shock

g | no warnings apply

Memory is a weird thing.

She could recall that exact moment perfectly. Feelings and images. The force against her skin. Brightness. And then darkness when her eyelids fell, trying to protect her vision. Warmth. Incredible warmth. Like falling into the sun. Shards of... things. Sharp. Blood. She could smell her own blood. Sounds. Loud, unfamiliar sounds. She knew that she threw up her hands, or maybe the blast threw up her hands for her. Her feet were kicked out from under her. And then she was falling. It was almost like flying for a moment. The ground was cold. And sharp.

After that is when everything gets disjointed.

Greg.

She didn't know if he was alive until someone told her that the paramedics found a pulse.

For a while, though, she hadn't known. His body on the floor, battered and bruised, possibly lifeless. She tried to get up. She sent the requisite orders to her legs, her hands, her arms. Nothing happened. Time wasn't passing, or maybe it was, she didn't really know. It seemed like nothing was happening. It seemed like she could have stood up, right then, and viewed that single frozen second of existence, completely separate and apart from it.

She wasn't really sure how she had gotten outside. Someone had helped her. A woman. She knew that much. Feminine hands and a feminine voice. She had said something to her, about Greg. But those words were lost.

She had been shaking. Someone told her she was in shock. Someone said they were going to get a blanket, but they never came back. She hadn't noticed or cared at that time. The only thing she had cared about was the fact that she was Sara Sidle and she was alive. And Greg Sanders was not here and maybe he wasn't.

There had been pain, but pain was good. Pain meant you were alive. Each little twinge and ache and sting was a confirmation that there was indeed life left in this fragile frame. It meant that something was wrong, but she was alive and thus able to notice that something was wrong. The dead don't hurt.

So pain was good.

No one had really paid attention to her. She was breathing, after all, and sitting upright under her own power. Eventually someone came over to look at her, and that was when she learned the paramedics found a pulse.

Pulse was good.

That person said something about a hospital, but she wasn't sure if he had been asking her if she needed to go or telling her that was where Greg was going. Then that person went away, and she couldn't remember who it was.

Time had passed. And she had been the one motionless, while the world sped past her. People were walking and talking and sirens were blaring and there was this odd smell in the air that she hadn't smelled since high school chemistry, when Ricky Blankenship had knocked over a Bunsen burner. The sirens came then, too, as they had all stood outside, sweating in the ninety degree heat as the firemen poured into the building.

No one had really paid attention to her.

No, that's not true. He did.

He had been there. He appeared out of nowhere. He had been looking at her and touching her. He had spoken and she had spoken. And at some point, he was gone and she was being treated by a paramedic.

The stitches hurt, but pain was good.

She hadn't really heard him. Her brain had logged the word, however, and brought it back later, when the pain was lessened and the sounds and smells and sights of the explosion were gone. After she had put herself on the line and won a small victory, a small concession, the acknowledgement that something did indeed exist.

She tossed the take out container in the trash and walked over to her bookcase. Her fingers slid over each the spines until they stopped on a thick red one. Not really knowing why, she pulled it out and flipped through the pages, stopping when she found the one she didn't even know she was looking for.

hon●ey, n. pl. hon●eys, adj., v., hon●eyed or hon●ied, hon●ey●ing - n. 1. a sweet viscid fluid produced by bees from the nectar collected from flowers and stored in nest or hive as food. 2. this substance as used in cooking or as a spread or sweetener. 3. the nectar of flowers. 4. any of various similarly sweet viscid products produced by insects or in other ways. 5. something sweet, delicious, or delightful: the honey of flattery. 6. Informal. a. sweetheart; darling. b. (sometimes cap.) an affectionate or familiar term of address (sometimes offensive when used to strangers, subordinates, etc.).

There were more, but she stopped reading. She closed the dictionary and fitted it neatly back into its spot, next to her thesaurus. She located another book and sat back down, on her couch, where she had eaten her dinner. Alone.

Pain wasn't always good.

(fin.)