to close them but could not. He thought he could feel a tear escape and drift down his cheek, but he wasn't sure of it.

+++

That happened several times over the next few days, Dale had no clue at all of what was happening. When he was awake, he was lying there on the cot, unable to move.

When he drifted off to sleep it was like he was perfectly normal, he could reach out and touch, do things, move around.

He even attempted to go out into the hall and he actually made it past the door, but then suddenly he was back on the cot.

It was like he was limited to perhaps 30 feet or so, any further and there was a sudden end to his explorations.

He was standing there once wishing there was a TV set at least in the room when the night nurse came in.

Oddly, she stopped and looked around, a puzzled expression on her face.

Dale liked it when she came in, she was cute, but business like. She took a pan of warm water and washed him, she didn't bother to cover him with a cloth or anything like that. She even held his penis in one latex covered hand and rolled back his foreskin with the other, washing him carefully there, then patting him dry.

Dale stood there watching as she did that, he felt himself erect at the touch and washing, his body lying asleep on the little cot did also.

The nurse held it in her hand, looking at it with a grin on her face.

"Thank you." Dale said out loud but no sound came out, instead there was a gargling sounding grunt from his body lying there with his mouth stuffed full of hoses.

The nurse let go like she had been burned, she quickly covered his body back up and left the room.

Later he overheard her speaking to the day shift nurse when she came on duty.

"Just a reaction to stimulus, there is still no brain waves so he really can't feel that or know about it." The older woman said.

"It just seems to me like he must feel something for that to happen." The younger woman said.

"He really can't honey. I have washed him myself several times in the last two years, I got the same reactions. I even talked to the Doctor about it, he says it's different but not that abnormal in cases like this." The older woman left and went to her station down the hall.

The younger nurse watched her go, then she turned and came over beside Dale.

"You are in there, aren't you?" She whispered.

Dale felt his eyes open, he was back in his body again. He wanted to yell out "Yes!" but no sound came out.

"I thought so." The young nurse reached out and patted Dale's stomach, then quickly left.

Dale almost thought he could feel that.

Almost.

+++

It was quite some time later, Dale had no idea at all of how long it was, but he was playing with the day shift nurse, shutting off the monitors, making her run down the hall every time.

At one point she was yelling on the phone to someone, a man came in and ran some tests, proclaiming the equipment was working just fine.

He stopped that when the night Nurse came in, she was carrying a small TV set. Dale was elated, finally, something other than walls and the tiny little room.

She plugged it in, turned it to the news. Just then Dale felt himself back in his body, he could hear the TV set but could not see it because all he could do was look directly at the blinding lights.

He felt himself beginning to feel angry, this was going to ruin his eyesight if it kept up, assuming he ever got out of here.

The nurse came over and carefully tipped the bed until he was facing the tiny TV as the older nurse stood in the doorway, her arms folded across her chest and a scowl on her face.

"You really are being silly, Alice. You know he has almost no brainwave activity, he is basically a vegetable." She told the young woman.

"It's just something I wanted to try." She said, as the older woman left in a huff.

Later, she came in and bathed him, he felt nothing at all. He sat and watched the TV set until very late, finally she came in and shut it off. Then she did something with the bags hanging nearby, he could see most of that out of the corner of his eye.

When she put the cot back down, Dale felt his eyes close.

+++

Dale walked over and turned on the TV, keeping the sound down very low. He really liked the night nurse so he didn't want to mess with her and get her upset like he did with the older woman who often got delightfully crabby.

Searching the channels, he found a movie and stood there watching it.

It was nearly over when Alice came in, she looked at the TV set, stopped.

"Oh." She said.

She walked over and shut the set off, Dale turned it back on. With a puzzled look, Alice reached over to shut it off, Dale grabbed her wrist.

Alice screamed. Several people came running, they looked everywhere as Alice tried to explain what happened.

Finally they all left, shaking their heads.

Dale was more careful after that, for quite some time Alice acted a little bit afraid of his body lying there on the bed.

+++

His wife Janet came in one evening, sat by the bed for a long time as Dale slept.

Dale sat near her, just far enough away so as to not touch her.

"Has there been any change at all?" Janet asked Alice when she came in to take care of the feeding bags.

"No, not really. For awhile there I thought..." Her voice trailed off.

Janet just sighed.

"Maybe if you came by more often, talked to him? Maybe that would help." Alice said.

"I came here every single night for over a year, now it's coming up on three years. I have a right to a life, too!" Janet blurted out angrily at what sounded almost like an accusation.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean....It's just that, your husband is such a fine looking man, this is a shame. If only...." Her voice trailed off.

"This just goes on and on, it's broken me. I had to sell the house, everything and he just lies there! It could be years, maybe decades before he dies." She blurted out.

Dale sat there, a feeling of sadness came over him. Of course this was not her fault. He couldn't help himself, he reached out and stroked Janet's hair.

She jumped, then froze. The touch was identical to what Dale had done literally hundreds of times.

Dale pulled his hand back.

"My God, I....?" Janet stood up, looking around.

Just then a tall man walked in, Janet turned to him. He took her in his arms, hugged her tightly.

"This him? Bummer." The man said, looking over at Dale sleeping on the bed. Just then Dale began to open his eyes.

"Hey, he just woke up!" The man said, sounding puzzled.

"No, he does that all the time, but he isn't really awake." Janet said.

"Oh, OK. Well, ready to go?" He reached out and took her hand and they left.

Dale was sure he felt a tear drift down his cheek, and he became sure of that when Alice took a tissue and wiped the tiny spot of moisture from his eye.

"You are in there, aren't you? I knew it." She whispered.

