Coming back to consciousness isn't like what the movies told me it would be.
It isn't like swimming to a surface
or a blurry face slowly becoming clearer while it calls my name over and over.
It's more like booting my computer when I first get in
I kind of fumble my coat off while nudging my mouse around switching things on,
one by one:
Sense of smell; sense of taste; touch; sight
I only know it's back 'cause I see a single red light pushing through the crack of the cusion in the floor
I know that's where I'm at 'cause the carpet's sticking to my forehead so I can't roll my face to one side.
I wanna see if my other eye works
try to jerk my head back all I see is fireworks
horrified to hear a patch of skin rip above my eye
Got my hand free but all I see is blood with the right side
I'm not afraid of small spaces
which is lucky because I've spent many a morning like this under my desk
just so I don't have to make small
talk with Jeff.
It's weird - never in my life did I call for my arms and get no answer.
It's something I really took for granted - the obedience of limbs.
And as I, uh, try to summon my left arm
I realize I've been given command of a machine I've never bothered to understand
I couldn't even comprehend what made it go.
Story of my life!
Me on the side of the road, late for work, smoking hood.
Dry clicking sound with only one option left:
Wait and turn the key again in ten minutes.
Make up my own science and put all my faith in it.
And just like that
my eye starts cutting out shapes from the dark;
I start to get the feeling in my left hand back
my left arm trapped under bags
I slowly work it free and they fall apart.
I smell fire, but I don't hear it
I'm still for a while, can't tell if it's far away or if I'm deaf.
I'm pushing at the seat cushion blockin my view, but it's too close to get leverage with just one arm left
I work my knees up to my chest
so relieved to see them function that I actually consider just sleeping for a bit.
But then I think about that little kid who hit his head and went to bed and just slept himself to death.
As if to agree
my hearing switched on in both ears
but slowly, as if the world's volume was getting turned up.
And just when I thought my ears would break again the volume leveled off at the sound of the world burning down
Now my senses are conspiring, my whole body sweats
I slip onto my stomach
slide my arm under my chest and use my knees to launch my back up against whatever's stacked up on top of me
break through the broken seats and look and check and finally see
This. This.
This isn't what survival is supposed to look like.
This. There's no justice to it, there's no humans, there's no windows, this isn't what living looks like!
This, this is like God took a blender shaped like a 747 and packed 200 people into it!
Emptied the contents of a travel store on top, lit it on fire and forgot to put the lid on when he pressed start!
Seeing this knocks the wind out of me.
I lean against what's left of my chair
search this mess for the emergency exit that's supposed to be there by the fax, but there's nothing.
And I'm pissed
'cause this time I actually listened to the emergency instructions.
I even read along in the guide
because I did that thing where you're getting on a plane and you decide you're clairvoyant
and you're sure this is the one that's gonna crash for real
but if you have to get stranded somewhere and repopulate,
there's this hot girl in HR that would probably be ideal
and if I was right about this one, then I'm psychic
ya' know, my ego is through the roof
If I ever get out of this alive I'm gonna cruise into the office like some bitch-ass Nostradamus,
Not getting on planes, trains, buses, bicycles.
Telling everyone they have 2 weeks to live
I finally catch my breath and try to stand up,
but the minute I'm almost upright both my feet roar and start to give
My right arm screams back, which is a relief, because I wasn't even sure that it was still there
I start to drag myself forward under a thick layer of smoky black stink of charred flesh and burning hair
There are no sirens, no talking, no outside at all!
I'm alone in a mass grave with no place to crawl and it all comes to a steep slope
A wall of suits and bad upholstery
There's no way over, nothing's where it's supposed to be!
The only way out might be buried behind there!
What's left to breathe tastes more like sand than like air
I can do this!
I can join this amoebic burning mass if I could just get through this day
I'd come out in business class and crawl away
Take the last gasp of air and dive into the passage where the fire hasn't hit,
hoping that I'll fit
Inching through a corpse head butting anything blocking me but I can't hold it anymore!
I look up to see.
The clock. It's 5 o clock.
It's 5 o clock.
Thank you Lord.
I can't take another minute of this place.
