The first sunlight of the morning filtered in through the window and lit up the cheeks of a young boy lying in bed. A nurse entered the room and regarded the child with a mixture of tenderness and pity. Although there was no need to be quiet, she trod gently as she approached and laid a pile of letters on the bedside table. She lifted his head carefully and slid out the pillow so that she could give it a new case. The child’s eyelids didn’t even flutter. It was only the rosy hue of his cheeks and the frail rising and falling of his chest as he breathed that gave any indication he was alive.
The nurse was a young and pretty woman called Sandra, whose dark, curly hair made her a favourite with half of her patients. She forgot the task in hand for a moment and gazed sadly at the boy’s innocent complexion, reaching out to stroke his forehead.
‘Good morning, Theo,’ she murmured, knowing that he probably couldn’t hear her. ‘It’s a bit stormy today but you’ll be nice and dry in here. Don’t worry if the windows rattle a little – it’s just the wind.’ She wondered if he would sleep for ever, and a tear came to her eye at the thought. She quickly dried it with the corner of her sleeve and admonished herself with a pinch: as a nurse, she ought to be used to this kind of thing, but sometimes it still got to her. After all, here was a nine-year-old child who had spent the last three months in a coma, and who the doctors doubted would ever wake again. They had conducted every kind of test imaginable and found him in perfect health. Except for the fact that he would not wake up.
They had found Theo one May morning, asleep beneath a tree in the garden of the children’s hospital. No one could imagine how he’d got there and he didn’t appear to be harmed in any way. There was no clue as to where he had come from and they knew only his name, since it was sewn into the jacket he was wearing when they found him.
He had become the Mystery Child of St Jude’s Hospital. His photo had made the front page of half the major newspapers in the land, and his story had touched the nation. Television celebrities and politicians had arrived to help publicise the search for Theo’s family, and the telephone never stopped ringing with agents offering to represent the sleeping child. Donations sent in by well-wishers funded a poster campaign across the country in the hope of jogging someone’s memory. Theo’s photo could be seen at bus stops and train stations across the country, accompanied by the words ‘Do you know this boy?’
Streams of people came forward claiming to be Theo’s father, mother, uncle or best friend, but a brief interrogation quickly showed them to be imposters. They just wanted to be on television: for, odly enough, Theo had become a minor celebrity. Letters and flowers poured in every day from people who had read about him or seen him on the latest chat show. Benefit concerts were held for him in the stadiums of the land and priests of every denomination urged the faithful to pray for Theo’s release from the evil clutches of sleep. Theo was surely the first person in history to become famous by doing nothing other than snoring occasionally.
All of the medicines and therapies of the doctors had failed, and they succumbed to the pressure of the alternative practitioners, who were anxious to demonstrate their cures. Reflexologists, crystal healers, Tibetan chanters and voodoo shamans filled Theo’s ward with incense, quartz crystals and the tongues of roosters (reputed for their rousing properties). They squeezed Theo’s toes, hummed dead languages into his ears and blew particles of ground coffee up his nostrils.
It was only when the shaman’s incense sticks set fire to the sheets that the doctors finally had the excuse to throw out the lot of them. Bad vibes in here, they declared, as they were hustled out of the entrance by some burly security guards. No wonder the boy doesn’t want to wake up.
One of the doctors had suggested that it would not harm Theo to have his fan mail read to him each day. Maybe, she argued, he would respond to one of the letters. They didn’t know if Theo could hear but there didn’t seem to be any harm in giving it a try.
Sandra sat down next to Theo’s bed and looked through his prodigious pile of mail. She stroked Theo’s thin, sandy hair with her left hand. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘You’ve got some postcards here from Barcelona – pity I don’t speak Spanish. Anyway, it’s lovely handwriting, so I’m sure it says nice things. Hmmm. Here’s one from the old folks’ home down the road. I’ll leave it for later, if you don’t mind. I can’t face reading another essay about someone’s shaky knees right now. Hello, what’s this one? I don’t recognise the stamp.’
Sandra picked out a letter that had been posted in a circular, purple envelope. There was no return address and the stamp featured some kind of blue creatures sliding down a sandy hill. She supposed it must be from somewhere in South America. She opened the envelope and as she did so a lively aroma filled the room. It was the kind of scent that evoked a happy memory long forgotten, of something funny and touching that had happened in the past.
Sandra pressed the envelope to her face and inhaled deeply. She remembered how she had loved to play on the swings as a child, a steady hand on her back pushing her higher and higher until she thought she might be able to touch the sunshine itself. A smile spread across her face… and she failed to notice that Theo’s eyelids were twitching.
Sandra came back to the present and slid out the letter from the envelope with a growing curiosity. She unfolded the golden sheet of paper and laughed as she saw what was written.
