Cold Hands
Cold Hands
I stare into the white tiles of the ceiling above me, fading away quickly. White seeped into my consciousness as clouds, floating along gently over blue oceans and green continents. I remembered the glowing embers of the fire adorning the building so many of us were pulled out of. We never survived. We never breathed again. The survivors breathed through tubes snaked down their throats, bled with the liquid being fed to them through needles. We were not living, only breathing.
Soft, cold hands wrapped themselves around my own. The feel of the ice fingertips opened my eyes. I hadn’t seen a human being different than the doctors and nurses in months. I worshipped the feeling of flesh on flesh without the accompaniment of needles or unwanted words. I relished in the stare of their soft blue eyes, so familiar, yet so strange. My nervous system rushed every bit of blood through the IV and into my wild heart. My senses were wide awake to a feeling other than pain for the first time in what felt like centuries. I missed this, this flesh on flesh, bone on bone, this layerless touch that sent my five senses on a joyride. We were only holding hands, but there were no cold rubber gloves between the skin, no tight grip as they pushed another needle through my veins. There was nothing but skin on skin, flesh on flesh, bone on bone, every layer touching intermittently as my fingers were weaved through theirs.
Pink pale lips parted as a serene ocean was wrapped around me like a blanket, so soft and plush and warm. Warm like the sheets of a soft bed on a cold rainy day, where under the covers seems like the perfect place to be. Their eyes brought me in like a lover’s embrace, warm and still, with their sweet breath on the back of your neck. Those pale, pink, beautiful lips parted once more as they fell in place onto mine. Arms wrapped around necks and words were exchanged in low whispers, afraid to lose this moment by breaking the heavy comforting silence.
As the heart monitor settled into a long, slow, steady beep, I finally felt alive.
Soft, cold hands wrapped themselves around my own. The feel of the ice fingertips opened my eyes. I hadn’t seen a human being different than the doctors and nurses in months. I worshipped the feeling of flesh on flesh without the accompaniment of needles or unwanted words. I relished in the stare of their soft blue eyes, so familiar, yet so strange. My nervous system rushed every bit of blood through the IV and into my wild heart. My senses were wide awake to a feeling other than pain for the first time in what felt like centuries. I missed this, this flesh on flesh, bone on bone, this layerless touch that sent my five senses on a joyride. We were only holding hands, but there were no cold rubber gloves between the skin, no tight grip as they pushed another needle through my veins. There was nothing but skin on skin, flesh on flesh, bone on bone, every layer touching intermittently as my fingers were weaved through theirs.
Pink pale lips parted as a serene ocean was wrapped around me like a blanket, so soft and plush and warm. Warm like the sheets of a soft bed on a cold rainy day, where under the covers seems like the perfect place to be. Their eyes brought me in like a lover’s embrace, warm and still, with their sweet breath on the back of your neck. Those pale, pink, beautiful lips parted once more as they fell in place onto mine. Arms wrapped around necks and words were exchanged in low whispers, afraid to lose this moment by breaking the heavy comforting silence.
As the heart monitor settled into a long, slow, steady beep, I finally felt alive.