A question had always lingered in my mind, ‘Who am I?’ Am I merely a human with the identity given to me by my parents? How would you answer the question about your true identity? What could be or what should be the basis? Surely, our identity changes on the ground that how others and ourselves perceive it. For someone you are a daughter or a son, a sister or brother for another, a husband or wife for yet another. But who are you to yourselves? The answer is still hidden for me.

‘Live’, was the first word that came to my mind when I woke up. Not just any normal sleep but a long one…almost for three months. My relatives had given all hope that I’ll wake up someday…and at that time, I came to life again. What about my parents? Were they still hopeful? I guess they would’ve been, if they still were to be in this world. Or were they keeping an eye on me far above from the heaven? But not all the dead go to heaven. Some still, linger around us, in a shapeless form…which we can’t make out in this human form of ours and with this earthly vision, and hence we are unable to see them. Though they still present there, they are with us all the time, sitting just beside us when we are reading, walking side by side with us. Their presence which some of us can feel and yet some very rare and legendry who can make them out through that shapeless form, changes our lives in thousand ways.

It did change mine. I was lying there, in one of the hospital rooms…all unconscious, until I felt someone grasp my hand. I think people would’ve grasped my hand many times before this in the hospital, when life was playing dead with me. They would’ve grasped my hand in hope or sometimes in vain. But I never felt their warmth or coldness, whatever it was, as I did then. My whole being became conscious of my surroundings, after such a long time…which did seem like eternity to me. That travelled up to my chest and filled me with a new life.

“Beep-beep”, it was the first sound that I could make out from that chaotic environment filled with indistinct noise and chatter. As I opened my eyes, I saw a doctor and a nurse hurrying about me and the doctor perhaps ordering the nurse to give him this and help him with that. But, for me it was all too fast. My heartbeat was so fast that I could hear it. Before long it was the only sound that I could hear and my vision started to blot out once again. Darkness surrounded me, and I stood there once again all alone. When I first was conscious of myself…a consciousness that made me feel that I was alive, I was surrounded by this very familiar darkness. And I was plunged here again, after I saw a ray of hope to make my way through this eternal boredom. ‘Am I to stay here forever’, rang in my head. I felt like a flightless bird with wings, who had seen others fly, and was trying myself to fly. Struggling through this darkness, that perhaps was enshrined within me, I set on to take a long flight.

When I woke up again, perhaps by winning from myself, I didn’t see the doctor or the nurse. But it was a middle-aged woman, who was holding my hand close to her heart. She became suddenly active like a cat who had just seen a mouse, perhaps because she saw me wide awake. As I tried to sit, she helped me. My mind was full of questions, ‘Who is she? Why is she happy to see me awake?’ I turned my head sideways, when I saw a sudden movement. It was a middle-aged man, whom I hadn’t noticed earlier, going out of the room. “Are you feeling alright?”, the woman asked me with a curious child-like face. I didn’t feel like talking, but still ignoring her question I asked mine first, “Who are you? And why would you care about me?” The woman’s face changed colours as fast as a chameleon. She left my hand and rose up from her seat, her face looking as if I had told her that her husband is dead. My attention was again distracted when I saw someone opening the door. It was a doctor accompanied by that same middle-aged man. The man was stout and plump as a teddy-bear. But that was not really what was important for me right then. The doctor sat near me and holding my hand he checked my pulse and spoke in a cheerful voice, “Ah! Looks like you are alright Miss Wang. Do you know you had been in a coma for three months? Does it feel good to be back?”

“Miss Wang?”, it just popped out from my mouth involuntarily.

“Yes, isn’t your name Wang Hua?”, the doctor asked with a smile, but his expressions changed when he saw my clueless face. He became serious and asked me, “By any chance, do you remember who you are?”