Silence

~ an imagined nightmare ~



I felt my body before I ever opened my eyes. I was tired, achy, from long days of work multiple days in a row. I didn't want to get up, didn't want to move, didn't want to rip off my covers and start another long day. But I had to.

Still, I could snooze, just a little bit.

I pulled my covers tight to my face, curled my body in, and...

Nothing. Where was it?

My eyes shot open. I tried again.

Nothing. Tension came to my neck.

Again. Nothing.

I sat up, the cold air of the winter morning less shocking then normal.

I tried to speak, tried to say something, anything.

Nothing. Again. Nothing.

My hands went to my throat. Tears filled my eyes. I cried, but I couldn't wail. I tried to yell, but there was no sound over my breath, no utterance except air.

I stumbled out of bed, tripped towards my door, and found it locked. I banged my hand against it. I pulled, wrenched at the doorknob.

Nothing. I slammed my fists against the wood. I silent screamed til my throat was raw, then slowly I slid down to the floor.

I curled into a ball again, my tears slipping sideways across my face, pooling on the hardwood.

I silently whimpered. I quietly wailed. I cried.

I closed my eyes.

And then I awoke in my bed, tense, exhausted, and alarmed. I took a deep breath. And I hummed, the soothing way I always hum when I'm waking from or slipping to slumber.

And the world was okay again.

Distressed

It started Monday night.  At first it was just a tickle in my throat, nothing new.  I fell asleep with a cough drop under my tongue like I'd done many a time before, believing this would be enough.

When I awoke the next morning, I still had a tickle in my throat, but it was just a tickle.  And I still had work...

As my day went on, the tickle mutated, growing into pain, bad pain, and my cough drops weren't helping.  In fact, it seemed like my cough drops were triggering coughing fits.  There were other symptoms: intermittant nausia and dizziness, feeling weaker than normal.  None of these were good signs.

By the time we were finishing up our tear down, I had to keep myself from crying.  I'd started coughing occasionally, and it hurt, really hurt, whenever I coughed.  I knew, just knew, something was very wrong.

The next morning I went to Patient First.  They tested me for strep and the flu, both negative.  Still, the doctor thought I probably had the flu anyway; he perscribed a flu medication plus some liquid codeine.  I filled the scripts, went home, changed clothes, and went back to work.

Wednesday was to be an easy day, a half day, a simple gig.  But, as I worked, I could feel it.  I couldn't move, couldn't function like I normally would.  It took me much longer to perform simple tasks, and it took so much energy out of me to just get through this simplest of gigs.

That day I continued to drink fluids.  Tea helped to soothe my throat.  I went to sleep at 11pm having taken my first dose of the codiene, the drug giving me a nice dull haze to slip into.

And then I woke up at 2am.  My throat was on fire, worse than it had been before.  I chugged more ginger ale, rolled over, and made myself fall back to sleep.

And then I woke up at 5am.  My throat felt even worse.  I made myself a hot toddy, went downstairs, and watched random television hoping my throat would feel better.  It didn't.

I tried to stay strong.  I kept hoping my pain would ease.  But there came a point when I was ready to ball.  I tried to speak to a roommate around 8am, and each word was a new level of pain.

I took two Tylenol, another dose of the codiene, curled up on the cough, my body in a tight ball, and cried myself to a restless sleep that lasted about an hour.

And then came the weezing.  It felt like something was obstructing my airway, like mucus was half covering my throat.  Every breath was a labor.  I gave it sometime, thinking it would go away.  With each breath, I grew more and more scared.

Finally, I couldn't deny it anymore.  I picked up my phone and typed out a note.  I walked up to the kitchen, where one of my roommates was fixing something.  I showed her my phone.

I'm having difficulty breathing; I think I need to go to the hospital.

She didn't need my note to realize I was not good.  You could hear every breath enter and exit my body.  We rushed to get shoes on my, grab my wallet, and bundle up against the frigid cold.

By the time we had gotten to the hospital, I had hacking coughed enough that whatever was hampering my breathing had been dislodged, but I had given up on talking; it just hurt too much.  I wrote out all my answers to the intake secretary. 

We waited for about an hour before they took me to the back.  As the nurse spoke, I just kept writing.

Before she even asked me any questions, I pointed to notes I'd already written:
Symptoms - painfully sore throat, chills, intermittant nausea and dizziness, weak.
It hurts to swallow, cough, or talk.
My pain is at an 8, a 9/10 when I cough.  Yesterday it was a 7.

