NaNoWriMo Novel: Except II

Writing’s actually going pretty well.  There’s so much to talk about that I’m not quite sure where to start or end.  Right now, I’m just trying to pen as many individual scenes are possible and worry about stringing them together later on.  I posted my first day of writings here.  A week in, here’s what I penned today:

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It was cold. Her toes felt exposed. She tried to shift under the stiff sheets, but her body felt heavy and cumbersome. When she attempted to lift her hands to rub her face, she felt her hand tethered to something next to her bed. She could hear her wheezing breaths. In and out. In and out. Lulled by the calmness around her, she allowed herself to go back to sleep.

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The door clicked open and shut. Instinctively, she tilted her head to follow the sound. Soft rubber shoes squeaked towards her in quick, purposeful steps. A cool hand reached over and touched her temple. She felt something plastic being adjusted near her throat. There’s a slight tug on her left hand, and a coolness spread through the top of her hand. All of a sudden, the room’s cold. Whoever was with her tucked in the blanket and spread another blanket over her, hands trembling while folding the blanket under her legs and feet. Maybe she was the one trembling. For some reason, she didn’t feel hungry, just empty. Shuddering, she turns her head to the right and rests on the firm pillow.

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“Baby? Mommy’s here. Can you hear me?”

Soft, warm hands cover hers. Her brain jerks to consciousness. The female voice coos only several feet from her face. She hears the screeching jerks as the metal chair was pulled closer to the bed. When she was fully awake, the coldness started to dawn on her again. For the first time since she felt this way, she tries to open her eyes. They wouldn’t budge. Her lids weighed heavy, and she could feel her eyeballs straining to force them up. She can’t remember the last thing that happened before she felt this way. Life seemed normal until. Until what? She wasn’t sure.

“My precious. You look so thin. If you can hear me, just tap your fingers okay. Your dad’s talking to the doctors and will be in here soon.”

There was a sort of forced strength in her mom’s voice. It was so low, she could barely hear. The chair lurched back a few inches, when her mom stood up to lean over her. As the mother kissed all over her face, she could feel and smell the wetness of salty tears. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

She tapped her fingers, which lay relaxed on the bed under her mother’s small, bony hands. She could feel the tautness of the skin, almost leathery but gentle. Again, she tried to open her eyes. She pushed and tugged at the lids until they finally opened. Slowly, she blinked. There was a lot of light in the room. At first she couldn’t make out anything but piercing whiteness. Blinking a few more times, her eyes started to dilate. Everything looked blurry, like a thick coat of fog had set over the room. To the left, she saw a dark blur. When the figure realized that her eyes were open, it moved closer to her, tilting back and forth looking for a sign of recognition.

“Hi, baby. How are you feeling?”

Her mouth opened, but no sounds came out. Instead she heard an ugly sort of gurgling and felt an extreme shock of pain emanate from her throat. Instinctively, she furrowed her brown and scrunched her face together in pain. She wanted to whimper but was afraid of causing even more pain.

“Hold on, baby. I’ll go get a nurse.”

Eyes closed again, she heard her mother dash out the room, the door closing shut with a soft click. If she could, she would sit up and scream. But she couldn’t move anything. Her whole body screamed in pain with her trapped inside it.

Finally, a cold gust of wind passed over her as the door opened. The rubber shoes were back.

“She tried to talk but only made this gurgling sound. Then, her face winced in pain. I… I don’t know what to do.”

“Calm down, ma’am. I’m just going to check that everything’s in place and that she’s all right. Then, I’m going to give her some morphine in the drip. Hopefully, that’ll calm her down.”

Cold hands passed through her forehead before quickly checking her palm and then her neck. A sticky tape was lifted from her throat, causing some of her skin to pull up. She realized that the plastic thing she felt before was actually in her throat. The hand adjusted the round plastic tube before replacing the tape on her neck. There was the ripping open of packaging. A quiet clang of glass that was placed onto a metal surface. The hands where doing something but she couldn’t tell what. Suddenly, she felt cold again. Her left hand throbbed. She tried to imagine what the likely female nurse looked like. Tried to determine her features only by the touch of the hands and sometimes and accidental brushing. Tried to think about anything to keep her feeling the pain. She’d open her eyes and attempt to squint out a silhouette, but her lids were heavy again and she couldn’t muster up the strength. The ear piecing pain started to subside. It was replaced by an euphoria and lightness. Her face relaxed. The last thing she heard was the nurse explaining to her mother that blood pressure was a good indicator of pain, so the monitor can help her gauge when to ask for more morphine.

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A man’s hands cupped her face. She jolts. She feels the hands let go and reach out to cup her left hand. Time didn’t play a role in her life at the moment. She can’t remember when it is or how long she’d been asleep. Her eyes were heavy and her hands felt swollen and raw. She couldn’t talk. She was truly trapped. There was only one thing left to do. He eyes fluttered inside the sockets, growing wet. The warm wetness bubbled out and rolled down the sides of her face into her hair. Someone to her right dabbed a soft tissue around her eyes. She could tell they were Puffs, soft and slightly greasy from the lotion.

“It’s okay, baby. Let it all out. It’s going to be okay.”

Her mom’s voice was cracking now. She felt lips on her left cheek and drops of warm liquid drip down from her mom’s face and down hers. Her mom held her like always, when she was crying after a fight or fit. She knew it was her dad sitting to her left now. He just sat there silently, firmly holding on to her hands and fitting her hand in his large palm as they did when walking outside. She especially remembers going to the Chinese grocery stores and holding his hand, even when she was 24.

“Mmmmgngmrnsrnmm…” She tried to say mommy, except her vocal chords wouldn’t listen. It didn’t hurt as much this time. She wasn’t sure if it was the emotion or the medicine or her body feeling better.

“Shhhh. Don’t say anything, sweetie. Your throat has to heal. Are you in pain?”

Mustering all her strength, she shook her head slowly and in a staccato from one side to the other. Her mom dabbed her face again. Her face started to relax.

“Sleep now. We’ll be here if you need anything.”

She squeezed her father’s hand, which shot a quick burst of pain down her arm, but she didn’t care. The scene was fading, and her consciousness floated away.