Don't Catch Me!

Chapter 12 - What the Hay?

Chapter  12 –  What the Hay?

My whole body felt like it had been pummelled.  Three rounds with a heavy weight boxer might be a suitable comparison but then again those WWE wrestlers in the bright lycra suits were more violent.  I fought to open my eyes, unsuccessfully.  Every single bit of me ached including my eyelids. 

The light penetrated my closed eyes sending sparks of pain through my optic nerves.  I turned my head, meaning to bury my face in my pillow but ended up with a face full of hay instead.  I groaned and half asleep I sat up splattering small particles of straw out of my mouth.  Reluctantly I resigned myself to accepting that I hurt.  With that accomplished I began the task of trying to dislodge the hay from my body and scratching. 

Wait a minute, why was I rolling in hay? 

My eyes were open now.  Wide open.  Completely unfocused but open. 

Where was I?  Why was I here?  What happened?  Memories started to resurface.  Ohh, that’s right.  I jumped through a dimension gate.  

Ha!  Sure I did.

I rubbed my face with the heels of my hands then tried to focus again.  With much squinting and blinking I recognised the wooden barn, although in the daylight it was even more dilapidated than I guessed last night.  Right now I was a couple of meters above the dirt floor in what I suspected was a hay loft.  Large stacks of hay bales surrounded me and little sharp pieces of straw stabbed me through my clothes.  Joy, sheer unadulterated joy.

Why did people depict hay as anything other than spiky, scratchy, vermin filled dry grass?  It was hardly the romantic bedding material the movies portrayed it as.  I would hate to take a romp in this stuff!  On my list fantasy hook up sites, haystack was way down the list.  And I mean, after swamp but before ant nest.

A gentle chuckling sound brought my attention back to my surroundings.  I looked up to find Joel reclining in the bales between me and the edge of the loft with the hint of a smile playing across his face.  The sunlight caught the different browns in his hair and made his skin look golden.  He opened his arms and shuffled across to draw me into his embrace.   Maybe I was a little quick to judge, you really should try something before making grand sweeping statements.  Hay, it might not be so bad, you know, with the right distractions.

“Good morning, or I should be saying good afternoon.” He muttered against my skin as his lips kissed mine.

A sleepy mumble was the best I could reply with.  He pulled away and looked at me with serious eyes.

“What?”  I stretched, trying to cover my yawning, and then started pulling long pieces of hay out of my hair.  Attractive look, I am sure.

“How are you feeling?”

“What was that stuff you gave me?  It really knocked me out.”

His face flinched as his eyes dropped from mine, “You had nightmares, don’t you remember?”

“I did?  Wow?  Really? How could you tell?”

He didn’t meet my eyes, but he shrugged, “I still don’t know how you did it? How you managed to survive the jump?  In your nightmares you were falling again.”

“Yeah, well, I supposed that doesn’t surprise me.” I scoffed and his eyes quickly met mine in confusion.  “Let’s just say I’m not keen to do that again.”

The pain flooded from his eyes and I guessed that he was blaming himself for everything.

 I smiled gently back at him, “I’ll be OK.”