They put in an IV.  They took blood for tests.  They gave me pain meds and fluids for dehydration.

About an hour later, with the tests run, and nothing coming up again, they had a diagnosis: throat infection.  They perscribed an antibiotic, more codiene in case I needed it, and gave me a doctor's note.

I'm still to take the meds Patient First perscribed, holding onto the hospital's codiene in case I run out.

It is so very hard for me to admit when I'm hurting, to admit when I'm in real pain.  It's incredibly difficult for me to take myself to the hospital.  But the fear...  That was the hardest part of all.

When you don't know what is wrong with your body, when all the things you try that normally work no longer make you better, when you don't understand what is wrong but you know something is wrong...  The fear was the worst part.

But I'm okay now.  The pain meds took me down to a 4 before I left the hospital.  I've been hovering there or slightly below ever since, making sure to take the Tylenol and codiene regularly.

Because when I don't, when the time comes up for me to take my next dosage, and I can feel the pain grow just a little.  When it feels like a cheese grater is against my throat ready to slough off its fill, the fear comes back and I wonder if my breaths will be my last.

For being the daughter of a doctor and a medical secretary, I kind of suck at this whole health thing.

Wordplay

~ a pittance poetry ~


1)

Deep in the forest, creeping through the almost night
Drifts a little girl clinging to a small light.

She wanders and cries, and holds her beam tight
Not knowing what dangers lurk or could fright.

She wishes she were home, weeps at her plight
For she does not know how exactly to fight

The fear welling against her little child might
That there is something in the woods that will bite

Or claw or tear or scream or scare or quite
Frankly, more horror the thought, invite

Her terrors to rise to worse heights
Like her lost toy, this her search for her white kite.



2)

Don't tell me what to say
Don't tell me how to play

Don't pretend you're nice
Don't pretend I'm your vice

Don't smile and lie
Don't ask or pry

Don't give or take
Don't feint or fake

Don't love and leave
Yet be what I need

Do smile and ask
Do test and pass

Do open yourself up
Do let it erupt

Do tell truths
Do kiss my bruise

Do hold me tight
And be just right


3)

He loved me
He left me
He healed me
He cleft me

In two to live
In two we give
In true our hearts
Incur love's darts

Hard Or Soft

~ a half imagined nightmare ~



We sat on the floor of his bedroom, down in the basement, as cluttered and full as ever. Two bare bulbs hung from the uncovered wood floor beams. His television displayed an old black and white movie, something scary. His bed was tousled. His clothes were everywhere. Why did I date a man who lived in his friends' basement?

We sat on a small rug in front of his bed. It was like the kind you'd sit outside a door to clean your shoes on before entering your home. No comfort. Barely kept the cold of the cement floor from creeping up into my skin. Why did he want to sit on the floor?

Control. He was in control.

I sat, cross-legged. His legs surrounding me. His arms around me. Trapped. He was in control.

His hand was at my throat. His voice was in my ear.

"Hard or soft?"

"Hard," I said, just despite him.

He started to squeeze. I couldn't breathe.

Would he kill me now? Would this be it? This man who told me I made him better. This man who tried to tell me he loved me. This man who I once loved. Who was this man?

His free hand brought out a blade. Showed it to me.

I wasn't dead yet. Even with his grip around my throat, even with air being almost gone, I wasn't dead yet.

This was not the same man. This was not the man I dated, the man I loved. This was not the man with the sly smile, the huge hugs, and an arm in which my head cradled at night.

This was a monster. With crazy panicked eyes full of menace for me. With hot putrid breath that filled my nostrils. And with a stench of sweat that slathered on my skin as he held me.

His knife hovered, too close to my eye.

He scared me. He horrified me. But I would not relent, would not let him have the pleasure of my fear even as inside I trembled with terror.

"Hard or soft? Hard or soft?" He played with the knife in front of my eye, swaying it with his words.

"Hard" to the left. "Or soft" to the right.

"Hard," I said, despite him, rebellious, unrelenting even to the end.

And then everything went black.

Appetite

~ a moment of terror ~


There is something about that first feeling as it passes over your lips. Something about that first drop on your tongue. That first taste. The fullness of the liquid. The salted sting of it as it flows from someone else and into you.

It is a powerful notion, a powerful moment, when the blood of another crosses your lips.

He laid in my arms, young, pretty. He was just becoming a man, just turning into something more than annoying. That's why I chose him. All that promise. All that potential. I knew it would make him even more delicious to consume.

