Status: In progress
Broken
Prologue
I’m burning. I burn until I can’t feel anymore, and then I drift.
I notice the things that are missing first. I can still feel the burn of ice in my left hand, but when I try to curl my hand into a fist I find that the burning is all in my mind - there is no hand left to burn. No fingers, no hand, no wrist, just an absence that I can’t quite understand. My right hand burns less, and it is there, at least - if missing the smallest finger.
But it is my face that hurts the most - not the burning cold, but a bitter heartache. The first day they bring me a mirror, they tell me that I am not the same - as if I don’t already know that the cold burned who I used to be away. But when I see myself, I see a skull. My nose is half gone, like a stump of a long-burned candle. My ears are gone, my skin is like shiny wax. Am I dead? No, but I wish I was.
If I was dead, I wouldn’t hear the screaming. Mine, and his, with the fire and ice out of control around us. Turning on us and striking like a snake. Weakness in strength. I wouldn’t see his face as the flames licked over his skin, his hair crisping and skin blistering. I wouldn’t feel the breathlessness and the short, sharp shock as my blood freezes.
But my dreams never reach the end. Not here. I disappear into blackness that is as soothing as death, but not as permanent. I wake, to feel the burning, and to dream the screaming.
I recognise some of the faces. Faces that meant something to the girl who died. But she is dead, and feels nothing any more. Nothing but cold. They smile, they cry, they talk, they sit in silence unable to bear what I am. But I just watch them, my eyes as cold as the hand that I no longer have.
They tell me they love me. They tell me I’m needed. They tell me the happenings of the world. But they don’t understand - they are speaking to the gravestone of the girl they knew. I am just her skeleton.
They mention taking me home, to the place where the girl lived. But they decide it is not safe. I don’t tell them that I wouldn’t have gone. Instead, they take me to a place that is all white and glass, where a woman cooks and makes me eat, and I spend hours staring out of the windows over the green that isn’t right. The green disturbs me, and I scream louder when my eyes close. And surrounded by green, the dreams don’t fade to black. I am trapped until the end, and wake up in a sweat as cold as the ice.
Little things disturb me. The shadow of a bird flying past the window flits across the wall and I dive from my chair, brandishing my fork in my hand. A draft comes through the door and I spin, eyes wide and fearful. The woman asks me how I feel, and I squeeze my eyes closed, my hands over my ears, screaming to block out the thoughts that aren’t mine. They aren’t mine. They are hers.
I hear the woman talking one night as I lie in my nest of blankets. She is on the phone. She asks how I will ever be able to help. She asks if they should have let me die. I want to hear the answer, but there is only silence. Silence and then the resumption of topics that I have no care for. The dead girl would have cared, but I don’t. Any care I ever had was burned out of me by the ice. I catch one name, one that still has the power to touch my frozen heart. But he is dead, too, and I weep icy tears as I slowly fall back into the realm of nightmares.
I notice the things that are missing first. I can still feel the burn of ice in my left hand, but when I try to curl my hand into a fist I find that the burning is all in my mind - there is no hand left to burn. No fingers, no hand, no wrist, just an absence that I can’t quite understand. My right hand burns less, and it is there, at least - if missing the smallest finger.
But it is my face that hurts the most - not the burning cold, but a bitter heartache. The first day they bring me a mirror, they tell me that I am not the same - as if I don’t already know that the cold burned who I used to be away. But when I see myself, I see a skull. My nose is half gone, like a stump of a long-burned candle. My ears are gone, my skin is like shiny wax. Am I dead? No, but I wish I was.
If I was dead, I wouldn’t hear the screaming. Mine, and his, with the fire and ice out of control around us. Turning on us and striking like a snake. Weakness in strength. I wouldn’t see his face as the flames licked over his skin, his hair crisping and skin blistering. I wouldn’t feel the breathlessness and the short, sharp shock as my blood freezes.
But my dreams never reach the end. Not here. I disappear into blackness that is as soothing as death, but not as permanent. I wake, to feel the burning, and to dream the screaming.
I recognise some of the faces. Faces that meant something to the girl who died. But she is dead, and feels nothing any more. Nothing but cold. They smile, they cry, they talk, they sit in silence unable to bear what I am. But I just watch them, my eyes as cold as the hand that I no longer have.
They tell me they love me. They tell me I’m needed. They tell me the happenings of the world. But they don’t understand - they are speaking to the gravestone of the girl they knew. I am just her skeleton.
They mention taking me home, to the place where the girl lived. But they decide it is not safe. I don’t tell them that I wouldn’t have gone. Instead, they take me to a place that is all white and glass, where a woman cooks and makes me eat, and I spend hours staring out of the windows over the green that isn’t right. The green disturbs me, and I scream louder when my eyes close. And surrounded by green, the dreams don’t fade to black. I am trapped until the end, and wake up in a sweat as cold as the ice.
Little things disturb me. The shadow of a bird flying past the window flits across the wall and I dive from my chair, brandishing my fork in my hand. A draft comes through the door and I spin, eyes wide and fearful. The woman asks me how I feel, and I squeeze my eyes closed, my hands over my ears, screaming to block out the thoughts that aren’t mine. They aren’t mine. They are hers.
I hear the woman talking one night as I lie in my nest of blankets. She is on the phone. She asks how I will ever be able to help. She asks if they should have let me die. I want to hear the answer, but there is only silence. Silence and then the resumption of topics that I have no care for. The dead girl would have cared, but I don’t. Any care I ever had was burned out of me by the ice. I catch one name, one that still has the power to touch my frozen heart. But he is dead, too, and I weep icy tears as I slowly fall back into the realm of nightmares.