Sixty-One (Heather); Drowning...
Cold... So very cold... And it's so dark in here... No... My eyes aren't - open? I....... I don't understand what's going on... What's going on? I feel - strange... Kinda......weightless... How odd... This can't be right... My head feels like it's been filled with lead... That really can't be right......... My mouth feels like it's been filled with embalming fluid and my bones feel like they've been replaced with cotton wool... Yeurgh...
My eyes feel heavy, and oddly dry. I try to open one, but it feels glued down. I keep trying... I'm getting frightened now... It's like I don't have any control of my limbs...my muscles... I should be used to this: I used to pass out like this all the time when I was 17... I can beat this... I will beat this....... But I don't know why I'm here like this now... I don't understand... Where am I? Why am I like this? I didn't faint, I'm sure I didn't faint... I must have - slipped... Somewhere.......hit my head...........I gotta...............gotta get.....control over myself!
I take a deep breath and wince; it hurts to breathe too deeply. Something is most definately wrong! I'm in literally two minds... Like... One second I can be perfectly coherent... And the next....... I..... I can't remember what I was saying... Panic wells up inside me and I wish I could curl up and hide until it all goes away... My thought processes are fragmenting...drowning in.......something... It feels like I'm trying to breathe underwater, breathe through a thick smoke... Think through candyfloss... Virtually impossible... What am I doing here? Where is here anyway?!
I'm getting angrier, and with the anger comes more fear. The more angry I get the more afraid I become, because I can't do a thing to stop myself from being like this! Experimentally I try to flex my fingers. Nothing. No response. I can barely feel them. God I'm frightened...! I try again, and again, feeling more and more desperately afraid, wishing I could cry and scream out my fear. But I can't even do that... I'm trapped in this living nightmare...
Then, suddenly, thankfully, I get a breakthrough. If I could cheer I would, and the panic begins to ebb away slightly; I got my finger to move! Just the one, but surely it can only get easier from here-on-in? If I could smile, I would. I'm going to be okay, I just know it!
I manage to get all my fingers moving, I can flex them, clench them into a fist, wiggle them around, the whole lot! The panic has almost gone now; it's okay, I can breathe a little easier too. Of course, I was just panicking over nothing... I'll come to and I'll be in a bed, after having fallen and hit my head in that blackness after the gig... That thought warming me, I try to move my arm, but after what feels like an entire lifetime I give up. Not gonna happen. Shit... Now what? Okay, logic... Logic! Logic before the panic bubbling in my stomach makes an unwelcome return to my mind... Eyes... Yes, try the eyes... I concentrate my attention on my left eye. It's stronger than my right, for a start! It's opening... See, it's all going to be okay!
But... The world's feeling all strange and fuzzy and I can't remember what I was doing and I can't remember why I'm here and why on Earth can't I move and what is going on I don't understand and-
PAIN! Oh God... Pain... Sharp as a knife, clear as day... Then nothing.
Chapter 60 ; Contents ; Chapter 62
