Who am I?

“Who am I?”

The words escape my lips in a whisper as I jolt awake, my heart racing, the darkness wrapping around me like a heavy blanket. I blink, trying to shake off the fog that clings to my mind, but the room is a stranger. The shadows dance along the walls, and I feel a tight knot of confusion in my stomach. Where am I?

The air is thick and unfamiliar, carrying scents I don’t recognize — lavender fabric softener, the lingering aroma of roasted chicken, something floral and artificial from a wall plug-in. My heart hammers against my ribs like a caged bird desperate for freedom.

I sit up slowly, the sheets tangled around my legs like restraints, and scan the room. The furniture is unfamiliar, and the walls are painted a color I can’t name in the darkness. I rub my eyes, hoping to clear the haze, but it only deepens. The mattress beneath me is firmer than I remember my bed being, and these sheets feel different — cotton instead of the worn flannel Jules always preferred. Jules. The name floats through my mind like a butterfly I can’t quite catch.

I swing my legs over the side of the bed, my feet touching the cool floor — hardwood instead of the carpet I expected. I stand up, feeling unsteady, my joints protesting with sharp aches that seem to echo through the room. My trembling fingers explore the nightstand beside me, searching for something familiar. Instead of the old brass lamp with the torn shade, I find smooth wood and an unfamiliar digital clock that glows an angry red: 2:47 AM.

I take a tentative step forward, my heart pounding in my chest. I need to find something — anything — that would anchor me to this place. I walk slowly, my footsteps muffled against the carpet in the hallway, and as I turn a corner, I catch a glimpse of something reflective.

I approach the mirror, and my breath catches in my throat. The face staring back at me is old, lined with deep creases and framed by wispy gray hair. I don’t recognize the man in the glass. Who is he? I reach out, my fingers brushing against the cool surface, searching for a connection, a memory, but there’s nothing. Just a stranger’s face, filled with confusion and fear. My reflection looks like a ghost in white pajamas that I don’t remember putting on, eyes wide with terror.

I turn away, my heart racing, and step into the hallway. It stretches before me like a tunnel, dimly lit and eerily quiet. Family photographs line the walls, faces smiling back at me in the dim light filtering from somewhere deeper in the house. I should know these faces, shouldn’t I? A wedding photo shows a young couple, the bride’s veil catching the light. Children blowing out birthday candles. A graduation ceremony with proud parents beaming.

I feel like I’m wandering through a dream, disoriented and lost. I move cautiously, one hand trailing along the wall for support, trying to make sense of my surroundings, but every door looks the same, every corner feels unfamiliar. The house is full of sounds I don’t recognize — the hum of a different refrigerator, the tick of an unfamiliar grandfather clock, the settling of walls that aren’t mine. Or are they?

I find myself in a living room that looks like it belongs in a magazine. Everything is too neat, too coordinated. Throw pillows arranged just so on a leather couch I’ve never seen before. A coffee table with books I didn’t choose, magazines with addresses I don’t recognize. This isn’t my home. But then, where is my home?

The kitchen draws me forward, perhaps seeking the comfort of something as basic as a glass of water. The refrigerator is covered with children’s artwork — stick figures and crooked houses drawn in crayon, held up by magnets from places I may or may not have visited. I study the drawings more closely. Two children, always two, drawn with the unsteady hand of youth. Soccer games and birthday parties captured in waxy lines. One drawing shows a tall figure labeled “Grandpa” standing next to two smaller ones. Grandpa? The word echoes strangely in my mind. These children… do I know them? Am I… Grandpa? Me?

Suddenly, I feel a hand on my shoulder, and I jump, spinning around. A young man stands there, his eyes wide with concern.

“Dad?” he says, his voice a mix of relief and urgency. “It’s me, it’s your son. It’s still the middle of the night.”

My mind races, trying to process his words. Son? I have a son? I search his face for a hint of recognition, but my thoughts scatter like startled birds. His face is kind but worried, with lines around his eyes that speak of sleepless nights and heavy concerns. There’s something familiar about the set of his jaw, the way he holds his shoulders, but I can’t place him. The world seems to tilt sideways.

“I… I don’t understand,” I stammer, my voice trembling. “Where am I? Who are you?”

His face crumbles slightly, as if I’ve struck him. He steps closer, his expression gentling. “You’re at home, Dad. You’ve been having a rough night. It’s okay. I’m here.”

Home. The word echoes in my mind, but it feels distant, like a fading photograph. “Dad, I’m your son.”

“My son?” The words feel foreign on my tongue. I have a son?

“Yes, dad. It’s me, Buddy.”

Buddy.

The name hits me like lightning, and suddenly the world tilts. Images flood my mind in a rush that makes me gasp and reach for the kitchen counter. A little boy with gap-toothed grin, no more than seven years old, standing in our backyard holding a baseball glove almost as big as he is.

“Come on, Dad, throw it harder!” he’s calling, bouncing on his toes with excitement. The leather of the ball is warm and worn smooth in my hand, and I can smell the fresh-cut grass mingling with the scent of Jules’s garden roses. From the kitchen window comes the sound of her humming and the rich aroma of her famous pot roast — she always made it on Sundays. “Dinner in ten minutes!” she calls, her voice carrying that musical lilt that made even the simplest words sound like a song. I wind up and pitch the ball, watching as Buddy lunges for it, glove outstretched, missing by inches but laughing as he chases it across the yard.

