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Description
The sheets felt cool and soft against my skin as I slowly drifted back into consciousness. I floated somewhere between sleeping and awake for some time before noticing that I had no clue where I was or what had happened to me. Hot panic stormed over me as I finally jerked out of my semi-conscious state. For a few seconds after opening my eyes, I felt an odd sense of floating, bathed in white light, and then I realized it was too bright to see anything and I shut my eyes tight to the sharp pain in my eyes and lower back. Pain...pain...but where did the pain come from? What happened? Where was I?

When the pain finally subsided, I slowly let my eyes open and the room crept into focus. It was a small room, no larger than 10 feet in height and twice that in length. Two large fluorescent lights stared down at me from the ceiling, bathing the room in an off-white artificial light. Staring at them for too long darkened the room around me and hurt my eyes, but it was hard to look away. I had to force myself to look elsewhere on the bare ceiling before I blinded myself. A tiny wooden table lay in the corner, and one of its chairs sat next to my bed like a ghostly visitor. Lethargy quickly washed over me, and my eyelids suddenly felt like massive steel weights. They closed easily, and I drifted back into sleep as quickly as before.

When I awoke again, the falling sun had cast a deep yellow glow on the west wall of my empty room, apparently through the window I hadn’t noticed before. I was more awake this time, my eyes adjusting faster than before. Judging by the depth of light, it was probably sometime around 6:30 in the evening. My head was definitely a lot clearer than before, and things started coming back to me. It was an accident of some sort, but that memory was still sort of vague in my mind. It wasn’t a pain, but a deep pressure further down my thin legs, in the general area of my knees and calves. Looking down, I could see my two feet sticking up in the sheets like tents, and a great white X covering the center of my chest like some strange religious symbol. I ran my hands over the smooth cross on my chest, my fingers noticing every split and crest of the white bandages. I figured that I must be pretty doped up not to feel much of what was going on, but, then again, I was still in that just-woke-up-from-surgery state. My hands then slid up and over my chin, feeling for any injuries on my face. I had a small, round bandage over my left eye, and a smaller, thinner one on the left side of my chin. A small shock of pain jolted from the bulge under the bandage on my chin. Stitches. I lifted my hand away quickly, not wanting to cause any more pain than I was experiencing. Running my fingers through my smooth, brown hair, I realized how tired I was, how exhausted I was just lying there. I gathered the strength and sluggishly propped myself up on my elbow. It wasn’t my arms that were hurting then, it was my back, a large knot of pain twisting in my lower back. I could feel the tautness of the bandage on the wounded skin of my back. Sitting up stressed it enough, so I plopped back down onto the soft mattress with a second twang of pain shooting through my spine. I took in a few deep breaths and waited for the sting in my back to calm. When it had finished, I stared up at the ceiling, the two fluorescent eyes off by now. Things started coming back to me, but all at once like a whirlpool. I needed to sort things out.

Ok. Let’s start this from the very beginning.

The sky was sunny and bright as I drove my car down 8th Street (I can’t quite remember where I was headed). Large, fluffy white clouds rolled along the horizon in front of me. Thin beams of sunlight shone through them, creating brilliant rays that gleamed and glinted in the wide blue sky. The soft leather of the steering wheel felt firm in my hands as I turned onto Country Club. Music flowed out of the speakers in my car, surrounding the interior with that chest-thumping beat of the bass. What surprised me was the amount of cars that following me into the intersection. None. I was the only one at the intersection when the red light came on. It was interesting, especially on a normally busy street like Country Club.
As I eased into the intersection after the light change, a cold chill ran down the center of my back. I could feel the little hairs on the back of my neck standing on end. I wasn’t quite sure what it was, but it worried me. By the time I saw the car speeding at me from my right, I was already in the middle of the intersection and too late to avoid it. I didn’t even brace for impact, but just before he hit me, I looked over and had enough time to think “this wasn’t going to end well.” His car slammed into mine at a blinding speed, sending me into neck-craning circles. The world spun so fast everything seemed to merge into one great big blur, the colors running like wet watercolors. I didn’t even know what direction I was spinning anymore. I felt a small jerk, and then everything around started flipping, turning over upside-down. It took me a few seconds to realize that I had clipped the curb and was now rolling in the air like a stunt plane. Then the slow motion of my flipping jolted to a stop as I slammed into the light pole on the corner of the street, bending the car into some malformed L-shape and spraying glass shards in every which way. The car slapped onto the concrete sidewalk upside down, rocked a few times, and then fell silent. Every sense in my body kicked into overdrive. I could hear every drop of oil leaking from the car and dripping onto the pavement. I could smell the slightly sour smell of leaking transmission fluid, the sharp odor of car exhaust, and the creaking of heating metal. I could even feel the warm, thick liquid of blood streaking paths down face. Then the pain started, a deep, sharp, stabbing pain like being stabbed in the thighs and forced to walk. It was almost unbearable, the darkness of unconsciousness sucking me in like a vortex. I tried moving my legs, but the pain stopped any further attempts of getting them active. I would have to pull myself out of this wreck with just my arms. My head pounded with bold from the position I was sitting in (well, squashed in). I slowly turned over onto my chest, being careful not to move my legs, once I was turned over, I reached my hands out, grasping for a crack in the sidewalk, a stray bar of steel, anything. My hands closed around a bent piece of car frame and I slowly pulled my body out of the wreckage. Broken glass cracked underneath me, piercing my skin like sharp bee stings. It took almost all of my strength, but I was at least able to pull the top half of my body out of the car, my broken legs still stuck under the heap of steel that was once a car. I collapsed onto the sidewalk, not noticing the searing heat it pressed against my cheek. And the last thing I saw before I dropped into unconsciousness was a group of people bolting toward me, rushing to help.