He rode his motorcycle at night, on old forgotten roads where he could embrace his need for the wind rushing over his skin and the thrill of pushing his bike to its limit.

I made sure to appear to breakdown my car on that rode, late at night, with no one around. I made sure I wore something to attract him, something alluring, revealing, enticing. I made sure I had my syringe at the ready, and the knife nearby, for when it was time.

He stopped, ever the good Samaritan, and asked me if I needed help. And when I said I did, he did something even more remarkable. He threatened to rape me.

Said he wanted a fee for his generosity. Said nice hot piece of ass like me on a dark rode like this needed protection against the darker elements of this world. Said he'd be just the guy to help me out, provided I helped him out first.

His words would make the kill that much sweeter.

I took my shirt off for him, let him see the goods, pulled him in closer. He was young, handsome, and stupid. When his lips found my neck, I found it more than ironic the fate that soon awaited him.

My syringe found his neck and he fell into my arms.

When he awoke, a few hours later, we were far from where he was last conscious.

We were still outside, but now he was the one disrobed. On the ground. His hands bound. I left his mouth free to scream, his eyes free to see. I wanted him to see, wanted him to watch as I approached.

I showed him the blade. I'm sure it was nothing to his surprisingly hardened eyes. One little nick and the blood trickled from his neck. He struggled as my lips found his flesh, lapped up his blood, sucked the life force out of him.

Soon, though, his voice grew weak. His struggling eased and then stopped. His body grew cold.

It always is a little sad when they turn cold, once beautiful and still quite stunning, but lacking the warmth that is life, that is the essence of them.

For now his essence was inside me, churning in my belly, giving me his power, his allure, his youth.

So young, so stupid, so sweet for me taste tonight. I would gladly have drank from him forever were it possible, but this woman always has too great an appetite.

There There

~ a moment of terror ~


"There, there. It'll be over soon."

My father would always say that when I was going through something horrible, something painful. Like when I broke my arm falling from the tree in our back yard. Or when every centimeter of my skin itched from the chicken pox but I couldn't scratch any of it. Or when I got my period for the first time and my guts felt like they were being riped out.

Father was always there to massage my scalp or rub my back, sometimes hugging me, holding me, rocking me gently and whispering, "There, there." Father protected me, loved me.

So hearing those words, my father's words, drip from the lips of this man, this monster, this thing that called himself Lover, shook me more than anything else I imagined he would soon do to me.

There was no love in his touch, no love in his eyes. There was danger. There was hunger. Hurt. Pain. Misery. He said it would be over soon. I hoped he wasn't also a liar.

The scratches, scraps, and bruises on my skin did not yet ache as much as I knew they eventually would. He'd grabbed me on my walk back to my dorm, slamming me into the sodden earth and wrestling me into his van even as I fought him the entire way.

I'd cut through the swath of trees that separated the high rise apartments just off campus from a side campus street, apartments too expensive for me to afford and far enough away from my classes that I didn't care. But I'd wanted to visit Brandon, my boyfriend, before my school week started.

My parents liked Brandon, I sometimes thought more than I did. He rubbed my back almost as good as my father and soothed me in more adult ways. He kept me centered, kept me sane as I studied to apply to medical school. I wanted to be a counselor, to help the hurt, the abused, the broken.

As I laid on the cold cement floor, the irony of my life's goal struck me.

As he riped apart my clothes, my wrists bound in clothesline, my whimpers silenced by a piece of fabric from my once comfy rugby shirt, my eyes darkened also by a torn piece of my clothing, I wondered how I as a counselor would I advise my patient going through this ordeal.

How would I comfort a woman about to be violated in who knows how many ways? How would I walk her through the physical pain and the emotional turmoil? How would I connect with her, soothe her?

I recalled hearing somewhere that you should relax and let them do what they want. I advised myself to do this, just relax, lying like a dead fish, my body limp.

I thought maybe taking my mind to another place would also be beneficial. Not some place happy, for I knew that would never work. But maybe a place of physical pain, unchosen pain again.

And then I remembered my father lying next to me, my abdomen riped in two from my blossoming into womanhood. I remembered his rocking me and rubbing my back.

I remembered the seemingly unrelenting pain, wanting to cry, wanting it to end, wanting to rip my insides out, anything to stop the pain.

And then I remembered his words again, and thought it fitting to go there, back to my bedroom in a house no longer standing in a room with a man no longer living. I thought maybe, some how or some way, his comfort echoed in this horror would help me survive a new pain that I quietly begged and pleaded would just end.

