Robert Lamont awoke from a dreamless sleep with a sudden start. Various plastic tubes were hanging from his limbs and appendages, but at this stage he is unaware that this is the case. He attempted to move his head to the right to check the time on his alarm clock, for since he had awoken, in bed, he must surely be at home. But he soon discovers that he can’t seem to move his neck in any direction. All he could see was the roof; a plain, neutral white in colour, it provided him with little information as to where he was. There was a faint humming in his ears, tinfoil static, barely audible, with voices coming from somewhere in the room, it could have been the television, who knows, or perhaps that vast all-encompassing tinnitus which makes real silence impossible. However it seems that in the short time he has been awake- that is if he really is awake- he has discovered a negligible amount of information on his current situation. So perhaps he is asleep, and contrary to what was stated at the outset, this is actually a dream. But no, something is happening. A dull, resonating pain, ever increasingly in magnitude, originating just below his kneecap and moving upwards in a circular motion at that moment registered in his brain. There is no doubt about it now. He is most definitely awake…

-Mr. Lamont, can you hear me?

His neck muscles relax a little and he is able to move his head to the right, a grey and black machine pulses with authority and purpose at his side. Then to the left, another, a clear plastic pouch filled with transparent liquid, offering its contents through a tube into his forearm. As he tilts his head forward, he can hear his neck creaking like a rusty door latch. Looking towards the end of the bed, he can just about distinguish the outlines of a figure sitting down on a chair directly opposite the bed.

-Try not to move, Mr. Lamont.

Back to looking at the ceiling. Nothing much going on there at all, to be honest. The pillow is a little stiff, perhaps he’ll get them to change it. The bed sheets too, they’re a little uncomfortable. Maybe they will leave a mint on the pillow afterwards. This isn’t a hotel though, is it? Do they do that in hotels? He tried recalled the last time he was in a hotel. Pointless, nothing comes of it. A presence at his side, the figure, still indistinct, fuzzy, shining a light in each of his eyeballs in turn. Now this is quite intolerable, how is he to remember anything with this idiot disturbing his thoughts like this?

- Look here, Lamont manages to groan, I want to speak to the manager. It isn’t right that you should be disturbing me like this. I’m trying to figure something out.

The dexterity of his neck movements was becoming ever greater and he manages, once more, to tilt his head forward to look towards the end of the bed. His vision becomes more focused, and he can just about make out the figure who is now, once more, sitting on the chair. A woman, contrary to his earlier assumption. Old, well perhaps about his age, younger maybe, forty-five, fifty. She has straight black hair with tinges of grey cut to the length of her shoulders. There are two others, dressed in black; tall, towering figures, solidly built, standing at each corner of the room behind her, but he is unable to make out their faces. Lamont finds his voice once more, and looks towards the woman in white in order to ask her a question.

- So I do hope that you will tell me exactly what is going on here? Lamont asked the woman.

- You were in an accident, Mr. Lamont.

- Ah yes, things are beginning to make some sense now, he remarked. Although his basic faculties of deductions were beginning to return to him, there were still some things which did not seem to make a great deal of sense.

- A car accident. The doctor said to him.

- Impossible, he thought to himself. He didn’t drive. He had tried to learn of course, but now, when it seemed that the mere mention of driving to work seemed to affect his colleagues with an expression that one would offer to an unsuccessful rapist, he had abandoned the idea. He didn’t mind walking. He had been doing so all his life, in a pedestrian manner so to speak. He wasn’t the best walker.

-You weren’t driving, Mr. Lamont. The doctor maintained.

- Stop addressing me like that, it’s becoming quite irritating, Lamont groaned.

- You weren’t driving, Robert.

- No. No, that doesn’t sound right at all: back to the one before.

- You’re in the Western Infirmary, Mr. Lamont. My name is Doctor McAllister, and I am the consultant trauma specialist here…

Some words followed, which he was surely familiar with in his professional capacity, yet in his present state he struggled to comprehend them. Five thousand words on the history and current restoration of the Stevenson Memorial Fountain in Kelvingrove park by the Friday morning deadline. A fairly inane mental memorandum originating ex-nihilo, which is perhaps irrelevant to his current predicament. Who was driving? The doctor was still talking, but he was rapidly losing the ability to cogently process the information she was conveying to him. His eyelids grew heavy- they rubbed dryly against the tops of his eyes as they moved, of their own accord, to close over. He attempted to resist, but as the pain in his legs became stronger and more oppressive, he could feel his resolve to stay awake diminishing, and once more, he felt the presence of the doctor at his side. He closed his eyes. She was still talking. Her words came into focus as he drifted off into the enveloping darkness.

- These men are police officers, she said. They wish to take a statement. I would advise you to take some rest. This is something to help you sleep.

