©September 2002

Rationally, you know it's not dark. It's daytime, or so the clock says; ergo, it's light around you.

But inside, it feels dark. You feel dark.

Everything is black, thick, hanging heavy. Blackout curtains pulled closed around you, holding you in and everything else out. You can't see around it. You can't see, even with your eyes wide open. Nothing but darkness.

Except where it's tinged red, a violent, ragepainbloodhurt red.

The red echoes through you, throbs dully with each beat of your heart, each breath you take.

Your hand aches with it, each tiny bone from fingers to wrist sending off snaps and shifts of pain, clear lines of bright white, mingling with the red. But nothing breaks through the blackness, the darkness.

You hear them, the others around you; hear their words, the sounds of laughing, of crying, of talking. There's a low hum of song from somewhere, and the electronic noise of phones, computers, the microwave timer. All the sounds are high, though none so high as yours, and you miss the low, heavy rumble absent from you all right now.

There's too much noise in your head, too many sounds that don't mean anything, too much to sort out or sort through. Too much, period. Your head aches in time with your hand, a pounding, pulsating beat throbbing hotly, and there's that red again – sliding slick and thick over things, coating them, coating you.

If the darkness inside you were calming or soothing, you'd let yourself get lost in it. It's not, though. It's a violent, turbulent place, with those flashes of white and red, of rage and pain and loss, and you want to reach out, find an anchor, hang on until the darkness recedes. You want out. You're not sure how to find anything in the blackness, though, and you wish desperately for a little bit of light, for something to help you find your way.

"Chris? C'mere, man. Is it time for more pain stuff?" Warmth touches you, sparks a soft yellow that cuts through the black for a moment, enveloping you.

You're tugged over gently, and the warmth continues, stroking your head, gentle spikes easing through your hair. Fingers. Touching you. You breathe in deeply, slowly, some of the pulsing red and black fading in the wake of the touches. Some of the noise dimming with the same. You struggle with its loss at the same time you rejoice in it, making a soft noise that could be either contentment or complaint; you're not even sure which.

He shushes you. "You're fine. I have you. Relax."

Light streams in through a JC-shaped window, pushing the blackness away, soothing the red into softer tints.