Karen felt something.
It was a weak fluttering under cool, clammy skin. Fast. Was that…her pulse?
Karen wasn’t sure, but her eyes seemed to be open. Through swirls of green mist, she thought she saw the fingers of one of her hands resting on the inside wrist of her other.
What was that rasping noise? Her breathing? Or the hypnotic green mist, which added to her dizziness and nausea. Still, weakly, her stomach also grumbled with hunger and she smelled something. French fries.
And ketchup? And something else, something metallic…
Her hand… Had the bleeding finally slowed?
Karen tried to flip her hand over to check, only to be met with waves of wooziness. She held her breath.
Silence. She was alone in the back of her storage unit with no phone. She opened her mouth and screamed for help but couldn’t even hear it herself.
Was it already too late? Even if the hand she was too weak to flip over had finally stopped bleeding?
A summer’s day…
Some green mist swirled around Karen’s face. Sunlight sparkled through it. Karen’s eyes closed. She saw a summer’s day with flowers starting to bloom as a man’s elegant voice spoke of “the darling buds of May.”
Light! The light became so bright, and Karen longed for it. She strained to reach it, to reach the sun, her feet seeming to leave the earth behind her.
“No, Karen, no!”
Frank’s voice pulled her back. Her eyes fluttered open. Two green mists seemed to be at war with each other. Karen struggled for breath.
French fries.
Karen’s fingers twitched. It seemed all she could do.
Ketchup.
Her stomach heaved with nausea, but then it grumbled. One green mist highlit…French fries! Ever so slowly, Karen slid her arm across the floor toward them.
