Kevin Brooks - See Through Me

I could see.

And in the moment before the sheet was pulled down over my feet, the moment before the grey-haired man began easing me back down to the bed, I saw a flash of red . . .

The red of meat.

‘Can you hear me, Kenzie? Can you understand what I’m saying?’

I was lying in the bed, staring up at the grey-haired man and the olive-skinned woman as they stood there looking down at me. I felt utterly exhausted. Bone-tired and drained. And my body was aching all over. It was the kind of ache you get when your body’s been through a battering – dull and bruised, wearying . . . but not painful.

I didn’t hurt anymore.

‘Kenzie?’ the woman said. ‘Can you tell us how you’re feeling?’

I had no pain, no sickness, no fever. But I knew I wasn’t right. My skin felt wrong – cold, but not cold . . . clammy, shivery, prickly, raw . . . and the wrongness wasn’t just on my skin, it was in it . . . inside me . . . beneath the skin.

The top of my head felt different too.

And I seemed to be wearing long white gloves that reached up to my elbows . . .

‘If you can hear us, Kenzie,’ the grey-haired man said, ‘just nod your head, okay? We need to know –’

‘What’s the matter with me?’

My voice was a croaky whisper.

The man and the woman glanced at each other for a moment – sharing a look that I didn’t understand – then they both turned back to me.

‘Hi, Kenzie,’ the man said to me, smiling his doctor’s smile. ‘I’m Doctor Reynolds, and this is my colleague –’

‘What’s the matter with me?’ I repeated. ‘What’s going on? Why am I –?’

‘We’ll explain everything soon,’ he said calmly. ‘Your dad’s on his way here now. He won’t be long. We’ll tell you as much as we can when he gets here. In the meantime –’

I sat up suddenly, taking them both by surprise, and before they could do anything to stop me, I threw off the bed sheet, grabbed the hem of my gown, and yanked it up to reveal my feet and legs.

I think something in me knew what I was going to see, but however much I thought I knew, it was never going to make any difference. Nothing on earth could have prepared me for what I saw that day.

My feet and lower legs were covered by the knee-high white socks that I’d seen before, but with the gown pulled up to the tops of my thighs, the upper halves of my legs were visible. But they weren’t my legs anymore. They weren’t real . . . they couldn’t be. They were skinless, stripped . . . a gruesome vision of naked red muscle and sick-yellow globs and pinkish-white gristly things . . . and something of bone . . . two half-hidden white domes, one on each knee . . .

Knee caps.

No . . .

It couldn’t be.

I moved my right leg, cautiously raising my knee . . .

The skinless vision responded.

It was my leg.

That thing of meat and bone was me.

I closed my eyes, unable to look anymore . . . but nothing happened. I could still see. I could see through my closed eyes . . .

See through . . .

It couldn’t be real.

But it was.

I’m not sure what happened then. I vaguely remember a feeling of absolute blankness – no thoughts, no emotions . . . just a stupefied nothingness – but I don’t know if it was a natural reaction to the shock, my mind and body shutting me down, or if one of the doctors had given me something to calm me down. Either way though, the next thing I can remember is sitting up in bed, with the olive-skinned woman standing to my right, Doctor Reynolds perched on a chair to my left, and a woman I’d never seen before sitting in a chair beside him. She had short blonde hair and an eyebrow stud. An open notebook was resting in her lap.

The room was still very dim, and as I gazed slowly around – getting my first proper look at the place – I realised there weren’t any windows. There were lights fitted into the ceiling – four flat squares of whitish glass – but they were all turned off, and apart from the pale glow of the monitor screens, the only source of light I could see was a small LED panel fixed to the far wall. I stared at it for a moment, then closed my eyes . . .

I could still see it.

Nothing had changed.

‘How are you, Kenzie?’ I heard Doctor Reynolds say.

I turned and looked at him. I didn’t know what to say.

‘Your dad’s had to go back home, I’m afraid,’ he said, leaning forward in his chair. ‘There was a problem with your brother –’

‘What kind of problem?’ I said. ‘Is Finch all right? Has something happened to him?’

‘No, he’s fine,’ the doctor assured me. ‘It was just something to do with his carer, apparently . . . some kind of mix-up. Your dad had to go back to sort it all out.’

‘But Finch is definitely okay?’

He nodded. ‘And your dad’s hoping to get out here tomorrow.’

‘Does that mean you’re not going to tell me anything until then?’

Doctor Reynolds glanced at the woman beside him. She’d been watching me closely while I’d been talking, and at one point she’d scribbled something down in her notebook. She was still looking at me now – a serene steadiness showing in her eyes – and after a few moments’ silence, she leaned to one side a little, resting an elbow on the arm of the chair, and spoke to me in a measured tone.

‘Do you want to wait for your dad before we start telling you anything?’ she asked, her eyes fixed on mine.

‘Not if I don’t have to.’

‘Do you mind if I ask why?’

‘I can see inside myself,’ I told her. ‘I can see my own muscles, my bones . . . and when I close my eyes –’ I closed my eyes ‘– I can still see you.’ I opened my eyes and stared at her. ‘If all that was happening to you, would you want to spend another whole day waiting to find out what’s going on?’

The woman didn’t say anything for a while, she just sat there, gazing thoughtfully into my eyes. Eventually, she turned to Doctor Reynolds and gave him the slightest of nods. He nodded back, glanced across at the olive-skinned woman – who was adjusting something on one of the monitors – then he turned his attention back to me.

‘Right then, Kenzie,’ he said. ‘Let’s start with the simple stuff.’

The ‘simple stuff’ didn’t take very long. Dr Reynolds introduced himself again – his first name was John – and then he told me who the two women were. The olive-skinned woman was Dr Miriam Kamara, and the other one was Dr Shelley Hahn. Dr Reynolds then went on to explain where I was, and why I’d been brought here.

‘You’re in a specialised medical facility called the RDRT Centre,’ he told me. ‘RDRT stands for Rare Disease Research and Treatment. We’re about twenty miles north of London here, so you’re not too far from home. I’m the Centre’s Clinical Director, and Dr Kamara is Head of Physical Care.’

I looked at Dr Hahn.

‘I’m a clinical psychologist,’ she told me. ‘I work with the Centre’s Recovery and Evaluation team.’

I nodded.

She smiled.

Dr Reynolds went on. ‘We’re not the only Rare Disease Centre in the country,’ he explained, ‘but we’re the only one that undertakes both research and specialised treatment. Our treatment capacity is quite limited – we only have four special care rooms, including this one – but we only take on the very rarest of cases, so we don’t actually need any more beds. At the moment you’re our only patient.’

He paused for a second, sipping water from a plastic cup.

‘Any questions so far?’ he asked me.

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘When are you going to tell me what’s wrong with me?’