A New Type of Realism

(2) Our Courage, Our Cancer

I looked around the room I was in, and grabbed the closest thing that I could use as a makeshift weapon. I scrambled for a broken chair leg that lay on the floor about five metres away from me. I held it in my hands as I headed step by step towards the hallway.    

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I used the tip of the broken chair leg to push the door open slightly wider. Carefully, I made my way through the doorway as the door creaked ominously on its injured hinges. I clutched my weapon tightly out in front of me, parallel to my chest. My breathing rate doubled, as did my heart beat. It felt as though my poor heart would burst out of my chest, grab onto my weapon, and high tail it out of the hospital and onto new horizons. I hated the feeling. It's why I spent my whole life up 'til now in my parent's home, not doing anything for myself of taking any opportunities. I wasn't the adventurous type of person. I preferred to be tucked up in bed with the duvet halfway up my face when I was forced to watch horror movies. I was 23 and I had yet to watch 'The Exorcist'.

My brother, Dylan, was the exact opposite of me. 'The Exorcist' was one of his favourite movies and he'd managed to watch it at a friend's house when he had been fifteen. It was impossible to scare him. He was the type that thrived on adrenaline inducing activities. In short, if the world ended, which it seemed to have done, I had planned to stick by his side. I had to find him. I found myself feeling oddly relieved at the thought that if this was the apocalypse, if the world truly had ended, then I would never get the chance to actually watch 'The Exorcist'.

I stood in the hallway and looked around. I pressed my back against the wall; it felt safe to know that no one could sneak up on me from behind. I looked down one end of the hall and saw an emergency exit. I checked the other end of the corridor to make sure that no monster was lying in wait, and then made up my mind to search beyond that beautiful exit.

Suddenly, I heard a door bang behind me. I turned just in time to see a green blur flash across the hallway and into another room. I saw the door close, though a thin slither was left that was just wide enough for someone to peak through. I thin shadow covered three quarters of the light that flooded into the hallway.

"I'm not going to hurt you," I called out. I was telling the truth, even if the situation had called for me to harm whoever was behind the door, I was in no state to fight. Huge tremors ran down my body like an earthquake that I only I was subject to. My hand shook of its own volition; I was no longer in control of my own body. I heard a high pitched voice ask who I was from behind the door.

"Devyn, m...my name's Devyn. E...everyone calls me Dile th...though." I could barely utter my own name. The tremors that ran through my body had begun to affect my voice. It was as if I'd been kept in a walk in freezer overnight, and had only just been let out.

"What marks are on your wrist?" I heard from behind the door. I thought it was a strange question to ask, but I wanted to convince the person behind the door that I was a friend, I needed the company to help me through my own terror. The person did not offer their name in exchange. During my time asleep, people's priorities had changed. Politeness had become unimportant; manners didn't matter any more.

I stared blankly at the crack in the door, whoever it was must have been able to tell how confused I was, as the next thing I heard was something about a symbol on my right wrist. I directed my gaze to the aforementioned area. I pushed up the sleeve of the lab coat and stared at the black dots on my lower arm. I wondered how I could have missed them before.

"Three dots. There's three dots in a sort of..." I waved my left index finger in a circle above my right wrist, "...triangular shape." I finished. I had no idea what it was there for, or even what it meant. I'd been branded with ink. I wondered whether it was permanent. It would be hard to hide from my mother.