Muted

Ignored

Before you is a scene so foreign and distant. The characters so familiar, yet acting so alien. You stand gazing at a jewelry store across the street. Walsh stands next to you with a hand on your shoulder. He wasn't gazing at the store, in fact he was wearing a blindfold. Wispy forms of a man and woman dance hand and hand across the street. They're dressed in black funeral attire with small white rose corsages. The jewelry store takes on a less welcoming form, looking more like a pesky mirage, teasing you with water always just out of your reach.
From the side of the store, you can barely make out the figure of a truck. Hunting like a shark, attracted to laughter instead of blood, the van swims out of the thick noise surrounding the store and knocks over the couple. They slip beneath the beast's belly. And many white rose petals, melt off their vague appearances. The petals blow away, following the current made by the sharks movements. One swiftly floats in front of your face. Without hesitation, to clamp both hands around the petal in a single clap. But the crack from that clap, silences everything.
Walsh turns to face you, his expression unmoving behind the blindfold. He reaches behind his back removing a set of cuffs from his belt. Your eyes widen and you try to pull away, but he still swiftly locks your wrists together. Unable to release the petal trapped beneath your fingers, you tell Walsh to release you.
'What are you doing Walsh? I'm not the bad guy let me go!' is what you wanted to say. But when your lips parted, as if you were underwater, only bubbles float out. No noise. The petal that remains wedged in your palms begins to heat up. Its burning your hands, imprinting a mark or painful reminder. You shake your arms and scream at Walsh to remove the cuffs. But he can't see nor hear you.
Why does it hurt more to be ignored, than being branded?

(Your POV)

Your eyelids feel so heavy, as if chained to the floor. You could barely see the light from your desk lamp through the tiny crack you manage to open. Once you were able to pull them apart however, all you could see were Chris Pine's eyes.
'What the...' curiosity and confusion force you to reach up over the covers and push the Star Trek poster off your face.
'It finally fell, huh. Gah! The room is freezing, I don't want to get up.' you curl deeper into the foam mats, but your socks are caught on the sheets. A searing pain courses up your thigh and into your gut. You hiss then straighten back out as you were before.
'Ow ow ow, Why do my legs sting so badly?' gingerly, you sit up and remove the sheets to see your shins. The bed sheets fall right off and collect in a ball on the floor.
'Weird, I usually have my sheets tucked-in at the foot of the bed.' you gaze back at your legs. Knee high socks that are stripped pink and white, were prickled and bumpy. Clearly, they were hiding something.
Lifting your legs turned out to be more painful then anticipated, as you try to remove your socks. You hiss between your teeth trying so hard not to cry out figuring 'Nama would still be asleep. After a long while, you became able to see under the pink and white stripes. There are sets of beige fabric wrapped angrily around your shins. The bandages are held together with metal clips, and at some points dried blood seeped through to soil the fabric.
'What happened? Why am I bandaged? Is that MY blood?' You don't know or understand what is going on. Your heart races as you decide to remove the bandages. Gently unwrapping the fabric around your left leg.
'The fabric keeps getting more and more bloody.' You think while continuing to unwrap. As soon as you saw your flesh, you drop the bandages curled in your fist. Several stitched up gash wounds cover your shins in misshaped lines. Each two inches or three inches long. Some straight or curved; others look like they were stab wounds. And all of them were sealed with dry blood. You gasp, eyes wide and full of fear. You unwrap your right leg to find a similar scene of scattered lesions.
'Wha...What is THIS?' You begin to shake, not just because the room was cold, but because you were full of confusion and fear. ''Nama! 'Nama!' You want so hard to scream out but you can't move your eyes away from your shins. And your voice seems caught in your throat.