Strange Places

Laying in bed, I jumped awake. A pair of eyes staring at me. It was so dark in the room that seeing who these people were was not possible. I’m not even sure how they could see me in this darkness. They seemed to be focused on something else now. Thankfully, that something was no longer me. The door swung open, and light violently spilled into the desolate room. For a moment, I thought the brightness would allow me to see these strange and unfamiliar faces, but it only made it worse. I made the executive decision just to wait patiently until my eyes adjusted to the darkness that swallowed this room. I was expecting to see the concerned faces of my family members surrounding me, but in return, I found my room to be filled with sophisticated men and women in long white lab coats. There was a collection of wires that were covering every blank part of my body. I looked around and noticed that all of the doctors were on the opposite side of my room. The room was still a milky black due to the lack of civilization. For some reason, I was confident that they could not see me. I began to tug and pull at the wires that seemed to overpower my body. I needed to be prepared to run if I so had the chance. I had only removed two of what seemed to be hundreds of wires within five minutes. I decided to attempt the task of removing the IV that had been anchored in the middle of my forearm. I began to tug on the IV when a horrid screech came from the machines that seemed to surround me. I didn’t need the lights to know that all of the doctors had now focused their attention towards me.

I heard the shuffle of hard-bottomed shoes on the frigid tile. I suddenly felt a strong grip on my arm and the stick of my IV returning into my arm. I waited for the lights to turn on and to see more than the silhouette of these odd people. But instead, I felt a strong pressure on the spot that my iV had occupied. A moment later, everything seemed light, including me. Within seconds, light spilled into the small white room, and the doctor’s faces were revealed. No one looked familiar in any way. I was frozen in my bed, unable to speak. I looked ahead to see the same cold stares looking back at me. The only

words I could mutter were “What’s happening to me?”.

There were no responses. I only received cold and blank stares. One woman flashed me a wicked smile and she pivoted towards the door. Everyone seemed to follow her demanding lead. I thought to myself, “She must be in a powerful position”. Her clipboard had to have been a few inches thick with solely loose leaf paper. The thoughts began to race through my mind. They couldn’t all be about me, could they? The only thing that I think of that would be in my files was the time that had strep throat at age 12. They had prescribed me medicine for a week, but that week seemed to drag on a little longer than the rest. I remember thinking that I was much more mature than the average 12-year-old. But when it came to the taste of artificial orange, all bets were off. I stared at the white liquid for what seemed like an eternity. I decided to go for it. I mean, how bad could it be? I tried to throw back the small drink in a way that resembled how my father drank fireball. The medicine lasted in my mouth for about 5 seconds until I felt the chalky consistency slide down my throat. The liquid came up as quickly as it had gone down. I had always thought that would be the most distress that I would ever endure. Clearly my ideas were off. I was connected to this bed by IVs that were embedded so deeply in my arm; I was sure they would never leave. I was more than sure that I was the focus of over a dozen cameras all at one time. At that moment, I knew that there was not much that I could realistically do. I pondered options inside of my head. I could try to see how far I could run without triggering a high-tech alarm of some sort. I knew that if I did so, it would most likely alert every section of this ”hospital”. For all I knew I could be in a basement at this moment. I had seen this kind of thing on TV before. I never thought that I could be that person.