Sheepor Wolf
03-04-2004, 10:54 PM
Living Death
Isn’t it ironic? You never feel more alive than when you want to die…
Maybe she had died. How do you know, after all?
All the treatments had failed. Face set in a mask, (hiding disappointment or grief?), the doctor told her there was nothing they could do. Except for one last experimental treatment. There were risks. But then, considering the alternative? Not much of choice, really.
The machine gave a flat line. Alarms sounded, nurses and doctors rushed in. Her time of death was established at 22.41.
She saw lights on the ceiling move through a veil of white, she was being moved. But where? She tried to ask, but found she could not speak. She couldn’t move at all. What was going on? Her body was numb and her mind half-awake. The rustle of doors sliding, the elevator moving down. Voices around her. Moving again, more moving lights.
Someone removed the sheet, mumbling “What a waste”. She tried to make out where she was, but all she saw was a plastered ceiling. The lights seemed brighter here, though. A vague silhouette of a man leaned over her, and he started cutting her clothes, taking them off. Four hands lifted her on another cold surface and she was moved again, but now everything was dark…
Panic, where was she, how long had she been in the dark, what was happening?
Now she was somewhere else. Everyone she loved was there, crying, looking at her. And dressed in black, OH MY GOD THEY THINK I’M DEAD! How can this be? She could see and hear and feel, she was alive! Why didn’t anybody know?
The lid was closed, all she perceived of the world outside were muffled sounds and the sensation of being moved. She had been taken away from her home, by car. She could only hope they were not going to bury her. Her mother, her father, her husband, her children, all the people she loved, no one had realized she was alive. Why? WHY?
She was slowly sinking for a few seconds. Then there were the terrible dull sounds, sand on wood. Her mind cried and screamed, but body remained frozen. Soon there was no more sound at all, nothing but a maddening silence and an even worse darkness…
“They know I’m alive!” rang inside her head as she heard a scraping. They were taking her out! The coffin was lifted and the lid was opened, she saw the stars and the branches of trees overhead.
“Well, the treatment works! I knew it would, I just knew it!” She knew the voice, but it wasn’t her husband, or her father. No, it was the doctor. “You must be hungry. That’s why I brought you this.” Something sharp was stuck in her arm. “I know it’s not exactly a boeuff stroganoff, that’s your favourite, no? But since you can’t open your mouth, let alone chew, this will have to do.” She was dumbstruck, she’d been buried alive, who gives a fuck about food? “Also, I brought you this,” holding a tube over her head. If she could move she would have strangled him with it. What was he doing? “The air in your little coffin is not going to last forever, you know.” Jesus Christ!
“You will be fine,” he said after having drilled a hole in the coffin lid, sliding the tube through. “I’ll drop by regularly to refill your drip and we can have some fun!”
Fun?
Again there was the darkness and the sound of sand on wood…
There wasn’t really any telling how long she had been there, devastatingly alone with her thoughts. The past was like a bad horror story, and the future didn’t look very promising either. The doctor’s mask when he had told her the bad news hadn’t been disappointment or grief, but something darker. She forced herself not to think about the ‘fun’ the doctor promised. But there was nothing she could do. And there would be no help, after all, to everyone but the doctor she was dead and buried. But she wasn’t dead, and wouldn’t be for a long time.
She thought of the past, of a time long ago and almost forgotten. She hadn’t always been sick. She had been happy. All those little things, all the trivial things that never seemed to matter. But they matter. They matter more than the big things. Tears inside her head were swelling at the thought of everything at once. Her daughter Lizzy calling for help because there was a snake in the garden. Dan, her husband, like a true knight, coming to the rescue to vanquish the rain worm. The twinkling lights in her son’s eyes, cute little David, he was He-man that day. A day at the beach. The tide had devoured the children’s (well, mostly Dan’s) sand castle; two sad faces but ice cream to make it all better. Coming home from work one day to find her bed covered in rose petals surrounded by burning red candles. She and Dan had made love for hours. And then some more in the bathtub. It had started to rain on their wedding, even though it was in July. Grandpa and her uncle Carl hurried to get the cake inside. The dance, Dan had never been much of a dancer, but he tried so hard. Her graduation. She had never seen her mother so proud. Even further back now. She was a child again, back in the village. She was playing with the boy next door, who was three years older and a real bully. How stupid boys were back then. And how stupid they were later on as well, for that matter. Visits to her grandmother’s house, a fresh apple pie always waiting. Every time she asked “Do you want some whipped cream on your pie, love?” even though she knew that she always wanted cream. The more, the better. All the little things…
Her life flashed before her eyes, so vivid it seemed she was reliving her life, rather than seeing it. Everything was happening at once it seemed. Nevertheless it seemed to last for hours. The images moved faster and faster, into a single blurred intense sensation. Was she dying?
Then a bright light broke through the blur. The light was so intense she saw nothing anymore and she couldn’t blink or lift her hand to block the light. It hurt her eyes. Then, all of a sudden, it was gone.
