Spoilers: Pretty much everything. I love comments!

Some people live the charmed life.

I'm not one of those people.

Really, I'm not.

You would think that since I was given a second chance at life, a new body, unimaginable strength and ability, I'd be about the luckiest bastard on the face of the earth.

You'd be wrong.

I've been shot at, kidnaped, locked in a chamber alternately at sub-zero and tropical temperatures, knocked out, held hostage in a bank, strapped to a gurney, thrown out of an airplane. I've scaled a skyscraper, swung across Wall Street, bent metal, chased an international terrorist through subway tunnels, been on the run... a couple of times.

The other day, or well I guess it was the morning really, I woke up early but kept my eyes closed. Without opening my eyes, I could see everything in the room. The night stand with the latest Grisham earmarked with the passage I was reading the night before. The oak chest of drawers that Lisa and I bought after we were first married. The new windows facing the backyard that overlooks the swing set I put together for Heather when she was seven years old. The new curtains Lisa just bought to go with the new windows, all white lace and frilly. The master bathroom with that old toilet that even now makes the same sound after all these years. Lisa still doesn't know how to fix it. And then there's Lisa, lying next to me. So quiet and so peaceful. Just lying there like she always has.

And then I opened my eyes. It took me a moment to recognize my surroundings. The small alarm clock with the numbers 5:57 blinking in red, the computerized shutters that open and close each morning and each night, the brick wall, the damned tiled ceiling I've counted enough times to drive me insane.

I was still in the townhouse, still in the same place _ the same place _ that I've been in for the last year and a half. My whole life is a series of waking ups and eating meals and exercising and doing test after test after test. I wake up when I'm told, I eat my meals when I'm told, I go to bed when I'm told. I do everything when I'm told.

There are times when I don't think the loneliness will ever end, that this empty hole in my heart will always be just that _ empty.

I miss my wife and my daughter. I miss everything. Waking up to the smell of bacon and eggs and coffee. Reading the morning paper. Checking the scores on TV. Watching quiz shows. Coming into the city with Lisa to see a show. Teasing Heather about a new boy she happens to mention. Shooting the breeze with Roger. Hearing my favorite song on the radio. I miss candy bars and pizza and barbeques and baseball games, heck, even the commute to work.

I miss my life. I miss the freedom. I miss the choice. If I could make the same decision again, while I was hooked up to those billion dollars machines that let the doc talk to me, I'd...

I don't know what I'd do.

For now, though, I guess the only thing I can do is to take it all day by day. Just day by day. If there's even a chance, as small as that chance might be, that I could see my wife and little girl again, even just a glimpse, then I guess it's worth it. It has to be.

I wonder what a person who lives the charmed life would do.

End

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