Silence. Well, as close to it as he was likely to get. Silence descended. He awoke once more with a start. The doctor stood over him and looked pityingly into his eyes. Her cheeks were sunken and blemished with pockmarks; she was as thin as a rail and underneath the top of her white lab coat, the collarbones protruded hideously outwards. She unbuttoned the coat, revealing her pallid naked body. Her ribs jutted out from her torso just beneath her upturned breasts, which were wrinkled with hideously large brown areolas, her stomach was rounded and crumpled into several goose livered folds which hung over the top of her overgrown pubic hair:

-I think you should fuck me Mr Lamont, as your physician I would highly recommend it. She said, rather authoritatively.

- What about these Policemen?

- They can watch, if you wish.

He took a moment to contemplate the offer. It wouldn’t do. Something lingered in his mind. A word. Yes, a word. A word which would shed some light on his current predicament. One of the policemen approached the bed and removed a shiny black baton from his belt, before holding it suggestively to his mouth. Presently, the nightstick metamorphosed into shiny eel, which attempted to wriggle with all of its might out of the policeman’s grip.

-Is that entirely hygienic to have that thing in a hospital, Lamont enquired, a little distracted from his previous thoughts.

-Have what? The doctor asked him.

-That animal, what is it, a snake or something, that thing, look, in that man’s hand.

-Where are my manners, the Doctor replied apologetically, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment: This is our consultant Neurologist, Doctor Cathar.

-Him? I mean, that thing…surely not?

-Yes, I can assure you that you’re in very capable hands.

- But he doesn’t have any. Hands, that is. Well, as far as I can see anyway.

- I’m sorry Mr Lamont, but I have to say you’re being incredibly rude.

- My apologies, I’m sure that he is a first class physician. What did you say his name was?

- Never mind, it really isn’t any of your concern….Good morning. Can you hear me? I think he’s conscious. Both legs are fractured, on the left there is a linear fracture, and on the right there is a transverse fracture- we removed shrapnel and other debris from the left patella. There is a hairline fracture on the right wrist, and of course superficial abrasions on the facial, neck and torso areas. There is a danger that a pathological case may develop in the right leg, due to the weakness of the bone. Although the neck is sprained, movement within a small radial plane is possible. But I would advise not to make any attempt to move it significantly. The driver was suffering from major head trauma and was pronounced shortly after arrival of what we suspect was a subdural hematoma- but I’m afraid it’s difficult to be certain at this stage. Yes, I think he should be responsive now. Good Morning Mr. Lamont.

The word is more or less associated with this current situation which admittedly is quite opaque at present. He is in a hospital, yes, an accident, yes, but the circumstances surrounding said accident are elusive and no one seems to be offering him any information on the subject, in fact the present situation is one that is quite deplorable within a medical facility. While not knowing the exact protocol or procedure which is to be followed in such cases as his he is certain if not certain about much else that what he has endured would constitute some form of professional or indeed criminal transgression. He tried to remember the last time that he had fallen foul of the law. Pointless, nothing comes of it. The lack of a word, or the lack of its meaning, or constitutive element, the lack of the result, the condition, which it designates.

- Do you know where you are Mr Lamont? A different doctor, a man this time, addressed him.

- In hospital. That much is clear. What happened to the lady doctor, Doctor McAllister? Lamont asked. There were three other people standing around the bed, all in white coats. Rootless cosmopolitans.

- Try not to move Mr. Lamont. You’re in the Western Infirmary; you were brought here two days ago. I’m afraid…I am afraid that your wife, Catherine, has died as a result of the accident. I’m sorry.

- Well if you say so, Lamont replied, fully expecting the doctor to remove his clothes at any moment. An uncomfortable silence followed, where each doctor around the bed offered a look of condolence. He tried to smile but soon realised that he was, without a doubt, most definitely awake. The Doctors that were gathered around his bed conversed with each other in reverential tones, allowing the patient time to assimilate the gravity of the information which had been communicated to him, but in actual fact, Lamont felt very little. Perhaps it was his medicated state, or the relentless physical pain which affected every part of his body, but he could not seem to muster any form of emotion at the news of his wife‘s death. Yet he could not seem to summon the appropriate amount of solemn despair which was required in situations such as this. He kept silent, hoping that anyone who happened to glance over his face in search of emotion would simply assume that he was too overcome with grief to respond. The male doctor who had spoken was young, much younger than him- no older than thirty- he wore thick metal framed-glasses which probably made his eyes look larger than they actually were, and spoke with a mild east-coast accent. He tried to recall the last time he was in Edinburgh. Pointless, nothing comes of it. For all the numerous images that had formed in his mind converged to form one, of him, of his pathetic puny frame, ravaged by age and complacency, on that bed, adrift in a sea of unsurpassed malice. It soon passed, leaving a trace, of a life, which no longer lives.