Subject One

II. Fall

Alone with my thoughts. And now is the time for the freakout. I take one of the pillows and scream long and hard into the thread until my throat is charred. Setting the pillow down, I breathe out every last bit of air and wait until my lungs burn before I take it in again. I'm not supposed to be here. I'm not supposed to be here. I should be in the ground, unfeeling and cold, but here I sit, in a comfortable bed in a strange hospital who knows where. There's nothing more that I want to do then get up and leave this room and try to figure out what happened to me, but I can barely even sit up on my own. My thoughts are still fuzzy, my brain feeling more like scrambled eggs than an organ.

Let the forty-eight hours of being alive begin. I scan the room again, and find a remote on a small metal nightstand next to the bed. I grab it, and turn it on. I don't think I've ever watched real television before. It's strange, watching made up stories, and I clock in many of the hours of the forty-eight hour medically-induced insomnia with eyes glued to the fake world. It's even better than fantasy paper. During one of those hours, a nameless man comes in with a bottle of the silvery liquid and leaves without even bothering to acknowledge me. I drink many liters, but never had the urge to urinate, which I was thankful for because it would be very difficult to reach the bathroom in my current state.

When the digital clock clicks to 3:36, which I'm not sure was early morning or late afternoon, there is one loud knock on the door. Before I can even give a classic "come in," a tall, willowy figure bursts into the room. He is a young man, with plain brown hair, buzzed on the side with an unruly mop on top. He carries a digital notepad, which he never takes his eyes off of. He approaches my bed, bends down, and immediately opens my mouth with his fingers, finally peeling his eyes away from the notepad to peer into my cavity. With him close to my face, I see that his eyes are light brown. Light brown eyes staring straight at my tonsils.

I smack his hand away. "What the hell?"

He looks into my eyes, but only briefly. "Doctor Arthyr. I'm assigned to you for study." He nonchalantly tries to slide his finger in, again.

"Assigned to study me?" I retort, slapping his hand away, again.

"Yes." He places a finger on my bottom lip. His brow contorts into that of confusion, as if he hasn't run into a troublesome patient before. His brow quickly turns to that of aggravation.

"Open your mouth."

You have to be kidding me.

"Alright that's it," I brush his hand off, and drag myself halfway across the bed to put space between us. The effort takes a toll on my body, and my arms start to shake, but it's worth it. His open mouthed face of disbelief is priceless. "I'm not a thing, okay? I've been poked and prodded and haven't been told anything about what's going on except..." I can't even think of a single word to describe my experience since waking up. "Absolute vagueness."

He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose and murmuring, "I knew I'd have to deal with this today," under his breath.

"Deal with what? Someone that says no to you?" I roll my eyes. "Sorry you have to deal with such unpleasantries."

A long pause, filled with simmering and glowering on both sides.

"Your nurse didn't tell you anything?" He asks.

"Not anything I could fully understand. My brain feels like goop."

"Classic, Mafiona." He sits down on the edge of the bed with a huff. He grabs the remote and shuts the television off, drowning us in silence. He faces me, but his eyes are on the notepad, quickly typing something in with deft fingers. "You killed yourself."