Cyan Sleeves

Regaining Stances

I didn't even have to open my eyes to know where I was. The sensations of the room had been ingrained into my brain since I was three years old. From the smell of intense sanitization, to the feeling of the blankets covering me, to the numbed pain of the IV in my wrist, I already recognized exactly where I was from my nightmares.

I wanted to open my eyes, sit up, or run like hell, but my body didn't agree with any of these things. Instead, I laid there, trying to keep a firm grip on my consciousness.

Let's review. Last night, I...

I couldn't remember what stupid thing I had done to put myself in the hospital. Any time I reached into the part of my brain that kept that knowledge safe, I felt myself getting locked out. I figured I would remember it later on.

Unable to look around, I observed my surroundings with my other senses. I could hear the steady beeping of a heart monitor, and wished I could unplug it. There was some sort of weight on my chest – I figured that part of my body had been numbed by a sedative. Somewhere behind the weight was a sharp pain, subdued for now, but ready to come out as soon as the medicine wore off. The only remnant of pain that hadn't been blocked out was the horrible migraine I had, pounding through my skull. It felt even worse than the one I had when I came to the hospital years ago.

My eyelids covered basically everything, but I could tell that the room was brightly lit, although I wasn't sure if it was being caused by the sun or by an artificial light. Strangely enough, I could also sense a bright blue light. It wasn't intense, and didn't seem to be coming from outside of my eyelids, but rather from my eyes themselves. Is this because my eyes are blue, or is something weird going on?

I heard a door creak open softly, with footsteps following the noise. Sensing a chance to get more information, I spoke up. "Hello...?" My throat felt sore, and my voice was barely audible. However, the person was able to hear it anyways, their footsteps stopping.

"Oh, you're awake." She said, calmly. "Your parents will be very happy to hear that." After that, the footsteps walked away, the door shutting quietly. Even the sound of the door shutting was too loud for my headache, ripples of pain coming from my head.

After a minute or two, I tried to open my eyes again, this time succeeding in doing so. I wasn't surprised by what I saw.

I spy something that is white... Oh, wait, that's everything.

The blue light seemed to disappear when I opened my eyes up, so I chocked it up to "weird things that happen when you're on medicinal drugs." It wasn't so strange that I felt the need to ask for an explanation.

I looked around the room, trying to find clues as to what was happening. The room's light was indeed coming from the sun, through a window to my right. The last memory I had was from the middle of the night, so I knew some time had passed. There was a board on the opposite wall, but it was far enough away that I couldn't really read the small text. Aside from that, the room was a lot like the one I had stayed in nine years ago.

My mom suddenly burst through the door, and my gaze flicked towards her. She looked very distraught, with her eyes red and swollen from crying. I immediately felt sympathy towards her, wondering how much pain I had put her through once again.

When she saw me, she came to my side and sat down near my legs on the bed. She never took her tired eyes away from my face.

"Oz..." She finally whispered. "I'm so sorry."

I couldn't shake my head, so instead I responded. "I'm sorry for scaring you, Mom." My throat hurt when I tried to speak, so I mentally made a goal to not talk too much.