‘Well, Theo,’ she said. ‘This one smells great but I think it was sent by another crazy. It says:
“ Dear Theo,
It’s time to wake up. You have a visitor.
Love
The Storyteller.”
‘I’m awake,’ Theo whispered.
‘How crazy is that?’ Sandra laughed, not hearing him. ‘As if someone could just tell you to wake up and that would be it! I mean, as if all the doctors and the experts hadn’t managed to…’
‘I’m awake,’ Theo repeated, a little stronger now.
‘…cure you with their technology and – what did you say?’ she gasped, losing her breath as she saw the piercing blue of Theo’s eyes.
‘I’m awake,’ Theo said patiently for the third time.
Sandra stared at him speechless, tears streaming down her face in joy. Her first impulse was to smother him with kisses but then she remembered her responsibility as a nurse and ran to get a doctor.
The next three hours were the exact opposite of what someone who had been asleep for three months would want to face. A never-ending series of doctors and men in white coats marched in and out, armed with clipboards and briefcases full of stainless steel instruments. They took his pulse. They checked his blood pressure. They tested his reflexes and shone lights into his eyes and ears. Theo tried talking to the doctors but they were so busy running tests that they didn’t seem to hear him. The best response he could elicit was an occasional ‘Shhhhhhh’ and a pat on the head. Theo decided that if they were going to treat him like a dumb animal, he might as well play along. Sooner or later they would have to run out of things to test.
When the doctors were satisfied that he really was awake and apparently in good health, they seemed a little disappointed and sent for the psychologist. Presently, a middle-aged man with thinning hair walked in, a leatherbound notepad under his arm. He took up a seat a little too close to Theo’s bed. His breath reeked of tobacco. He regarded Theo gravely and gave a smile that didn’t seem in the least friendly.
‘Good morning, Theo,’ he said. ‘My name is Dr Bunsen. Can you hear me?’
‘Perfectly well, thank you,’ the boy replied.
Dr Bunsen frowned and picked up his pen.
‘Well, then, perhaps you could tell me a little about yourself. Would you like to tell me where you live and where can we find your family?’
Theo thought for a moment and realised that he had absolutely no idea. His mind seemed empty of any memories except of waking up and seeing Sandra crying by his bed. Only that and strange fragments of dreams that swirled around his head. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know. I don’t remember,’ he said.
Dr Bunsen’s eyes rolled. ‘Now, Theo, this is not the time to play games. I have never seen a case of amnesia in anyone younger than 21, and I highly doubt that…’
‘No, really. I don’t remember,’ Theo insisted cheerfully.
‘Very well,’ growled the doctor. He wrote in his notepad: ‘The subject claims to have lost his memory. Most likely he is lying to avoid confronting his past.’
Dr Bunsen had never liked children: screaming, dribbling, restless creatures of tantrums, snot and loud voices, always on the verge of breaking something or else erupting in tears. He hadn’t even liked himself much as a child. As he grew older, he tried to be as big as possible by bullying anyone younger or weaker. His only friends were the nervous hangers-on who grinned anxiously every time they thought they were in danger of getting hit.
He had chosen psychology in the hope that he might learn how to trick people into liking him. However, his mother had pushed him to specialise in child psychology to overcome his hatred of children. Yet the more he came to understand why he couldn’t stand kids, the more clear and justified his reasons seemed to be. Children were steered by secret agendas buried deep within their unconscious minds. How could you reason with someone who was still traumatised by hidden memories of their potty training?
And to think he could have become a hotshot brain surgeon and made millions. Instead, here he was with some smart-alec kid who was already more famous than Dr Bunsen would ever be. And now this brat wanted to pretend he’d lost his memory?
‘Listen, Theo,’ he said in a sugared voice that Theo found to be vaguely threatening. ‘We’re here to help you. Running away from your problems won’t make them disappear. Life is all about facing up to things. You’re only hurting yourself if you’re holding something back.’
‘Well, there is one thing,’ Theo admitted, hardly daring to look up.
‘Yes?’ Bunsen responded eagerly, grabbing his pen.
‘While I was asleep I kept having this strange dream. I remember only bits and pieces. There was this yellow planet with two suns and three moons. There were hills and valleys made up of powdered cheese, and these blue creatures were surfing down them. And there was an old man sitting on a rock…’
‘Theo, Theo, Theo. If you insist on wasting my time with this make-believe, we’ll never get anywhere.’ Bunsen shook his shiny head and scribbled on his pad: ‘The boy appears to be mildly delusional. It cannot be ruled out that three months in a coma may have damaged his mental health.’
Dr Bunsen stood up and looked down his nose at Theo, making him feel very small. ‘When you can think of something a little more, ah, relevant, to say, we’ll talk some more. Now be a good boy and get some rest.’ He gave a kind of a false wink that made Theo flinch, and left the room.
