Get it Right

         The letter was cold and impersonal. I had hoped that perhaps things could be patched up, but the letter seemed to say that the good times were forgotten and only the bad times remained in mind.
         I gazed out the window and saw all the people below. Hundreds of them running to their homes or their jobs. They seemed pathetic to me, and yet at least they had something to look forward to. Maybe they had a wife or a husband waiting at home for them or maybe they liked their jobs or at least worked with people who talked to them or were even their friends. When I ran into one of my coworkers outside of the office he ignored me as if I was nothing more than an ant scurrying beneath his feet, not much different from when we meet in the office.
         I never drank much and was beginning to think that I should. My life might as well be over. I even opened the window and looked out, not down like before but up into the sky, and what I saw ended my suicidal thoughts real quick.
         Great fireballs were in the sky. Burning smoking paths through the clear blue sky. I had always kept up with astronomy and had heard nothing about a meteor shower for tonight. Even as I watched the meteors smashed through a nearby building. These weren’t dust size cometary fragments, these were fucking huge.
         People were running in the streets by now, but I knew better. There was no safe place from a barrage like this. Running was useless and so I stayed where I was, calmly waiting for my end.
         The sounds were deafening outside, explosions, car horns, screams, and the ever present sizzling sound of the meteorites flying through the air. I saw a bright light in front of me and knew that my meteorite had found me. Annoyed I wondered what had taken it so long.
         It didn’t hit me. I sat yet the light just sat to. Neither of us moved, we were statues and the sounds outside stopped. It wasn’t until they came out of the light that I realized what was really happening, right before I fainted at least.

         I woke up in bed; my beautiful wife was caressing my head.
         “You took quite a fall there, you should know better than leaving a screwdriver on the step, next time your going to break your neck.”
         She was so beautiful, her hair was long and dark, her body long and slim, I took her hand in mine and kissed it. It was her, but no NO This can’t be real, she left me, she hates me.
         She frowned and then disappeared. I would say that I fainted again but I didn’t, I was simply left in blackness until the bed returned. This time another woman sat holding a cool washcloth on my forehead. She was more beautiful than the previous woman. When she saw my open eyes she leaned down and kissed me. Then in a voice that was laced with sexual excitement she said, “I was afraid that you would never wake up.” And then she began to undo her shirt. She got to only the second button before she disappeared to and I was left sitting on a cold metal surface. Then before I could even consider calling for help they came in and took me away. It happened to fast for me to even see them clearly before my world faded away again.

         This time I woke up and I saw I was not alone. A woman lay on a similar metal bed by me. She seemed to be in worse shape than I was and when I tried to get up I found that I could and so I quickly went over to her bed to see if she was all right.
         Standing over her I found that her breathing was steady and as far as I could tell relatively strong. Her pulse came in a steady rhythm but something seemed unusual about it. It seemed to beat with mine exactly. Before I could ponder this some more her eyes opened and a dazed look of bewilderment covered her features as she struggled to sit up.
         “Where am I?”
         I helped her sit up and then said,” I don’t know but don’t worry, everything is going to be all right, we should be safe for the time being.”
         “What do you mean?”
         I didn’t want to tell her about them or what was happening to me so I avoided the question.
         “I’m William.”
         She smiled and it was a beautiful thing to see on her face, “I’m Wilma.”
         The name sent a shiver down my spine. Wilma, the name of the woman who had just left me. Wilma the woman that I had seen as my wife before.
         The image disappeared and I was alone again.

         I woke and there was a man wiping my forehead, he said, “You’re going to be-“ and then disappeared before I could even say anything.
         I woke up again and felt my back against something warm. I turned expecting to see another woman but instead I looked straight into the face of one of them. She said,” Did you like it?” and then disappeared.
         I slept then. Frightening dreams that made me cry out in sleep, screaming for
Wilma and for them to make the pain stop. I woke up shivering yet covered in sweat, the cold steal table offered no comfort and held no heat. I felt something in my mouth and promptly began to feel myself begin to vomit. I leaned over the edge of the bed. It wasn’t much but it was all I had. At first nothing came out but then I began to feel something creeping up the back of my throat as the heaves continued. Something cold began to slide over my tongue and into my mouth, and then it brushed against my upper incisors before slowly sliding out between my lips. Even as its head went between my lips I could feel the rest of it still down my throat and slowly making its way out. It didn’t fall to the floor, but rather it turned and began to crawl up my face. I could feel it nearing my eye; finally I opened my eyes and saw, nothing. It was all black again. I still lay on my bed and aside from the cold I felt fine.

         I woke up and saw a woman lying in the bed beside me. She was pale, thin and small, she seemed like only a child, but I knew she was older. I heard a scratching at the door and slowly got up and walked over to it. The scratching continued and so I slowly opened the door. They stood on the other side.
         I quickly jumped back and stood beside the girl, she still showed no signs of life as they advanced slowly, much too slowly. What was the difference? This time it wasn’t real. Suddenly the girl vanished and they grabbed me before I could even think about it any more.
         I was left alone until I saw the bright light again. This time the noise was deafening, a loud roaring, and I heard voices, the voices of a lot of people.
         “There he is!”
         “Quickly get the medic!”
         “What the hell happened to him?”
         “Been through hell I suppose, lucky to be alive, the stupid shit.”
         One of them reached me and I collapsed to the ground. Two of them carried me to a stretcher and as they put me into the back of an ambulance one of them said, “You’re going to be all right man, just hang in there.”
         I was rushed to the hospital and I woke up the next day to find a doctor looking at me.
         He laughed when he saw me awake and said, “You’re looking a lot better tonight, just yesterday you nearly died and now you’re wide awake and your vitals all seem to be normal.
         It was only then that I realized that I was connected to a plethora of machinery that would have seemed more at home in a garage rather than a hospital, but I hadn’t been in hospitals much and apparently this stuff saved my life so who am I to complain.
         The doctor was still talking, “We had to replace your heart, it was on the verge of complete breakdown when we found you, luckily for you we had a freshly grown heart that had just come out of the tanks and so you’re the lucky owner of a brand new heart, guaranteed for a hundred years or a million miles, whichever comes first.” He chuckled slightly and then seeing that I didn’t respond to it he sighed and left the room.
         An artificially grown heart? Can they do that? I never kept up much on medical news but I figured that maybe it was still in the experimental stage and so maybe it wasn’t public knowledge yet. I laughed slightly my claim to fame is getting scared so bad that I need a test tube heart to survive.
         I stayed in the hospital for a month recovering. And my coworkers coming in and bringing me small useless gifts touched me. What the hell am I going to do with five bouquets of flowers?
         All in all it wasn’t a bad time. I left the hospital a month later, and as the doctor who had operated on me guided me out the door we were talking about how earlier attempts at artificial heart implantation always failed for some unknown reason.
         I laughed and as I was getting into the cab that would take me home I stopped and said, “I guess that I should be glad that you finally got it right, eh?”
         He laughed and then quietly said, “Yes we finally got it right.”
         I got into the cab and never looked back at the doctor but if I had, I know that I would have seen him walk back into the hospital just like anybody else.
         I ran my hand down the rough scar on my chest and said, “They finally did get it right.”