LEN BIAS: CROSSOVER
A novel
By: Michael D. McClellan | September 19, 2010
The rest of the afternoon is spent getting reacquainted with my surroundings - at least in Emily's mind that's what I'm trying to do. For me it's all about seeing the Schuler home for the first time. Living Jason Schuler's life outside of the hospital for the first time. I know she's hoping and praying that something in this house will trigger a memory and everything will come flooding back. That everything will be right again. If she only knew. I sit in the family room, my broken leg propped up on a pillow and my eyes glued to the TV, questioning why God would put both of us in this situation, why He would bring me back under these circumstances, why He would take the real Jason Schuler away from someone like Emily and replace him with someone like me.
Part of me wonders if this is how reincarnation works. In Sunday School I'd been taught that reincarnation was a part of other faiths such as Hinduism, and that it had no place in the world of Christianity. A Hindu thing, my mother had replied when I'd posed the question to her as a pre-teen. Even at that, I know the Hindus believe that the soul comes back into a newborn body - not into a former third team all-state high school player with limited coaching options. But Alyssa hadn't called my return a reincarnation. She said that I was coming back to fulfill God's purpose. No playbook, no hints as to what that might mean, no special instructions before sending me on my way. Just an acknowledgement that there was unfinished work down here, and that it was on me to do my part.
Emily brings a mid-afternoon snack; a ham and cheese sandwich, chips, Coke. I eat and she eats with me, opting instead for a salad with low-fat dressing and an unsweetened iced tea. We make small talk, laugh about the country music collection on the bookshelf, struggle through inevitable moments of awkward silence. Dr. Smithson had said that there would plenty of these, especially after leaving the hospital. He called it a common byproduct of retrograde amnesia. He said that patients diagnosed with this condition may feel embarrassed or stressed because they no longer remember key people and significant events. That, typically, the victim may be overwhelmed by the rush of well-wishers who seek to reacquaint themselves. That it's important to let the amnesic go at his or her own pace so that the amnesic is not overly stressed. That forgotten relations forget they are effectively meeting the victim for the first time and may make the victim uncomfortable through displays of friendship such as hugging, kissing or holding hands. Doctor talk. Nonsense.
How about sharing the home of a woman you've never met before? How overwhelming and uncomfortable is that, Doc?
We finish eating and then Emily climbs onto the couch beside me, my fully charged smartphone in hand. This turns out to be a welcomed distraction. She spends the next hour showing me how to use my new device, introducing me to the world of the Internet. I learn that I have something called a facebook account, and that there is actually a movie about the making of facebook called The Social Network. This fascinates me - and excites me. I immediately wonder if Eric and Michelle have facebook accounts, and just like that the world shrinks. My family no longer seems a million miles away. The thought of being able to reach out to them electronically, to see photos and videos of them, to learn what they've been doing with their lives...
And then I think it through a little more. Even if I were to find them, how am I supposed to get them to believe what's happened to their long deceased brother? It's been twenty-five years, what do they even remember about me? They'd see a crazy white man claiming to be Len Bias on their respective porches, and they'd lock their doors and call the cops. And why? Because this is the real world, and this doesn't happen in the real world. People don't inhabit the bodies of other people, it's as simple as that. They don't come back from the dead as someone else.
It doesn't stop the wheels from turning. There has to be a way. There's no way I'm not going to try. I could tell Eric and Michelle so much about ourselves, things no one else knows but family. Places we went, funny things we did, relatives only we would know about.
The thought gives me hope, lifts my spirits. I wouldn't call the emotion happiness, not with all that has happened, but it's as close as I've been since this long, strange journey began.
~ ~ ~
Emily cleans up the dishes and asks if I'll be okay while she runs to the Thompson house just down the road. Julie Thompson is a co-worker at Seringer & Chaney, an accounting firm in Wooster, and Emily needs to make sure she's caught up on outstanding work prior to returning on Wednesday.
I won't be long, she says. I'll have my phone with me if you need anything.
Don't worry about me, I reply. I'll be fine. Take your time.
She again promises she won't be long. She kisses me on the cheek and grabs her purse, and just like that I'm alone. I grab my crutches and take a another trip through the first floor of the Schuler house. Everything in the kitchen looks brand new - the cabinets are made of a light wood of some kind, and a large silver refrigerator stands flush below two of them. A microwave is recessed into the woodwork on the opposite wall. A large island sits in the middle of the room, the wood matching the floor and the cabinets, the marble countertop an interesting smear of what Emily called rain forest green. The aesthetics are pleasing to the eye, and as I admire the room I'm hit with an unexpected tinge of regret - at Maryland I'd considered majoring in interior design, but the coaching staff had recommended a less demanding curriculum. Basketball was Priority 1. Challenging classes, they explained, meant more study time and a greater threat to my eligibility. If I couldn't play I couldn't be seen, and if I couldn't be seen I'd have no chance of pursuing my dream of playing in the NBA. You can always go back later and get your degree, they had said on more than on occasion. Right now we just need to make sure you're taking classes that fit well with the demands of playing basketball at a premier Division I school, in the premier conference in the country - the Atlantic Coast Conference.
So I sold myself short. Again. I turned my back on something that truly interested me, something that I was passionate about, and instead I'd taken cake classes that required a minimum amount of effort to pass - which is exactly what I had decided to put into them; show up on occasion, study every now and then, copy homework assignments, cheat on tests...and be happy with a column of Ds on the report card and a one-point-something GPA.