Another memory crashes over me: Buddy, maybe ten now, standing in our living room in a makeshift cape, arms akimbo like a superhero. “Dad, watch this!” And he leaps from the coffee table, crash-landing on the couch cushions we’d arranged on the floor. Jules is laughing so hard she has tears in her eyes, and I’m simultaneously trying to scold him for jumping on furniture and applaud his perfect superhero landing.

Birthday candles. Seven of them on a chocolate cake that Jules spent all afternoon baking — I can still taste the batter she let me lick from the spoon, rich and sweet with a hint of vanilla. Buddy’s cheeks are round with baby fat as he leans forward to blow them out, his small hands gripping the edge of the table. The frosting is slightly lopsided where Jules tried to write his name, and there’s a smudge of chocolate on her apron. “Make a wish, buddy,” I tell him, and he closes his eyes tight, so tight his whole face scrunches up. When he opens them, he looks right at me and says, “I wished that you and Mommy would never get old.”

“Dad?” Buddy’s voice brings me back to the present. He’s moved closer, his hand hovering near my elbow as if ready to catch me if I fall. “Are you okay?”

“Buddy,” I whisper, and his name tastes like coming home. “Oh, Buddy.”

His eyes fill with tears, but he blinks them back. “Come on, Dad. Let’s get you back to bed.”

I want to believe him, to feel the warmth of familiarity, but my thoughts keep slipping away like water through cupped hands. “But where am I, Buddy?”

With his watery eyes and weak smile, Buddy replied with kindness in his voice, “You’re home, Dad. My home. You’re staying with us now — me, my wife Karen, and our two sons. Your grandsons.”

Grandsons. The word should fill me with joy, and part of it does, but it’s overshadowed by the bewilderment of not remembering, of feeling like a stranger in what should be familiar surroundings. I’m somewhat happy but still rather confused, yet I let him guide me away from the kitchen, back down the hallway lined with those smiling photographs.

He leads me back to the bedroom that isn’t mine but apparently is now. The bed is still warm from where I was lying, and Buddy helps me sit on the edge before pulling the covers up around my shoulders. His hands are gentle, practiced, as if he’s done this many times before.

“Thank you, Buddy,” I say as he tucks the blanket under my chin the way I used to do for him when he was small.

His breath catches, and when I look up, there are tears rolling down his cheeks.

“What’s wrong, Buddy?”

He wipes his eyes with the back of his hand. “Nothing, Dad. It’s just… It’s a rare occasion when you remember my name, is all.”

The words pierce through me like ice. “I’m sorry, Buddy. I don’t know what’s become of me.”

“Don’t worry, Dad. You need to sleep.” He leans down and wraps his arms around me, and for a moment, I’m holding my little boy again, feeling his heartbeat against my chest. “Goodnight, Dad.”

“Goodnight, Buddy.”

His smile is bittersweet as he closes the door, leaving me alone with the darkness and the unfamiliar room. I lie back against the pillows, staring at the ceiling, trying to will my mind to quiet, to let sleep take me back to wherever I was before the confusion crept in. I take a deep breath, trying to steady myself, but the fear lingers, a constant companion in this strange, dark night.

But then, like a door opening in my mind, I remember Jules. Beautiful Jules with her auburn hair and the way she hummed while she cooked — always the same tune, something her mother used to sing. I can almost smell her perfume, that delicate lavender scent she wore on special occasions, the one that lingered on her pillow long after she’d gotten up. How she used to read to Buddy every night, doing different voices for all the characters until he was giggling so hard he could barely breathe.

“I love that boy so much,” she used to say, watching him sleep. “He’s the best thing we ever made together.”

The memories come flooding back now, a torrent of moments I thought were lost forever. Jules teaching Buddy to ride his bike, running alongside him with her hand on the seat until the moment she let go and he was flying on his own. Jules at every baseball game, cheering louder than any other parent. Jules crying the day we dropped him off at college, and then crying again on the drive home because the house felt too quiet.

But then the memories shift, and I’m in a hospital room that smells of disinfectant and fear. Jules is so small in the bed, her face pale against the white pillows. The oxygen mask covers half her face, fogging with each labored breath. Her hand in mine feels fragile, like bird bones wrapped in tissue paper.

“Fight, Jules,” I whisper, squeezing her fingers. “Fight for me. Fight for Buddy. He needs his mother.”

But her eyes are closing, and the steady beep of the heart monitor is the only sound in the room. Beep. Beep. Beep. Each one marking another second she’s still with me. My hand clutches her hand with tears streaming down my face.

“I love you,” I tell her, leaning close to her ear. “I love you so much, Jules.”

Her fingers twitch in mine, and I think maybe she hears me. Maybe she knows.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

And then…

The beeping of the heartbeat stops. Silence. The long, endless tone that means everything has changed forever. That means I’m alone in a way I never thought possible.

I wake with a gasp, my body drenched in cold sweat, my heart racing as if I’ve been running. The room is still dark, still unfamiliar. My hands shake as I reach for the water glass on the nightstand, but it’s not there. Nothing is where it should be.

The dream — no, the memory — clings to me like smoke, and I can still smell the hospital, still feel Jules’s hand going limp in mine.

“Who am I?” I whisper to the darkness, the words disappearing into the silence of a house that doesn’t know my name.