The Accident
She stared bleakly ahead at the whitewashed walls of the room, her eyes a complete blank. The only movement that came from her was the blinking of her eyes, the only sound heard was the sound of her breath, coming in infrequent intervals.
Numerous tubes were stuck to her body like vines, relentlessly strangling her, tying her, controlling her. Her grey-speckled hair was neatly tied up, not by herself but by a complete stranger for she had no limbs to speak of.
A nurse burst in suddenly, causing the doors of the hospital room to slam, the loud noise amplified by the silence. "Time for your medicine, Miss Tan!" the nurse announced, pouring a glass of water and holding out the artificially-coloured pills. It was a period before she glanced over and finally pushed her dry lips open silently, for she couldn't talk, not for the rest of her life. The nurse popped the pills into her mouth and tilted the glass, pouring the water into it before leaving.
She returned back to staring at the blank walls, which was exactly how her life was like now. A complete blank.
Flashes. Images rushed through her mind, and she watched the play with the role of the audience when she was the actress in the play herself.
Graduating out of university with a doctor's degree was the first big step towards her dream life. She had everything in her life mapped out, as though life was just a great big plan. While others were busy partying and dancing away at pubs at their graduation night, she was already working on her first proposal. Topping her peers every year granted her a job months before she graduated with a high pay and position. At that moment, her life was unraveling smoothly along, with the sun shining brightly on top and smiling.
She focused all her energies into work. Some may call her a workaholic, but she preferred to think herself as dedicated and commited. Day and night, she could often be seen typing frantically away at the computer or bent over thick piles of paper which would lead any normal person to sleep within seconds. Not her. She could read them for hours without stopping.
She rose swiftly up the ranks without surprise, everything as her life plan had targeted. Very soon she became the CEO of her company, with a six-figure salary, a 4-floor terrace and a rolls-royce black car all to herself. Her wardrobe consisted of only freshly-pressed grey suits, and her hair was never out of place. Every single day, her heels clicking away at the marble floors of her company building, she carried a leather briefcase and pressed the button for the highest floor of the building in her lift.
The road in front of her was so flat and smooth with no rock to block her at all. She marched forward on this road briskly on, her head angled up and her eyes only seeing the brilliant azure sky.
Then her road in just an instant not only had a rock on it, it buried her underneath a rock wall. The sky was no longer baby blue but rolling grey, the clouds rumbling with fuming thunder. Lighting shot through her world and shot through her.
Driving that sleek car with the spiffy suit of hers, she met up with an accident.
Something that was not mapped on her life plan.
Suddenly everything came crashing on her. When she opened her eyes bit by bit, revealing the dull grey ceiling as now, she knew that her road had led to a cliff where she was now hurling down a long drop.
It was as though her brain was filled with water. The cruel reality did not, could not hit her conscious mind. In her mind she was still going up the lift, getting out at the top floor and facing her office where a magnificient view awaited her.
She refused to believe that her plan for life had gone astray, that the plan was now crushed up, discarded in the dustbin.
Until one day, when the water in her brain finally cleared, something in her died.
It was as though she had never been in the play before. All the admiring glances when she strode past them on her way to the office were now gone, replaced by pitying ones. All the praises, all the help offered, all the compliments disappeared into nothingness. Without limbs, she could not possibly have done anything. Without a voice, she could not have protested on anything. The company was fast to appoint a new CEO without any regrets.
And now, lying at the hard bed, unable to do anything but stare, she wondered what she had worked so hard for, when all that she had done would just fade away, as though it was just a mere smudge on the paper.
She used to have the world in her hands. Now, she had only air.
0 flowers
0 Comments:
far and wee
you and i together mysteriously and always floating
Sunday, August 14
3:49 PM
