State Of Grace

Chapter 50 - This Is Me Trying

"Liar."

"This is your fault."

"You killed me."

Cacooned in warm blankets, lying in a soft bed, breathing air that didn't smell of blood and smoke, or chemicals and sweat, she should've felt safe, but inside she was cold, her dry skin rubbed against itself, and breathing too deep made her heart and mind race. They kept telling her she should be grateful to be alive, but instead, Gracie was begging for the hands of death to pull her to the other side. They'd tried to take her, many times, but for some reason, she'd fought to live. And she had no idea why.

Her eyes fixed on a blank wall beside her, the same point she'd been staring at since the orderlies collected her from the hospital eleven days ago to bring her to another hospital, a psychiatric treatment center. There had been questions from doctors, police, and her parents, but Gracie had no answers. In fact, she hadn't been able to say a thing.

It wasn't that she'd forgotten what happened, if anything she wished she could could forget. If she could block it all out maybe she could get some respite from the haunting things she saw flashing in her brain over and over in vivid detail.

"Okay, love we have to go now," Stella said as she and Lilah rose from their seats at the end of Gracie's bed.

"We'll see you in a few days," they each kissed Gracie's cheek before leaving the room. She didn't stir from her withdrawn, despondent position lying down on her bed.

A nurse entered the room the second they left. Gracie knew she was on suicide watch because she hadn't been left alone since the hospital and even if she could get to the bathroom alone, she wasn't allowed.

After the doctors patched up her wounds, they were talking to her parents out in the hall. She didn't think of them, she didn't think of anything but the tray of instruments on the counter, a knife among them.

The surgical scalpel was small but sharp. Without hesitation, she picked up the blade and tried to drag it across her forearm. With her body weakened, she'd only made a superficial cut before the doctors came rushing back in, surrounded her like a swarm. Stella and Lilah stood at the door, hands over their mouths, water streaming from their desperate eyes.

"Please!" She shouted and gripped the blade tighter. One of the doctors slapped it out of her hand. She thrashed against the doctors as they pinned her arms and legs down and buckled her to the bed with cushioned straps. "Let me die! Just let me die!" She screamed her throat raw.

She thrashed her head against her pillow, and someone pushed their hand against her forehead and held her in place, the muscles in her neck burned as she tried to free herself but it was no use. They pushed a needle into her veins, she felt the cold liquid move up her restrained arm, and then it knocked her out.

Unconscious, bereft of physical senses, she still felt the horror in her dreams; a private screening of Rachel's fatal last step, and over and over again she saw the mangled, bloody body at the base of the cliff. She didn't even look human anymore. The hand that once caressed Gracie's skin and provided a sense of security, was now wrenched behind Rachel's back. Her spine was broken, and her legs were twisted beneath her, but it was her pale bloodless face that stuck out. Her eyes were still wide open and glistening with tears. She was covered in her blood now as well as Gracie's.

When the drugs wore off, and she came to, the cycle began. All of her physical pain returned with a fury and there wasn't a part of her, inside or out, that didn't ache. Still shackled, she thrashed and screamed like the wild animal they were treating her as until they knocked her out again.

She couldn't keep track of the time as it passed, but at some point, after finding her nightmares just as frightening as her bleak reality, she stopped resisting. Then eventually, they removed the restraints. Her broken body was free, but she no longer had any interest in trying to move at all.