Theo found himself alone for the first time that day and at once felt ten times better. Since waking up, he’d been tested, inspected and diagnosed by an army of doctors. Then he’d been intimidated, accused of lying and vaguely threatened by a psychologist twice his size. He wondered if he hadn’t been better off asleep.
The rest of the day passed fairly peacefully, though. Every hour or so, Sandra or one of the other nurses brought him drinks and comics to read, but otherwise he had the whole day to himself to think. He really had no idea who he was or where he came from. His memory drew a complete blank. Yet somehow this didn’t really bother him as much as it did the adults. What was the point in having a past? Just another bagful of memories to cart around the place. No, Theo was quite happy to start from scratch.
He doubted Dr Bunsen would agree with him, so he kept these thoughts to himself. Since the nurses had told him to rest, he spent the afternoon reading comics and listening to the rain on the windows. Knowing that just a few inches away the wind was driving a chilly downpour against the glass made Theo feel all the more warm and secure, wrapped up in a pile of blankets.
Each time Sandra came by it seemed like her smile wanted to leap off her face. Theo had listened to her voice for the last three months and it was a sound he loved and trusted. In a way, he felt like she was already an old friend.
‘Hey, Theo!’ She grinned as she arrived to puff up his pillow in the evening. ‘Are you warm enough? How was your day?’
‘OK. Except for the doctors.’
Sandra laughed. ‘I know what you mean. Sometimes I think they’re sicker than any of the patients.’
She placed the back of her hand against his forehead to check for fever and, finding none, she placed a glass of milk on the bedside table. ‘It looks like the thunderstorm they forecast has turned up. It might get a little loud but don’t worry. If you get scared, give me a shout. I’ll be just down the hall. Do you want me to close the window?’
‘No thanks,’ said Theo. ‘I like the smell of a storm.’
The winds grew in strength throughout the evening and the howling gusts sounded like distant voices announcing some momentous event. The sky grew black with ominous clouds and there was a sense of impending war. On the stroke of midnight the storm arrived and all hell broke loose in the sky above. The echoes of the thunder made the windows rattle, and lightning left streaks on the back of Theo’s eyelids.
He pulled the blankets close around him as he sat up to watch the show. He hoped Sandra wouldn’t walk past and order him back to bed. It seemed like someone up above was really angry tonight and wanted to let everyone know about it. The rain pelted against the windows and they shook in the wind.
Theo could hear some of the children crying further down the ward. He was grateful that he wasn’t easily scared, though he had to admit that he jumped when there was such a fierce bolt of lightning that it seemed like the air itself had split apart. The room was lit up and then plunged into a terrible darkness along with the rest of the neighbourhood. He guessed that the lightning must have struck a power line or something. He didn’t mind. It meant that the thunderstorm was clearer.
He pulled back the curtains even further and sent his pile of correspondence tumbling to the floor. The letters fluttered across the room in the breeze that came through the window and revealed one card that was written in fluorescent ink. It was the card that had awakened him that morning. Theo bent down to pick it up and read:
What visitor? Who was the Storyteller? And why had he woken up as Sandra had read him the card? Theo didn’t have any answers yet but he had a strange feeling that he would soon. He stared at the stamp that glowed blue in the darkness and tried to think what it reminded him of. However, the memory eluded him and he looked back at the sky for inspiration.
The clouds swirled dangerously overhead but there seemed to be one patch of sky that was darker than all the rest. Theo squinted to get a better view. Yes, it seemed as though there was something up there and it was getting bigger all the time. It must be something falling, he thought, or maybe floating towards the hospital grounds. It was too dark to make it out exactly, but one thing was for sure: it was headed right for him.
Theo gasped but couldn’t bring himself to move out of the way. He stared ahead as if hypnotised, not willing to believe what his eyes saw. Through the falling rain he could make out a figure holding on to a balloon and. While Theo gazed in wonder, it flew in through the open window and crashed right into him as he sat up in bed. He tumbled backwards in an avalanche of blankets and cushions, and found himself lying flat on his back with a heavy lump sat on his chest.
Some hidden instinct caused Theo to push his feet against the wall and he flipped his attacker on to the bed with a thrust of the knees. He jumped up and turned to face his opponent with a kung-fu posture that he copied from one of his comics. They stood motionless in the darkness, sizing each other up, neither daring to make the first move. Perhaps they would have stood like that until the morning had not a bolt of lightning suddenly illuminated the room. Theo found himself staring into the eyes of a four-feethigh Bloon.
‘Who on earth are you?’ Theo spluttered at last.
‘Hmmph. Some welcome,’ Bozo sniffed. ‘Didn’t the Storyteller let you know I was coming?’