Adam’s Adventures – Part 1
Adam sat in silence on the park bench, idly watching the ducks swim aimlessly around in circles on the surface of the muddy boating lake. It was quite warm for February, and the sun was shining with such intensity that he was forced to screw up his eyes against the glare which was reflected off the water.
What was he going to do? How could he possibly not know who he was or where he came from? If he knew what amnesia was (and he recognized the word as soon as the doctor used it) how could he not know anything about himself? It seemed so strange… to know things you were taught in school, mathematical formulae and historical facts and figures, that Paris was the capital of France and that Gordon Brown was the Prime Minister, and yet not know your own name or even if your parents were alive or dead!
“I’m sorry I can’t say something which sounds more hopeful,” the doctor had said, less than an hour ago as Adam had been discharged from the Infirmary. “I can understand how lost you must feel, but rest assured that most amnesiacs do recover some of their memory if not all of it.”
Adam smiled wryly. “And some never get their memory back at all, correct?”
The doctor nodded. “I’m afraid so, but the percentage is very small. Usually their relatives identify them from the newspapers or through the police, and once the patient is back in their home environment little day-to-day things keep jogging their memory.”
Adam wasn’t encouraged. He’d been in the hospital for over a month, ever since the police had found him, dazed and bloody from a head wound, wandering through the streets late one night. The media had latched onto his case, and for several consecutive days his face had been on more newspaper covers than Princess Diana’s.
But nothing had come of it. No one came forward to claim him, the police drew a complete blank, and, mysteriously, he had no form of identification on him.