“I think…” I look up at the sky and say the words to the stars, so I don’t have to see the look in his eyes. My voice is a broken whisper. “I think I’m having a miscarriage.”
The stars swim for a moment, fuzzy and unfocused, and then everything goes totally black.
* * *
Ifloat in the darkness. It’s not entirely unpleasant.
No more pain. No more sorrow.
Maybe I should stay here.
“Female crash victim, approximately twenty years old, lost consciousness in the field!”
I was always meant for the shadows, anyway. Some people say I gravitate toward them, but I think they have it backwards: the shadows have always gravitated toward me.
“Multiple contusions to her arms, legs, and temple. Pupils are equal and reactive to light.”
There’s something soothing about the dark. People let their secrets out, in the small hours of the night. Their masks come off. Their guards come down.
“We’ve got a pulse, but it’s irregular.”
You can be totally yourself in the witching hours; maybe because there’s no one else awake to judge you.
“She’s losing pressure.”
I am a creature of shadows. Some peoplelikethe dark; I’mmadeof the dark. The dark is in my blood, in each beat of my heart. So it’s not totally disturbing to find myself adrift here, detached from the flashing lights and screaming sirens and creeping absence of a friend I was not prepared to say goodbye to yet.
“She’s lost at least a liter of blood. Possible miscarriage. Get someone from OB down here.”
Yes. Maybe I will stay here. Maybe it’s where I belong.
“She’s in v-tach! Get the crash cart!”
The light is too hard. Too harsh. Too bright.
“Code blue!”
Bringing all your flaws sharply into focus.
“We’re losing her!”
You cannot hide, in the light. Not from pain or sorrow or loss or despair.
“Push one of epi and atropine!”
Why would you choose to feel any of that? Why would you pick blinding pain when you could float in the dark forever?
“Charge to two hundred!”
The dark is comforting. Swaying. Lulling.
“CLEAR!”
A flash. A flicker. A strike of lighting, in the darkness.
“Push another epi!”
There’s something I’m forgetting. A fragment of a memory at the corner of my mind, on the tip of my tongue, just out of reach.