My inner demon

Chapter two

Even though my vision is obscured by a thick blanket of nothingness, my other senses quickly adjust. Muffled voices surround me, yet none of them are calling me by my name, instead they are just shrieking at me, hoping it miraculously wakes me up. Sirens can be heard as they race down the street to come to my aid, and the flashing lights let a subtle glow meet my vision, breaking through the sheet of darkness covering my eyes. Heavy water droplets splash against my face, causing me to once again wince at the feeling of them yet I don't know why. My limp yet heavy body is hauled onto an ambulance stretcher and carried into the vehicle. The heavy doors are securely shut and the engine coughs and splutters into life as it ploughs through the inevitable traffic. As my vision gradually returns, I can now make out blurry silhouettes of men in green shirts muttering into a walkie talkie attached to the wall by a coiled cable and briskly attaching me to what I thought to be an oxygen tank: even though my breathing feels normal. Once again, I drift in and out of consciousness, fighting against myself to stay awake, but alas, my vision goes dark and my body turns numb.

I finally wake up in a hospital bed. A stabbing pain welcomes me as it races up my leg and into my head and turns into a voice:

'It was you...you killed her... its all your fault' it whispered with great pleasure and satisfaction, as if it has been waiting for years to finally talk to me. Its voice was shrill yet deep, soft yet rough, dispiriting yet comforting in an unexplainable way. It sounded so familiar to me, like it was part of who I was, like it was the final puzzle piece of my life falling into place. What comfort and warmth it supplied me with almost instantly turned sour and cold. I was lost for words. Should I talk back? or can it read my mind?

'You're probably wondering why I'm here, why I can so easily get into your head without you knowing?' It cackled in a witch-like manner, as if this whole conversation is more comedic than I assumed, 'Haven't you ever wondered why you always black out and wake in different places?'

A cold chill raced down my body, from the ends of my hair to the tip of my toes, rapidly increasing my heartrate in the process. I try to speak but my throat is dry and rough and even if I could speak, what could I say? How do I know I'm even talking to it and not just the air around me? The cold chill proceeds to return back to my head and I hear the voice once more:

'the reason is-' it continues to say but before it could finish its sentence, a doctor dressed in a long white lab coat which had its buttons placed in the wrong holes, enters the room shortly followed by Elliot who by now, is on the verge of collapsing from a lack of energy. His hair is messy and windswept and his face is all red and puffy from what I can only assume to be him crying, but I'm too tired to ask. The voice drained all energy I might've had from me and the only thing I'm now left with is questions. Questions people would hear and think I'm mad, but maybe I am mad? It cant be normal to have a voice in your head, a voice so clear and full of life you'd think it was a person. Regardless of my deep quizzical expressions, the doctor ushers Elliot to the soft mahogany coloured armchair in the corner of the room (where he briskly fell asleep) and he continues his path towards the head of my bed, tapping his chewed up pen against the metal on the clipboard which was firmly gripped in his brittle hands. Tutting and muttering to himself, he scanned through the paperwork attached to the clipboard, flipping over each page as if there was a contest on who can make the most noise (if there was, he would most certainly win). After what feels like a century of his monotonous tutting and flicking of paper, he finally lets out a deep sigh and perches on the edge of my bed, tightening the duvet around me from his weight. As I further inspected this stranger, I noticed the most peculiar things about him. For instance, his mole which sat on the centre of his right cheek, appeared to be drawn on with what looks to be pen and that his left eye is made of glass and therefore, sits in one position: staring at me. As my eyes darted across his face, he gives me a passive aggressive smile, exposing a gold tooth in the place of one of his front teeth and lets out a low cough in a way to signal the start of a conversation.

'I am Dr Umbra, I will be here to... urh, help you and make sure your making a... urh, speedy recovery' he spat in a strong English accent, stumbling on the simplest of words. As he said it, he scratched the top of his balding head, waking the thoughts trapped inside, 'So, anyway miss...'

'Brooks, Andi Brooks' I swiftly replied, eliminating the opportunity for him to once again tut and flick the pages on the clipboard to find my name. But regardless of what I said, he still ultimately returned to tutting and flicking the pages until he found my name.

'Ah, here it is, Adelaide Brooks' he mumbled to himself while he flipped the numerous pages back to their original position while staring at me dead in the eyes. He could tell that name annoyed me, I could see it made him happy by the way the skin on the outer corner of his eyes creased and the corner of his thin, stubbly lips upturned, blinding me with the reflection of the light against his gold tooth. I glared at him, questioning why someone who is meant to help me, can be so cruel. But as I do this, he leans closer to me and slowly open his mouth, creating a string of saliva in the side of his mouth. He sighs, purposely breathing all over my face and my nose is overwhelmed with the smell of stale beer and cigarette smoke.

'Don't play dumb Adelaide, I know who you are... and you know who I am' he whispers into my ear, slowly changing his voice into something more familiar to what I've heard before. He somehow notices this and slowly leans back and walks to the window beside my bed, 'Come on Adelaide, don't you recognise me?'. It was him! It was the voice I heard all these years, the voice haunting me all day every day. I rolled over in my bed, grimacing at the pain it caused but I was too shocked to care, my breathing became out of control and the heart monitor rapidly started beeping. I look over to him once again, he was just standing there hysterically laughing at me, making my heart race even faster. I could hear echoes of my name being called out, shouting at me to wake up, but I was already awake wasn't I? My eyes dart around the room, searching for any sign of life, but there was none: no doctors, no nurses, no visitors, no-one. Just me and him. Alone. He suddenly stopped laughing but still had a wide smile spread across his wrinkled face, and as he walked towards me he called out my name, not in his voice but in another voice, one more familiar and comforting:

'Andi! Andi!' he called out, matching his mouth movements to the sounds I could hear all around me. He now stood at the head of my bed once more, and his cracked hands lunged for my mouth and pressed hard: causing me to scream and flail my body around to try and escape this prison. He continued to laugh, but each breath he took caused his laughter to get louder and deeper. The heart monitor continued to beep out of control, but it slowly turned into an ear piercing scream, a scream coming from my body. It felt as if something was trying to escape but it was trapped, I screamed louder and louder, unwillingly matching the volume of his laughter, causing him to press harder onto my face, forcing my head deeper into my pillow.

And then I woke up...