"There, there. It'll be over soon..."

For Me

~ a dark thought ~

"I'm not answering your questions. Your questions are juvenile, amateur, rude. No, I will not answer your questions."

"Fine, then can you just tell me why. Why did you do it? Why? And to so many..."

"Now, that is a question I will answer. It was... the sounds.

"For me, well, I'm a very auditory person.  Low, reverberating sounds, bass, deep, bone rattling sounds are so very pleasing to me.  High pitch noises, nails on chalkboard, what have you, they hurt me, actually physically causing me pain.  But, there is... one exception to my odd auditory affliction.

"There is something about their screams, their wails and their moans. There is just something about the sounds they make.

"For me, the rest was just a means to an end. The blood, the blades, the mess...all just what it took to get them to make those sounds. Those beautiful, wondrous sounds.

"My favorites were when, when they still had fight in them, when they thought they would live, could live, through my ordeal, they would let out deep low guttural screams from the base of their stomachs busting out through their throats, propelled by every last molecule of air in their lungs. For me, that was the best part.

"Oh, that didn't stop me. No, no. Much like the first bite of dessert, when you know no other bite will taste as good, yet you keep eating, that was what it was like. Tasting the sounds of the screams, their moans, their pleas. Whimpers, whines, wails. Oh, the cacophony of it all still lives in my head. I had no need to record them. I remember every last syllable, every last note of them.

"For me, Sir, it had nothing to do with death, or gore, or brutality, though it took those things for me to get what I wanted, what I needed. For me, the sounds, the supple songs of their cries bursting forth, and my ears enveloping every moment of it. That was all I ever wanted, ever needed, and ever will need.

"So, Sir, do with me as you must. I'm resigned to whatever fate awaits me. Because, for me, I have a library of lyrics to play back each and every day. And no punishment you could lay down will ever be so great as to spoil the music ever playing in my ears."

The Hand

There are toys to be played with, laughter to be sung out, and gift cards to cash in. Therefore today I give you all another story I wrote some years back. Enjoy.

The Hand

She lay in bed, trying to pretend everything was normal. The radio was on. Her boyfriend was next to her. She was fine, in no danger at all. But she could not sleep.

It was the hand, his hand, back lit and shadowy, resting on his side. She couldn’t be certain; in fact she had to be wrong. The hand wasn’t looking at her, staring, waiting until she closed her eyes. Hands aren’t scary.

She tried to calm herself. Her boyfriend’s snoring began to grow louder. Her mind gripped onto that reality: her loving companion, asleep next to her. Maybe he would rollover, taking her view of the hand away. She waited. And waited. For once, he slept soundly.

She would convince herself this was silly. It was just the darkness of the room frightening her. She would overcome this foolishness. She closed her eyes. And opened them a nano second later. Did it move? No, she knew it hadn’t. It is a hand. Hands are not that quick, especially the hand of a sleeping lover.

She would do better. Count to five. Yes, she would close her eyes and count to five. She could do this. It was simple. She closed her eyes and counted 1 … 2 … 3…

She quickly opened her eyes. She had felt something touching her neck. But it had not moved, not even a fraction of an inch. That hand was still on his side. Yet, it felt like fingers, cold fingers, had tried to wrap around her neck.

But how could this be? The hand was exactly as it had been, unmoving, seeming to stalk her still.

This is in my head. I cannot let fear control me. I will do this.

She would close her eyes again. She could count to ten this time. She would do this, in hopes of willing herself to sleep. She closed her eyes. 1 … 2 … 3

Breath escaped her. She opened her eyes, reaching for her neck. Once again, she felt the cold fingers against her skin. And once again, the hand was there, unmoved.

She could not sleep. She could not think. Her fear gripped her mind. How would she survive this night with that hand always watching, waiting for her to close her eyes?

He can help me. I can rouse him.

Slowly, she reached over to his back and gently pushed him. No response. She tried again, harder. He stirred, finally.

Like many other nights, he turned over and pulled her close. She snuggled into his embrace, relieved she no longer saw the hand in the scary light.

He gripped her hip, as he was prone to do. The gesture sent soothing waves through her. She relaxed and closed her eyes, nuzzling into her pillow.

And as she began to dream of their coming beach vacation, feeling the warmth of the sun on her skin, and the breeze toss up her hair, she did not feel the cold fingers slip around her neck, as it squeezed the life out of her.