“Ready to have some fun?”
Isn’t it ironic? You never feel more alive than when you want to die…
Maybe she had died. How do you know, after all?
All the treatments had failed. Face set in a mask, (hiding disappointment or grief?), the doctor told her there was nothing they could do. Except for one last experimental treatment. There were risks. But then, considering the alternative? Not much of choice, really.
The machine gave a flat line. Alarms sounded, nurses and doctors rushed in. Her time of death was established at 22.41.
She saw lights on the ceiling move through a veil of white, she was being moved. But where? She tried to ask, but found she could not speak. She couldn’t move at all. What was going on? Her body was numb and her mind half-awake. The rustle of doors sliding, the elevator moving down. Voices around her. Moving again, more moving lights.
Someone removed the sheet, mumbling “What a waste”. She tried to make out where she was, but all she saw was a plastered ceiling. The lights seemed brighter here, though. A vague silhouette of a man leaned over her, and he started cutting her clothes, taking them off. Four hands lifted her on another cold surface and she was moved again, but now everything was dark…
Panic, where was she, how long had she been in the dark, what was happening?
Now she was somewhere else. Everyone she loved was there, crying, looking at her. And dressed in black, OH MY GOD THEY THINK I’M DEAD! How can this be? She could see and hear and feel, she was alive! Why didn’t anybody know?
The lid was closed, all she perceived of the world outside were muffled sounds and the sensation of being moved. She had been taken away from her home, by car. She could only hope they were not going to bury her. Her mother, her father, her husband, her children, all the people she loved, no one had realized she was alive. Why? WHY?
She was slowly sinking for a few seconds. Then there were the terrible dull sounds, sand on wood. Her mind cried and screamed, but body remained frozen. Soon there was no more sound at all, nothing but a maddening silence and an even worse darkness…
“They know I’m alive!” rang inside her head as she heard a scraping. They were taking her out! The coffin was lifted and the lid was opened, she saw the stars and the branches of trees overhead.
“Well, the treatment works! I knew it would, I just knew it!” She knew the voice, but it wasn’t her husband, or her father. No, it was the doctor. “You must be hungry. That’s why I brought you this.” Something sharp was stuck in her arm. “I know it’s not exactly a boeuff stroganoff, that’s your favourite, no? But since you can’t open your mouth, let alone chew, this will have to do.” She was dumbstruck, she’d been buried alive, who gives a fuck about food? “Also, I brought you this,” holding a tube over her head. If she could move she would have strangled him with it. What was he doing? “The air in your little coffin is not going to last forever, you know.” Jesus Christ!
“You will be fine,” he said after having drilled a hole in the coffin lid, sliding the tube through. “I’ll drop by regularly to refill your drip and we can have some fun!”
Fun?
Again there was the darkness and the sound of sand on wood…
There wasn’t really any telling how long she had been there, devastatingly alone with her thoughts. The past was like a bad horror story, and the future didn’t look very promising either. The doctor’s mask when he had told her the bad news hadn’t been disappointment or grief, but something darker. She forced herself not to think about the ‘fun’ the doctor promised. But there was nothing she could do. And there would be no help, after all, to everyone but the doctor she was dead and buried. But she wasn’t dead, and wouldn’t be for a long time.
She thought of the past, of a time long ago and almost forgotten. She hadn’t always been sick. She had been happy. All those little things, all the trivial things that never seemed to matter. But they matter. They matter more than the big things. Tears inside her head were swelling at the thought of everything at once. Her daughter Lizzy calling for help because there was a snake in the garden. Dan, her husband, like a true knight, coming to the rescue to vanquish the rain worm. The twinkling lights in her son’s eyes, cute little David, he was He-man that day. A day at the beach. The tide had devoured the children’s (well, mostly Dan’s) sand castle; two sad faces but ice cream to make it all better. Coming home from work one day to find her bed covered in rose petals surrounded by burning red candles. She and Dan had made love for hours. And then some more in the bathtub. It had started to rain on their wedding, even though it was in July. Grandpa and her uncle Carl hurried to get the cake inside. The dance, Dan had never been much of a dancer, but he tried so hard. Her graduation. She had never seen her mother so proud. Even further back now. She was a child again, back in the village. She was playing with the boy next door, who was three years older and a real bully. How stupid boys were back then. And how stupid they were later on as well, for that matter. Visits to her grandmother’s house, a fresh apple pie always waiting. Every time she asked “Do you want some whipped cream on your pie, love?” even though she knew that she always wanted cream. The more, the better. All the little things…
Her life flashed before her eyes, so vivid it seemed she was reliving her life, rather than seeing it. Everything was happening at once it seemed. Nevertheless it seemed to last for hours. The images moved faster and faster, into a single blurred intense sensation. Was she dying?
Then a bright light broke through the blur. The light was so intense she saw nothing anymore and she couldn’t blink or lift her hand to block the light. It hurt her eyes. Then, all of a sudden, it was gone.
“Ready to have some fun?”