I’m in a hospital room. An ER cubicle, to be more precise.
The snot left behind by crying won’t even let me smell the mix of disinfectant, despair, and simulated humanity that usually lingers here.
I don’t really know what I’m doing here. Or what I’ve got.
You know that feeling you get with sleep paralysis? When a demon sits on your chest? That one.
The one that makes your brain fizz. And your skull, from the inside. The one that hangs around for a few seconds when sleep sets in and the background TV suddenly changes volume.
My mother named it “sweetness” when I tried to explain it to her.
I’ve carried that sweetness behind my eyes for days. Just a flicker, but it’s there. While I’m awake.
Today it wasn’t just a flicker. Today it came with dizziness and weakness. Numb limbs. Palpitations. Sheer terror.
Side effects? A heart attack? A stroke? I don’t know yet. Soon they’ll do the ECG, the urine and blood tests. Maybe more. Maybe another medication change; a new cocktail — no alcohol, but plenty of the don’t-think-too-much kind.
I’m writing this with the IV line dangling. Still in a cubicle, number 6. Still alive enough to know that, really, there are very few things that matter. But, terrified, puking and crying from a wheelchair, I said every name I need in my life.
And I said one more sentence: I don’t want to die.
I suppose that’s a step.
PS:
I translated this from my parents‘ home. I’m here at last. I didn’t want to come here. But I’m safe, I think. Who knows?
They don’t know what was wrong with me today. We’ll see.
But I’m alive. So I write.