Flicker
993 Words
At first, everything was quiet.
Not peaceful — but heavy.
Like the world was holding its breath.
I drifted somewhere between dreams and death, weightless, untethered, not sure which side of the line I had landed on. I don't know how long I floated there — in that dark place beneath consciousness — but it felt like years. Or seconds. Or maybe it was both.
The first thing I noticed was the sound.
A soft, rhythmic beeping.
Not like a clock.
More like a countdown.
Like something keeping time with my heart, as if it wasn't sure I still had one.
I felt it before I understood it: the tightness in my chest, the ache in my arms, the dull sting beneath gauze I couldn't yet see. My mouth was dry, my throat raw. Every breath scraped against my lungs like it wasn't supposed to be there.
I opened my eyes.
The ceiling above me was too white. Too sterile. Too flat. There was no c***k to trace. No comfort in its blankness.
Hospital.
The word hit like a cold wave.
I blinked. The world trembled at the edges — like I was staring through water. Like everything around me wasn't quite real yet.
I tried to move, but I couldn't.
My body was heavy, bones full of cement.
There was something in my hand — an IV.
Tubes at my nose. Tape on my skin.
Machines murmuring around me, dispassionately keeping me alive.
My breath hitched.
I didn't understand. I didn't remember.
Or maybe I did — but only in flashes.
Blood.
Tile.
A blade in my fingers.
The green sweater.
The hum of my brother's voice.
A door breaking.
Then darkness.
Then this.
I must've made a sound — a small, broken cough, the first real thing I'd done in days — because suddenly, there was movement.
A chair scraped the floor. Someone stood. A gasp, half-caught in a throat.
"Lena?"
The voice cracked on my name like it had been waiting too long to say it.
I turned my head — painfully slow — and saw him.
My brother.
His face was tired, drawn. His beard was patchy, like he hadn't cared enough to shave. His eyes were rimmed in red. He looked older. Not by years, but by what he'd seen. What he'd almost lost.
He took a step toward me like I might disappear if he moved too quickly.
"Oh my God," he whispered. "You're awake."
I wanted to speak. I really did.
But my throat only gave a croak.
He reached for my hand — carefully, so gently. His warmth met my cold fingers, and it felt like the only real thing in the room.
Behind him, the door creaked open.
Two more figures stood just inside the frame, unmoving.
Mom.
Dad.
Mom's hand covered her mouth.
Dad's face was slack, shocked — like seeing me was both a miracle and a punishment.
I blinked at them.
I blinked at all of it.
And then the question rose up, heavy and slow and raw.
"...What happened?"
My voice was a rasp. A bruise given sound.
My brother's face collapsed. He sank into the chair beside me and lowered his forehead to my hand.
"You don't remember?"
His voice was wrecked. Like something burned down inside him.
I closed my eyes.
"I..." I struggled for the words. "I think I... tried to—"
I stopped. My mouth was shaking. The rest of the sentence was a razor I didn't want to pick up.
"...I don't remember why."
His shoulders shook.
I felt the tremble through the bed.
He didn't speak.
Because what could you say to that?
To your baby sister waking up and asking why she wanted to die?
I turned toward the window.
Gray sky.
Rain sliding down the glass like tears too tired to fall fast.
I wanted to sink back into the dark.
Into the soft place where nothing hurt and nothing mattered.
But my brother's grip on my hand was firm now. Steady. Like he knew.
Like he'd fought too hard to keep me here to let me slip away again.
The hours were stitched together with questions and clipped voices. Machines being checked. Nurses with soft smiles that didn't reach their eyes. My parents hovering like ghosts. Too afraid to get close. Too broken to back away.
They didn't say much.
But I saw it.
The guilt.
The grief.
The aching terror that even now — even breathing, even conscious — I still might vanish.
Mom cried quietly in the corner when she thought I was sleeping.
Dad stood in the hallway on the phone, arguing with someone about insurance and specialists and the word "watch list."
Everything blurred.
I was there, but I wasn't.
Like a camera stuck between frames.
Later that night, when the machines had quieted and the nurses had left, my brother pulled his chair close to the bed again.
He looked at me like I was both porcelain and dynamite.
"I flew in the second I got the call," he said. "Didn't even think. I just... ran."
I swallowed hard.
Tried not to cry.
"You shouldn't have had to."
He shook his head.
"You're my sister, Lena. There's nothing I should or shouldn't do. There's only you. And I'm not going anywhere."
His voice cracked, but he didn't look away.
"You scared the hell out of me."
I nodded. Slowly.
"I scared myself."
A silence settled between us. Heavy.
But not hopeless.
He squeezed my hand.
"You're not alone. Not anymore."
Later, when everyone was gone and the lights were dim, I lay in the hospital bed and stared at the ceiling again.
No cracks.
Just smooth, white silence.
I didn't feel okay.
I didn't feel safe.
But I was here.
And for the first time in a long time...
I wondered if maybe that meant something.
Even if I didn't know what it was yet.
- Writer
