Catastrophe

Miracles

When I wake up, I see a nurse cleaning up my bedside table. I cough to get her attention and she looks over at me and stops what she's doing and grabs her clipboard and squats next to me and asks,

"Hey honey, glad to see your awake. How are you?"

I smile my chapped lips and try to talk.

"I bet-ter... need water...chapstick... please." I whispered, my voice so raspy it sounds like I've been smoking all my life.

The nurse gives me a small smile and says,

"Okay, wait right here. I'll be back in a minute with water and chapstick." 

Then she gets up, leaving her clipboard, and walks out.

For a few minutes, I just sit there trying to re-think how it all played out.

I remember: "I go to try and set up a blockade against the door with our coffee table..." okay and "Now I feel wind, a strong wind on my back. I fall. I feel warmth along my cheek and neck." Funny, I don't remember having water... "Blood." I thought "It's blood. I want to scream but I can't, something's blocking my throat. I can't breathe. It's preventing me from breathing. I am going to die. I can't think... I'm losing too much air, my brain can't work." I don't want to continue, but I need to know what happened. I need to know..."My eyes are barely staying open and I fight unconsciousness. I want to live, I don't want to die... my family. Mother...father...Brandon...Kirstin... I can't leave them! I life my head, my vision blurring at the edges, my head pounding like it is about to explode, but I will not go down without fighting. I look over to see my mother holding Kirstin, crying and screaming, and my mother covering her free hand over her mouth trying not to lose herself, and my little brother, Brandon, sprinting towards me yelling at me to stay awake, tears streaming down his face. As I lose more and more air, I start to fade and realize I can't fight much longer.

"Goodbye Brandon. I love you." I just didn't have enough time or breathe to say it out loud before my lungs gave out and my eyes finally shut, unwillingly.

As I remember that nightmare, I start to cry again because I now know they all died... Becca said they did. I mean of course she could lying, but why would she? She put all her trust in me, she even told me her sad childhood... 

"No." I said, she couldn't be.

And as if on cue, Becca walks into the room holding a tray with water and food. As I look from her to the food, my mouth starts to water and I just stare as she walks with the food, taking hat seems like forever to reach my bed. When she finally gets in arms reach, I sit-up and reach towards it, my fingers yearning for the tray. I grab it and look at the food for a second, drooling a river, before stuffing my face. Literally, my face slams towards the tray, before I even understand what's going on. I lift my head and wipe my face off with a napkin I saw on the tray. I look right up at Becca with a murderous look. She looks just as confused as me, her eyes bulging out of sockets and her mouth open.  I swear she was trying to hold in a laugh, but it didn't matter to me at that time. All I wanted to know was what just happened? 

"Becca, WHAT THE HECK?!"  I yelled.

Becca gave me a bewildered look, and said, "What? ME? You thought that was me? I'm a stranger, but I would never do that. I was standing right here, it must've come from behind."

"Sure, Becca. A ghost just came right up behind me and smashed my face onto my tray. Right because GHOSTS definitely exist. You wanna find another excuse, and maybe you could try to make it sound reasonable." I said, still fuming.