“What the hell?”
The car felt warm. Why? There was cool air blowing from the vent, but I was still uncomfortably hot.
And then I noticed it. The heat was coming from the damn box. My eyes darted from the nearly invisible road to the box. I swear it was glowing, like it had a heat lamp inside it, and someone had just flipped on its switch.
I tore my eyes from the box and back to the—
“Oh, God!” Suddenly there was no road! I could feel the tires crunch in the shoulder gravel and, too quickly, I yanked the wheel to the left. My overcompensation began a spin and I tried desperately to correct back to the right. No good. The wind and rain completely disoriented me. I struggled, just trying to keep the wheel straight; my heart fell into my stomach as the spin carried me across the road, tires screeching. And then the world turned upside down.
At the same time I felt a slice of pain shoot through the side of my head, I realized that I smelled smoke. My eyes must have been closed, because I wrenched them open and it was like I was trapped in the middle of the sun. The pot had burst from its box. It was a ball of heat and light hurling, slow motion, in my direction. Time stalled and I seemed to be suspended on the outskirts of hell. Staring at the luminous globe, I got a bizarre glimpse of myself, like I was looking into a rippled pool of water that had been set afire, but was still able to show a ref lection. My mirror image was rushing forward, naked, with arms outstretched and head flung back like a glorious pagan dancer being submerged into the fiery ball. Then fire and smoke enveloped me, too, and I knew I was going to die. My last thought wasn’t a flashback of my life, or regret about leaving friends and family. It was simply, “Damnit, I should have quit cussing. What if God really is a Baptist?”
1
Consciousness didn’t return easily; it was an elusive thing. It felt like a dream, like the kind of dream I have had during an especially yucky period, complete with awful cramps. In my dream I change the cramps to weird, sugar-laced labor pains and then I give birth to a Twinkie, which somehow makes me feel better. I know. I’m Freud’s wet dream.
My head hurt. A lot. Worse than a sinus headache, even worse than an I-can’t-believe-I-drank-all-that-tequila hangover. And my body felt like—no, I couldn’t feel my body at all. Couldn’t open my eyes. Oh, yeah, I’m dead. No wonder I felt…
Blackness closed softly, like a friend.
The next time I woke, my head still hurt—a lot. And I was sorry to realize that I now felt my body. Every joint ached, like the flu from hell. Oh, God, maybe this was hell (if someone started yelling math problems at me, I was in hell for sure). But I couldn’t hear anything except a strange ringing that seemed to be inside my ears. I tried to open my eyes, but they wouldn’t obey. That was probably because corpses don’t have functioning eyelids. If it wasn’t for the fact that I was dead, I think my heart would have pounded out of my chest. Can corpses panic? Obviously, yes…this time blackness wasn’t friendly, it was seductive, and I willingly spiraled into its waiting arms.
“Be still, my Lady, all will be well.”
The voice was sweet and familiar, but it had a funny lilt to it that I didn’t recognize. My head was heavy, hot and sore. My body felt beat up. Something that lay on my head focused my disjointed attention to a sudden wet coolness. I touched a thick compress, but someone gently brushed my hand away.
“All is well, my Lady. I am here.” Again, that elusive familiarity.
“Wha—” God, my throat was raw and still on fire. Fire! Memory hurled back, bringing fear and panic. This time when I told my eyes to open they obeyed. Kind of. I tried to concentrate on seeing, but images and lights blurred together into confusion. The large blur sitting next to me moved, and my eyes began to focus on—
Thank God, it was Suzanna. If she was here then I couldn’t be dead, and maybe everything would be all right. I tried to maintain my focus on her as the room pitched and I struggled to blink my vision clear. She was already holding one of my hands, but, strangely, she tried to pull away as she saw my eyes open. I just grabbed on all the harder. It seemed she went pale, but it also seemed like there were four of her, then two of her, then four again as my vision wavered.
“My Lady, you must lie still. You have been through much tonight, your body and soul are in need of rest. Do not worry, you are safe and all is well.”
I tried to say, what the hell is wrong with you, but the sound my throat made was like a whispering snake—or one of those horrible opossums caught in headlights. (No, they don’t just play dead, they hiss and scare the crap out of unsuspecting women who have stopped the car on a dark country road just because they’re looking for some privacy so they can pee, jeesh.) Anyway, I couldn’t understand me, so I knew Suzanna couldn’t, either.
She pulled her hand loose from mine and someone I couldn’t focus on handed her a goblet. Goblet? A golden goblet? In a hospital?
“Drink, my Lady. It will soothe your throat and help you to rest.” Her gentle hand lifted my head and she held the cup to my lips as I tried to gag down the sweet, thick liquid.
Lifting my head had set off waves of renewed pain in my temples. Before the world went black again, I tried to stay focused on my friend. She was taking the cloth off my head and exchanging it for a new, cool bandage handed to her by an incredibly young nurse wearing an odd, flowing uniform. The “nurse” looked like she was ready to frolic in the meadow, not go to work in the E.R., or ICU, or…
Blackness was tinged with the sweet, cough-syrupy taste of medicine.
The next time the blackness lifted suddenly. It was not a gentle awakening. Oh, no, I was going to—
“Here, my Lady. Let me aid you.” Suzanna supported my back and held my hair out of the way as I puked my guts up over the side of the bed (she really is a good best girlfriend—I’m sorry I called her stuck-up before). When I finished barfing up my innards, she guided me back to my pillow and wiped my face clean.
I seriously hate puking. Always have. It makes me shake and feel out of control. I’m glad I don’t do it very often, but when I do, I admit I’m a baby about it. So, true to form, I couldn’t stop shaking. I was weak and disoriented, but I thought that might have been because I was dead, not just because of the puking.
“Wa…wa…ter.” I managed to get an understandable squeak out of my throat, and Suzanna immediately motioned to a waiting nurse, and another goblet appeared. She held it for me and helped me to drink.
“Uuuckk!” I spewed most of it out—it wasn’t water, it was weak wine. Now, I adore wine, but not after puking.
“Suz! Wa…t…er.” I gave her the girlfriend, I’m gonna kill you look as I tried to get my point across.
“Yes, my Lady!” She paled again and turned to the nurse, handing her the goblet. (What kind of hospital was this, anyway?) “Bring Lady Rhiannon water immediately!” The nymphlike nurse rushed away. Suzanna turned back to me, but she wouldn’t meet my eyes. “Forgive me, my Lady. I misunderstood. Blame me, not the maiden.” She folded her hands together over her breast, like she was praying or something, and bowed her head, still not meeting my eyes.
Okay, what the hell was going on? I caught hold of one of her hands and tugged, trying to get her to look at me. And then I noticed her hair. It was her normal color—blondish, with pretty, natural highlights—but it had become
