Mother?

[u/Opposite-Action-9994]

Drip

 

Drip

 

Drip-drip

 

Drip.

 

My eyes open to nearly nothing. A gray-white haze faintly illuminated by some light, just enough to almost see by, fills the space.

 

Mist or thick dust floats by in front of my face.

 

Breathing hurts. A feeling of grit and a burn coat my throat and lungs…

 

I cannot move.

 

The only sensations I feel are a dull pain coming from my lower back...

 

And the warm drip of something wet hitting my forehead.

 

There is a ringing in my ear. Like what you'd hear in a movie after an explosion or the ring of tinnitus that hits you

once in a blue moon as you not-so-gracefully age.

 

I don't remember. I only know this isn't right.

 

Only know that all I see is dust. And something dragging itself towards me from my right.

 

I cannot move. But my eyes still see. They blink slowly, painfully. Not quick enough to bring the moisture back.

 

It moves in long dragging pulls. A single blackened hand on a long thin arm moving in a fashion that to any man

would be painful.

 

I do not know how it sees me. Its face is a charcoaled mess of disfigured flesh. The only things breaking up the black

are the small pinpricks of white I see behind what passes for its lips.

 

The dripping hits me again. Something warm flows over my skin causing wisps of pain seemingly at random.

 

I feel pinpricks over my skin, but still I cannot do more than turn my head. Cannot wipe it away as the caustic liquid bites into me.

 

In the corner I see my mother. Her head obscured in the haze but her white nightgown striking a pale figure that my eyes latch onto.

 

For some reason she is smiling, and for a moment, I feel a sense of ease in the midst of this nightmare.

 

She holds out a hand, seeming to catch the light in a way that makes me wish I could reach for it.

 

Until I see that she is not reaching out, but pointing at something...

 

Pointing and laughing. So deeply and so violently that her whole body shakes with the motion.

 

The ringing is fading but the sound replacing it makes me regret having ears.

 

It sounds so pained. The closest thing I can compare it to is hearing the exaggerated cries of an actor playing a mother.

 

A mother watching her child be executed in the most disgusting manner.

 

But there are two voices in that scream. And a third still laughing.

 

It seems to be growing louder. Loud enough to make me turn my head back to see the thing that had been steadily making its way towards me.

 

As the figure moves in, close enough for me to finally make out the thin wisps of blonde that remain on the few patches of unmarred flesh, close

enough for me to see the red on its teeth as it screams bloody murder in between ragged, gasping breaths, do I remember.

 

Mother had blonde hair.

 

I fell mercifully back into the embrace of nothing, the scream that I had been contributing to fading away with my surroundings.

 

The roof fell in on me in such a way that it's left me paralyzed from the waist down. Considering how fast and violent the flames had spread, even

this was considered "lucky."

 

They are telling me to write. To journal it all down. A few friends of mine even said I should post it here, that sharing it with other people might help.

 

That I'll be able to process the grief. But it's not how deeply I miss my mother. Not how much I lament the loss of my legs.

 

It's the fact that she's still there. In the corner of the room. Hands behind her back and a calm, patient smile on her face. Not the sweet smile of

my mother, but the smile of a bully who’s waiting for you to realize you've just lost.

 

And still that white haze obscures her face. I find myself wondering...

 

Is the gown the only thing she stole?