Later, the Doctor came in and ran some more tests.

"You say he wept?" He asked Alice, she nodded.

"Interesting, but there are still no responses at all. Perhaps just a tear duct leaking." The Doctor left.

Dale lay there asleep when Alice came in later that evening. She had the pan and some washcloths, Dale stood there watching as she prepared the bath.

Sometimes he was like this when she bathed him, sometimes he lay there awake inside his body and he felt nothing at all. The rare times when he was asleep Dale felt the touch, several times he had wanted to touch her back but her reaction the one time he grabbed her wrist gave him pause.

He watched as she washed his sides, his back, then up his legs. He felt himself become erect, she looked down at him.

"I'm going to try something, do you mind?" Alice whispered.

"Oh, God, I am being so silly, I don't even know if you can hear me but I do know you can ..feel me." She giggled softly to herself.

She stripped off the gloves, her left hand was rubbing up and down his abdomen, her right hand slid up and over his quickly gaining erection.

Then her right hand began to stroke him with a firm grip, it felt incredible. There was no way to hold back at all, Dale felt himself flood back into his body, then he released. Alice's other hand came quickly over the end of Dale's erection to catch his seed as it blasted off, the first gobs spattering her uniform.

His breath was coming in short gasps, Alice looked up at his face with a glazed expression on her face.

Then she realized, his eyes had shifted and he was looking directly at her. Dale tried to lift his hand but could not, instead he managed to make a fist. Alice's eyes dropped to the motion, then back up to his face.

She still held his now softening penis in her hand as she now sat there nearly frozen in surprise.

"Oh! Oh, my! Oh!" She cried out. She let go, quickly grabbed the washcloth and cleaned him up, dabbing at her uniform.

Then she darted from the room. She was back in minutes.

"The on call Doctor will be right here, can you move?" She asked.

Dale made a fist, lifted his hand a fraction of an inch but the effort exhausted him.

A different Doctor than Dale had ever seen before came in.

"Can you hear me?" Dale tried to nod but could not.

"OK. If you can hear me, close your eyes."

Dale closed his eyes, opened them again.

"OH boy. Well, this is neat! Nurse, what were you doing when he came around?"

Alice blushed bright red.

"I was...uhh..bathing him. He had a...response while I was doing it and..."

"I see." The Doctor grinned and reached out to wipe a dab of semen off her sleeve that she had missed.

Alice was scarlet now.

"Hey, whatever works, honey." He grinned at her and left.

+++

Janet came in the very next morning, by then Dale was managing to speak a few words.

She sat there trying to talk quietly with him but her eyes were brimming with tears.

At first it was all encouragement, but finally she became serious.

"I have to tell you, Dale. Terry, he is a man I have been seeing, you haven't met him yet..We are living together."

"Yes I have." Dale told her.

"You have? But...?"

"I have been here the whole time."

"You know then. I am so sorry, Terry asked me to marry him and I said I would, we were just waiting..."

"For me to die, right?" Dale wasn't even upset, not really. He was not sure if the situation had been reversed that he could have lasted that long himself.

Still, her new man knew very well that she was married, and he knew the situation and still moved in.

Dale didn't like that thought all that much.

After more apologies, Janet mercifully left. Dale turned all of his attention to the matter at hand, which was to return his muscles to some semblance of their former strength.

+++

In four short weeks Dale could walk the halls, do a dozen push ups, manage to hold a pen to write with. The walker he had started out with was quickly discarded.

Alice came to visit him daily in the physical therapy unit.

One day she was visiting and a reporter showed up, as soon as he realized that Alice was the Nurse with him when he came to, he asked her what she had been doing when he came around.

Alice turned bright red again.

"She was giving me a bed bath and the water was too cold, it shocked me back to my senses." Dale lied quickly.

"Really, that is amazing." The reporter said.

The two of them giggled after the man left.

"Thank you for not blabbing about that, it was really against the rules." She told him shyly.

"How about if I try to blackmail you into doing that some more?" Dale gave Alice his best evil grin.

"How about instead you take me out for dinner, and then ask me nicely?" She grinned right back.

It was another month before they went out, Dale still didn't dare drive but that was OK, Alice had a car.

That night in her bed, she knew exactly what to do as she made him lay back and and she administered to his needs, making sure her own were also well attended to.

But something strange happened, Dale felt himself suddenly standing by the bed, watching Alice make love to him.

It was weird because he was completely aware of being in both places at once. In the middle of everything, he reached out and stroked Alice's bare behind, at exactly the same time he also had both hands busy fondling her bare breasts.

She stopped for just a moment, looked around. Seeing nothing, she went back to her efforts as Dale now used both hands to stroke her lower body, at the same time he used both hands to caress her upper body.

"I thought so. I don't know how you do that, but I was sure it was you when you grabbed my arm that time." She snuggled up tightly to him.

"I can't see you when you do that but I can sure feel you." She mumbled.

"I can see you and feel you both!" Dale grinned at her.

"I guess I can get used to it." She laughed.

+++

Several weeks later, Dale was working out when Janet came to see him with some paperwork. She had her new boyfriend Terry in tow.

Dale looked at and signed the paperwork, there really was not much left to split anyway.

He had loved her once upon a time, but life can get in the way of things, and Dale was not a vengeful man.

Not much, anyway, but he did trip Terry at the top of the steps on the way out. The man took quite a tumble, managing to get up but with a rather serious limp.

Of course, they could not really blame Dale for that, he was inside the room lifting weights at the time.

Yes, quite an interesting ability.

He could hardly wait to demonstrate to Alice some more of the things he could do.