This wasn’t any version of my room. It was generic. Sterile. A hospital room. My parents were asleep in chairs beside me that seemed too uncomfortable for sitting, much less sleeping. My mother’s eyes opened and saw that I was watching her. She quickly shook my father.

“Get up, he’s awake!”

He.

So I was a “he” again. Truth be told, I would have been equally happy with “she” or “they.” Because what mattered most today were “I” and “we.” I was alive. And we were still here.

Here’s what I know.

On Monday, October 28, Layton Vandenboom was driving me home from football practice, because my piece-of-crap Dodge Dart had broken down in the school parking lot. A song by Konniption came on the radio. Layton hated the band, saying they were overplayed. He looked down to change the station. When he did, he ran a red light. We were broadsided by a truck.

I was in a coma for several days. The damage was substantial. Subdural hematoma. My head had to be opened up and drained. Lots of internal bleeding elsewhere, a few broken ribs, and the business with my leg. Not pretty. But what struck me—besides the semi—was how clean the universe was in patching its own wounds. Things were coherent again. The clockwork was turning, the gears all fitting with perfect precision. There was a logical cause and effect for every outcome. All things explained.

I had a lot of visitors those first few days, but I was out of it so it all sort of blends together. Here’s what I remember.

The Johnsons came to visit. Leo, his parents, and yes, Angela was there, too. I cried when I saw her. I told them it was the medication. That was a real good excuse for telling a whole lot of people that I loved them. Leo included.

“Bro, look at this face,” Leo responded, not missing a beat. “How could you not love me?”

I asked him if he had heard from USC.

“Not until December fifteenth,” he told me. “That’s the day of their early admission announcements. But Stanford’s pounding on my door now. We’ll see.”

There were so many things I wanted to tell him. But I couldn’t clear my thoughts enough to do it. Maybe that was just as well, because words fall short of expressing things you’ve come to know in your heart. I get it now, I wanted to say, but that wasn’t true. I would never quite get it. I would never truly be able to see things from his point of view. But at least I was no longer a carrier in the epidemic of ignorance.

He made a point of staying a little longer, after his parents and sister had left. Then, when he was sure we were alone, his cool composure seemed to shift to a foggier place.