The sun was just a slice along the horizon when I awoke again, casting the longest shadows as it slipped beneath the vista. I pulled myself up onto my elbow and was surprised when I didn’t feel the spark of pain from my back. It wasn’t gone, just faded, dulled, like the ghost of paint on an old beaten car. I could sit up fully this time, and I did. Resting my chin in my palms, I found the IV needle still taped to outside of my hand. Funny how I hadn’t noticed it before. It had to have been there the whole time. I just hadn’t caught it.
I guess that’s just it. There are so many things in life that we don’t notice, so many things in life that we take for granted. Things that we just pass by and don’t give a second thought to. There are so many things that could happen in the blink of an eye. But we all live in our own little hamster-ball of safety, hoping and believing that nothing like that will ever happen to us. When the truth is, it can. It can happen to anyone. And the defining line between whether it will or won’t is as thin as a hair. You see, we don’t know when anything will happen. That’s why we live by routine. We do the same things everyday so there’s no chance of breaking pattern and causing something disastrous. We do the same thing every day because we know what comes next. Because when we know what’s next, we feel safe, secure. But when things begin to change, we get scared. And at that point we are unsure of what comes next, and we fear the things we don’t know will happen or not. Everyone has this fear, this uncertainty, and that’s why we build up our own safeties. We trick ourselves into thinking that everything is fine and that nothing bad will ever happen. We live our whole lives in this bubble, and there’s so many things that we pass by because of our fear of change. I guess that’s just how things are...
With my chin resting calmly in my palms, I thought about all of this and the day I’d just had. How was I to know that I remembered everything? How was I to know I hadn’t subconsciously skipped over things my mind didn’t want to remember? Well, I guess I don’t know. I guess I’ll never know. But for now, with the sun losing it’s grip on the horizon and the moon rising like a ghost, it will do.

This will do...

Description
The sheets felt cool and soft against my skin as I slowly drifted back into consciousness. I floated somewhere between sleeping and awake for some time before noticing that I had no clue where I was or what had happened to me. Hot panic stormed over me as I finally jerked out of my semi-conscious state. For a few seconds after opening my eyes, I felt an odd sense of floating, bathed in white light, and then I realized it was too bright to see anything and I shut my eyes tight to the sharp pain in my eyes and lower back. Pain...pain...but where did the pain come from? What happened? Where was I?

When the pain finally subsided, I slowly let my eyes open and the room crept into focus. It was a small room, no larger than 10 feet in height and twice that in length. Two large fluorescent lights stared down at me from the ceiling, bathing the room in an off-white artificial light. Staring at them for too long darkened the room around me and hurt my eyes, but it was hard to look away. I had to force myself to look elsewhere on the bare ceiling before I blinded myself. A tiny wooden table lay in the corner, and one of its chairs sat next to my bed like a ghostly visitor. Lethargy quickly washed over me, and my eyelids suddenly felt like massive steel weights. They closed easily, and I drifted back into sleep as quickly as before.

When I awoke again, the falling sun had cast a deep yellow glow on the west wall of my empty room, apparently through the window I hadn’t noticed before. I was more awake this time, my eyes adjusting faster than before. Judging by the depth of light, it was probably sometime around 6:30 in the evening. My head was definitely a lot clearer than before, and things started coming back to me. It was an accident of some sort, but that memory was still sort of vague in my mind. It wasn’t a pain, but a deep pressure further down my thin legs, in the general area of my knees and calves. Looking down, I could see my two feet sticking up in the sheets like tents, and a great white X covering the center of my chest like some strange religious symbol. I ran my hands over the smooth cross on my chest, my fingers noticing every split and crest of the white bandages. I figured that I must be pretty doped up not to feel much of what was going on, but, then again, I was still in that just-woke-up-from-surgery state. My hands then slid up and over my chin, feeling for any injuries on my face. I had a small, round bandage over my left eye, and a smaller, thinner one on the left side of my chin. A small shock of pain jolted from the bulge under the bandage on my chin. Stitches. I lifted my hand away quickly, not wanting to cause any more pain than I was experiencing. Running my fingers through my smooth, brown hair, I realized how tired I was, how exhausted I was just lying there. I gathered the strength and sluggishly propped myself up on my elbow. It wasn’t my arms that were hurting then, it was my back, a large knot of pain twisting in my lower back. I could feel the tautness of the bandage on the wounded skin of my back. Sitting up stressed it enough, so I plopped back down onto the soft mattress with a second twang of pain shooting through my spine. I took in a few deep breaths and waited for the sting in my back to calm. When it had finished, I stared up at the ceiling, the two fluorescent eyes off by now. Things started coming back to me, but all at once like a whirlpool. I needed to sort things out.

