Does she want to know where I am originally from or where I live?I ask myself. I hate small talk because those questions have no easy answer, and I don’t know what people want to hear.Hate hate hate it.
“Germany,” I say nervously.
“You don’t sound German,” she says, and I flush.
“Well, yes. Because kind of. My father is, well, was British; he’s dead, and my mother is half-German, and we lived there. But my German isn’t very good, even though I was born there. Worst language to learn in the world. We moved to England after my father’s death, my mother, she—“ I tell her all the stupid, irrelevant things because she is so hot, she makes me nervous. “Anyway, sorry, you might not want to hear all that, I’m rambling,” I say, dying internally. I always talk too much.
“No, no,” she says. “It’s quite illuminating,” she adds, and before I can do anything else, she grabs my hand and something pinches me.
What the hell?
I look at it in horror, look at her, but my eyes unfocus, and everything goes pitch black.
When I become conscious again,I first hear voices, and then realise the pain in my shoulders and wrists.
My eyes fly open as I remember what happened. That woman. She?—
My eyes dart up and around, but I cannot see a single thing. I am in complete darkness. I can only feel. I am fixed with what sounds like chains, somewhere above me. Panic surges through me immediately.
The room or whatever it is where I am, the entire world, the space around me zooms in on me and my heart races. My limbs get cold while sweat pearls run down my temples.
I can’t move.
I can’t breathe.
I can’t?—
My breath flattens.
Not enough air.
I hear screaming, and I am scared to the bone until I realise it is my own voice resounding painfully from the walls of the room I am in into my ears.
I scream more.
I am screaming out in fear.
In helplessness.
Someone must hear.
But nothing happens.
I am just hanging there, the chains digging into my wrists like knives.
Pain.
Somehow, focusing on the pain helps me control my fear.
Focus on the pain.
More pain in my shoulders.
Maybe if I stretch myself?—
My toes can reach the ground, but it hurts so much.
Everything hurts.