the sun is coming up over the hill
WHO: The Narrator and Nina Sayers
WHERE: One of the bridges over the river.
WHEN: Wednesday, March 16th, evening.
WARNINGS: None? Or maybe these two are their own warning.
SUMMARY: A chance encounter.
FORMAT: Starting with paragraph.
When it comes time for his release, the doctors are practically begging him to go. With his pain-free bruises and treasured scars, he is the living disappointment to the very idea of a hospital. The early doctors of ancient Greece, Hippocrates, whatever, they had nothing on this. The doctors drop his paperwork on the bed. Clean pants. A shirt. Socks. You're all set, they say. You're free. When he doesn't move to get up, they wait until he does.
He doesn't want to leave. He wants to be a horizontal statue with his eyes fixated on inane courtroom dramas, women with sweeping blonde wigs crying over lovers whose bodies look cut out of cardboard, sports commentators with voices whose volume would never be appropriate for a polite indoor setting, such as a hospital. If he imagines hard enough, he can see himself in their worlds. Mowing their lawns. Drinking their coffee. Breathing their air.
Anything but superheroes, he thinks. Anything but superheroes.
"Do I have to go?" he asks, but he's already unrolling his socks.
He was in the hospital five days for internal bleeding he wouldn't have even recognized if Selina hadn't brought him in. Apparently, starting fights in a constant state of hatred while also being unable to feel pain does wonders for the human body. Next time, he'll need to take notes.
The day before the doctors kick him out, another hospital calls him, NOHoPE, a name that rolls off the tongue and mouths mine. NOHoPE, the place of no hope, tells him that his boss has disappeared, and maybe he'll be back in a few days or maybe he'll be back never. The Narrator says that's well and good, but can he have some sick days please, can't they understand how stressful is it to be the puppet of some chatty Nazi transplanted from alternate World War II or whatever, can't they leave him alone? NOW? And they hang up and he tries to decide if he's fired.
When he leaves he has no where to go except to Tyler. And Bellatrix.
Tyler has his mattress and Tyler makes him sleep on the couch. And he does sleep. Like a rock. Or a corpse. He ignores the Network because maybe that'll be an easier way to get back home. Everyone who stops posting is assumed to be disappeared. If enough people believe his absence, maybe they can send him soaring into oblivion.
Six days after his release, he goes to the river and watches down below from the pedestrian bridge. He takes out his communicator and imagines dropping it into the murky water. In his mind, it hits SMACK like a belly flop and then it shatters into a thousand million billion zillion pieces and all the superheroes go away and the sky opens up and he is normal and he is living his life again. He'd imagine himself going in after it, but it's Wednesday and he can't die. The metal will take the fall for him. Like a noble hero. It's dangling over the edge, held between his thumb and forefinger, oh no it's going down oh no do you have any last words, but he can't let it go. His muscles are stuck.
Today, he's a different kind of statue.
WHERE: One of the bridges over the river.
WHEN: Wednesday, March 16th, evening.
WARNINGS: None? Or maybe these two are their own warning.
SUMMARY: A chance encounter.
FORMAT: Starting with paragraph.
When it comes time for his release, the doctors are practically begging him to go. With his pain-free bruises and treasured scars, he is the living disappointment to the very idea of a hospital. The early doctors of ancient Greece, Hippocrates, whatever, they had nothing on this. The doctors drop his paperwork on the bed. Clean pants. A shirt. Socks. You're all set, they say. You're free. When he doesn't move to get up, they wait until he does.
He doesn't want to leave. He wants to be a horizontal statue with his eyes fixated on inane courtroom dramas, women with sweeping blonde wigs crying over lovers whose bodies look cut out of cardboard, sports commentators with voices whose volume would never be appropriate for a polite indoor setting, such as a hospital. If he imagines hard enough, he can see himself in their worlds. Mowing their lawns. Drinking their coffee. Breathing their air.
Anything but superheroes, he thinks. Anything but superheroes.
"Do I have to go?" he asks, but he's already unrolling his socks.
He was in the hospital five days for internal bleeding he wouldn't have even recognized if Selina hadn't brought him in. Apparently, starting fights in a constant state of hatred while also being unable to feel pain does wonders for the human body. Next time, he'll need to take notes.
The day before the doctors kick him out, another hospital calls him, NOHoPE, a name that rolls off the tongue and mouths mine. NOHoPE, the place of no hope, tells him that his boss has disappeared, and maybe he'll be back in a few days or maybe he'll be back never. The Narrator says that's well and good, but can he have some sick days please, can't they understand how stressful is it to be the puppet of some chatty Nazi transplanted from alternate World War II or whatever, can't they leave him alone? NOW? And they hang up and he tries to decide if he's fired.
When he leaves he has no where to go except to Tyler. And Bellatrix.
Tyler has his mattress and Tyler makes him sleep on the couch. And he does sleep. Like a rock. Or a corpse. He ignores the Network because maybe that'll be an easier way to get back home. Everyone who stops posting is assumed to be disappeared. If enough people believe his absence, maybe they can send him soaring into oblivion.
Six days after his release, he goes to the river and watches down below from the pedestrian bridge. He takes out his communicator and imagines dropping it into the murky water. In his mind, it hits SMACK like a belly flop and then it shatters into a thousand million billion zillion pieces and all the superheroes go away and the sky opens up and he is normal and he is living his life again. He'd imagine himself going in after it, but it's Wednesday and he can't die. The metal will take the fall for him. Like a noble hero. It's dangling over the edge, held between his thumb and forefinger, oh no it's going down oh no do you have any last words, but he can't let it go. His muscles are stuck.
Today, he's a different kind of statue.