Ok. Let’s start this from the very beginning.

The sky was sunny and bright as I drove my car down 8th Street (I can’t quite remember where I was headed). Large, fluffy white clouds rolled along the horizon in front of me. Thin beams of sunlight shone through them, creating brilliant rays that gleamed and glinted in the wide blue sky. The soft leather of the steering wheel felt firm in my hands as I turned onto Country Club. Music flowed out of the speakers in my car, surrounding the interior with that chest-thumping beat of the bass. What surprised me was the amount of cars that following me into the intersection. None. I was the only one at the intersection when the red light came on. It was interesting, especially on a normally busy street like Country Club.
As I eased into the intersection after the light change, a cold chill ran down the center of my back. I could feel the little hairs on the back of my neck standing on end. I wasn’t quite sure what it was, but it worried me. By the time I saw the car speeding at me from my right, I was already in the middle of the intersection and too late to avoid it. I didn’t even brace for impact, but just before he hit me, I looked over and had enough time to think “this wasn’t going to end well.” His car slammed into mine at a blinding speed, sending me into neck-craning circles. The world spun so fast everything seemed to merge into one great big blur, the colors running like wet watercolors. I didn’t even know what direction I was spinning anymore. I felt a small jerk, and then everything around started flipping, turning over upside-down. It took me a few seconds to realize that I had clipped the curb and was now rolling in the air like a stunt plane. Then the slow motion of my flipping jolted to a stop as I slammed into the light pole on the corner of the street, bending the car into some malformed L-shape and spraying glass shards in every which way. The car slapped onto the concrete sidewalk upside down, rocked a few times, and then fell silent. Every sense in my body kicked into overdrive. I could hear every drop of oil leaking from the car and dripping onto the pavement. I could smell the slightly sour smell of leaking transmission fluid, the sharp odor of car exhaust, and the creaking of heating metal. I could even feel the warm, thick liquid of blood streaking paths down face. Then the pain started, a deep, sharp, stabbing pain like being stabbed in the thighs and forced to walk. It was almost unbearable, the darkness of unconsciousness sucking me in like a vortex. I tried moving my legs, but the pain stopped any further attempts of getting them active. I would have to pull myself out of this wreck with just my arms. My head pounded with bold from the position I was sitting in (well, squashed in). I slowly turned over onto my chest, being careful not to move my legs, once I was turned over, I reached my hands out, grasping for a crack in the sidewalk, a stray bar of steel, anything. My hands closed around a bent piece of car frame and I slowly pulled my body out of the wreckage. Broken glass cracked underneath me, piercing my skin like sharp bee stings. It took almost all of my strength, but I was at least able to pull the top half of my body out of the car, my broken legs still stuck under the heap of steel that was once a car. I collapsed onto the sidewalk, not noticing the searing heat it pressed against my cheek. And the last thing I saw before I dropped into unconsciousness was a group of people bolting toward me, rushing to help.

The sun was just a slice along the horizon when I awoke again, casting the longest shadows as it slipped beneath the vista. I pulled myself up onto my elbow and was surprised when I didn’t feel the spark of pain from my back. It wasn’t gone, just faded, dulled, like the ghost of paint on an old beaten car. I could sit up fully this time, and I did. Resting my chin in my palms, I found the IV needle still taped to outside of my hand. Funny how I hadn’t noticed it before. It had to have been there the whole time. I just hadn’t caught it.
I guess that’s just it. There are so many things in life that we don’t notice, so many things in life that we take for granted. Things that we just pass by and don’t give a second thought to. There are so many things that could happen in the blink of an eye. But we all live in our own little hamster-ball of safety, hoping and believing that nothing like that will ever happen to us. When the truth is, it can. It can happen to anyone. And the defining line between whether it will or won’t is as thin as a hair. You see, we don’t know when anything will happen. That’s why we live by routine. We do the same things everyday so there’s no chance of breaking pattern and causing something disastrous. We do the same thing every day because we know what comes next. Because when we know what’s next, we feel safe, secure. But when things begin to change, we get scared. And at that point we are unsure of what comes next, and we fear the things we don’t know will happen or not. Everyone has this fear, this uncertainty, and that’s why we build up our own safeties. We trick ourselves into thinking that everything is fine and that nothing bad will ever happen. We live our whole lives in this bubble, and there’s so many things that we pass by because of our fear of change. I guess that’s just how things are...
With my chin resting calmly in my palms, I thought about all of this and the day I’d just had. How was I to know that I remembered everything? How was I to know I hadn’t subconsciously skipped over things my mind didn’t want to remember? Well, I guess I don’t know. I guess I’ll never know. But for now, with the sun losing it’s grip on the horizon and the moon rising like a ghost, it will do.

This will do...