A New Skin

Chapter Two

Listen to the music video at Melissa's Dream Land.

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     Loud sirens and flashing lights haze my senses. The ground feels unbalanced and unstable to me. I try getting up, but my arms give up, pushing me to the ground once more. A rush to my head is as immediate as the sound of gravel turning under shoes become more prominent as they get closer. I try to look up, which follows by me getting pulled off of the road.

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     The doors slam to the ambulance, making me wonder why I was even pushed on a gurney in the first place. What's wrong with me? What happened to me after I fainted?

     I wait in the moving truck to hear any answers, but all I hear is the faint beeping of the heart monitors, and the wheels moving as quick as possible to the closest hospital. My veins burn from the IV in my arm.

     I want to turn to a paramedic, but I can't seem to move, much less speak. It's as if my vocal cords were ripped out of me along with my sanity. 

    My questions fade away anyways, as if they weren't even there to begin with. The pain in my head begins to worsen, sending more pain throughout my body. In that instant, the agony slowly begins to slowly grow, like the blood running slowly from a cut. 

    I close my eyes, and try to imagine that this isn't happening.

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   "Concussion to the head".... I wake to being pushed along in a hospital bed. "Keep her on IV".... Slumping into another long rest, I finally get my answers. A head concussion from fainting. But was that it?

    They push me to an operating room immediately, as nurses push out a metal table. Everything becomes a haze as something is injected into my IV. Being put onto the cold metal table, someone puts a mask over my mouth and nose, and everything goes black.

    Beeping monitors greet me as I wake to a bright overhead lamp. Rubber-gloved hands assist me to another hospital bed. 

   The smell of hospital hits me in waves. Being pushed into a recovery room, I start to wonder about what happened to that killer exactly. If he will come after me. If the police are becoming involved. If I will be okay. 

   After being put under for a while and getting stitches and getting bandaged, I am put in a small room for recovery. The exhaustion of everything today hits me immediately, followed by a long rest.

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Melissa's Dream Land

   Why am I so tired? Everything is so dark! I need water. My throat feels scratchy.

   Darkness turns into light so quickly, I feel like I should shield my eyes, but this is a dream after all.

   A bright green blanket of beautiful grass covers the entire ground. Suspicious, since I never have colorful dreams, I step onto the fresh blades, letting the grass get in between my toes. An overwhelming sense of euphoria begins to rush through my body, making me want to dance, so I do.

     The scratch of a vinyl record begins to play, and a strange song resonates through the meadow. This is then my cue to continue dancing. As I do so, flowers pop up everywhere without warning or reason. My dancing is making the flowers grow! I jump along to the melody and become entranced into this world, intrigued at my own brain's creation.