I Can Hear You

• Tahnaya Mclellan, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2016

My name is Hannah Hastings and three weeks ago I was a victim in a head on collision. I lost all feeling in my legs and the last thing I captured in sight, was the lights of the oncoming vehicle. I could hear the sirens of the emergency services arriving; the squeal of the sirens pierced my ears. I was curious to why I couldn’t feel any pain and I couldn’t speak or open my eyes. I felt like I was trapped. I tried in vain to communicate, but it was as if my brain wouldn’t allow me. I could hear the ambulance officers discussing my case. They were constantly trying to receive my response. I could hear my father sobbing beside me, I remember him being in the accident with me. Everything started to quieten down. I could no longer hear anything and just felt as if I went to sleep.

It had been a few days since the accident, and I still hadn’t wakened. I heard the beeping of the vital machines. I knew I was in the hospital. My mother sat patiently beside me with her hand on mine, she stared at the IV that I had always been frightened of. My veins still pulsating and the pierced skin was as red as my cheeks were naturally, before the accident. Now I could hear my mother explaining how pale my skin was when she was on the phone to my grandmother.

I heard my doctor enter the room; he told my mother how amazed he was that my heart was still beating. But he had some terrible news. My father, who was having open heart surgery that day, didn’t make the operation. I was still unresponsive, so I couldn’t hug my mother, or let out a cry. A tear rolled down my cold face. I heard my mother sobbing. She asked to doctor if she could see him. Now I was alone. I felt afraid and upset, but there was no way I could do anything about it. I fruitlessly tried to make contact with everyone.


I had blacked out again. It had now been a few weeks since the collision. My mother had come into the hospital to tell me how my father’s funeral was, and another tear rolled down my face.
“There’s something different about your face today,” “You’ve got more colour in your cheeks, beautiful,” She said.
I had started moving my hands and opening my eyes slowly. There was progress. I was glad to know I wasn’t in a vegetative way.

Overtime, I began to walk again. I was lucky to not obtain any injuries from the car accident. Trying to explain how I heard people when I was in the coma was difficult. No one believed me. They just thought my brain had completely stopped working. As if I was dead to everything around me. My brain was still functioning normally the whole time. The whole time, I could still hear you.