Chapter 30

I never made it to the podium.

I opened my eyes to find an unfamiliar ceiling.

This wasn’t the athlete’s village or my dorm room. There was a faint chemical smell, vaguely familiar but I couldn’t specifically identify it. I could hear the murmur of heavy traffic somewhere, but it was distant and subdued. With some effort I turned my head to the right. Pale grey-green curtains covered a window, and around the edges fingers of bright light played across the neutral-coloured walls. In my peripheral vision I saw a trolley with some random medical boxes blinking away. Looking down and finding a cannula in my left hand confirmed my suspicions.

“Hello?” I croaked.

Silence. I tried calling out again, but my voice cracked into a series of pathetic weak coughs.

“Jimmy?” said a sleepy voice.

I turned my head to the left. My mother was pulling herself up right from where she’d obviously been slumped in an uncomfortable looking visitor’s chair. Someone had given her a pillow and her hair was flattened up the side of her head.

“Hi, mum,” I said weakly.

“Oh, Jimmy!” she cried, standing up stiffly and coming over to the bed. Gingerly she reached down and hugged me, trying to avoid the wires and tubes that were emanating from under the sheets. I tried to hug her back but moving my arms felt like moving through wet cement.

“Shh, sweetie,” she said. “It’s okay. Let me call the nurse.”

“I’m in the hospital?” I croaked again.

“A private clinic, yes,” she replied, pressing a buzzer that lay on the bedside table.

“What happened? How long have I been here?”

“Uh, well...” mum hesitated. “Why don’t we wait for the nurse to make you a bit more comfortable.”

“Mum,” I said. “You can–” I stopped short as a horrible thought struck me. “I haven’t been here for– like, for years, have I?”

“Oh no!” she said hurriedly. “Nothing like that.” She looked at me funny for a moment. “Are you saying I look that old?”

“Uh, no...”

Thankfully a nurse arrived to save me from any further self-incrimination.

“Hello! Good afternoon, Mr Connor! It is nice to see you awake properly this afternoon.” A middle-aged woman with very American English under a light German accent bustled in and grabbed a folder from the foot of my bed. “How are you feeling?”

“Uhh, I don’t know. I guess not that good since I’m in hospital, right?”

“A good observation. Let me elevate you a little,” she made some movement above my head and the bed inclined a little, so I was able to look across the room, but not so much that I was even half-sitting. “I will leave it here for a while and raise you more later once you are used to it. Here.” She put the chart on the bed and poured some water into a cup from the jug on a trolley next to my bed, putting a straw in it and holding it up to my lips. I took grateful sips, feeling my dry mouth and throat soak up the moisture. “That’s good,” she said. “Just a little for now.” She put the cup back on the trolley and picked up the chart again. She looked at the rack of machinery next to me and made some notes in the chart before closing it and folding her arms across it.

“Okay, Mr Connor. My name is Roth. I am a clinical nurse here at the Luther Clinic in Hamburg. You were brought here after your collapse at the Wassersportzentrum. Do you remember anything about it?”

I frowned.

“Uh, I was in– I mean, I finished the two-hundred butterfly final ... I wasn’t last ... right? And, uh...” I trailed off. I looked over at my mum who looked like she was about to cry. “Mum? What is it? What’s wrong?” She just shook her head, not saying anything. I looked back at Nurse Roth. “What is it?”

“Nothing,” she said, soothingly. “You finished your race and then became unconscious in the water. Medical staff couldn’t help you regain consciousness by the pool, so you were taken to the emergency medical centre first, where it was confirmed there didn’t appear to be anything life threatening before you were brought here. And now, here you are awake.”

“How long have I been out of it?”

Nurse Roth eyed me closely and let out a breath.

“That is information that is supposed to come from a doctor, not a nurse. I will leave here and page Dr Veit who will come and talk to you. I am sure you will have questions, and I cannot provide you with many specific answers.” I started to protest, and she held up one hand and said “You have not been unconscious for that long. You are not Rip van Winkle, okay?”

“I don’t ... okay,” I sighed.

“Good!” said the nurse, brightly. “I will page the doctor.” She turned to my mother. “You can show him while I’m gone. I think that will be fine.” She looked at me again and winked before leaving the room.

“Show me what?” I asked.

Mum smiled at me through tear-filled eyes and pulled a newspaper from her bag. It was in German, but someone had circled a section of it. The heading was “Finale - 200m Schmetterling der Männer” and underneath was a results table. At the top with a little yellow medal printed next to it was the name ‘CONNOR, James’ and the legend WR in brackets.

“Oh, that’s nice, isn’t it,” I mumbled. Then darkness swam in again.

The next time I awoke, the doctor was in. Dr Veit was a tidy, cordial man in his early fifties, with a lightly clipped English accent. He introduced himself, explained that my mother was back at my parent’s hotel having a decent night’s sleep (“she hasn’t left your side”) then set about doing an examination. He spent what seemed (at least to me) an unusual amount of time palpitating my joints and flexing my arms and legs. While he washed his hands, a nurse drew some blood and once she had left Dr Veit pulled the visitor’s chair over from the wall and sat next to my bed.

He put his right ankle up on his left knee and sat back in the chair with his hands folded in his lap, regarding me carefully.