Death's Captive: Will she escape eternal confinement?

CHAPTER 8

Dr Matthews throws her soiled clothes into the collective linen basket then steps into a shower cubicle. I'm loitering as if I'm keeping a friend company. She's out of the shower in a few minutes, dries quickly and gets straight into fresh scrubs and a clean white coat then leaves the bathroom, no doubt heading back to the ER floor. She's thrown her towel over the wooden bench and left behind her toiletries bag in her rush to leave. I enjoy rifling through the possessions of the living, updating my small collection of pilfered items. I take a tiny bottle of shower gel then notice Matthews hasn't closed her locker properly. I help myself to a fresh pair of white knickers and watch them change to inky black as I drag them through the veil. I don't need to change my clothes, since I don't sweat, but I enjoy trying on different styles, especially as the fashions have changed so much over the decades, and besides, playing dress ups breaks up the monotony.

I don't need to shower either, but I like to. One thing I can remember is I used to love to take long hot showers in the winter when I was alive; I loved the feeling of being clean and smelling fresh. I can't feel the stream of water like before, and the water has to be scalding hot or I can't feel it on my skin, but I like to pretend. I don't bother to wash my hair. I've tried, but it only gets damp like when the clouds sprinkle water before it rains. It's kind of weird actually, like there's an invisible veil that only allows the smallest shimmer of reality to seep through.

I drop my black coat on the bathroom bench and step out of my dark jeans, then stand in front of the mirror and wipe away the stream. The palest of skin, toned curves and long dark brown hair, I pull my dark loose curls into a bun, remove my basic black underwear and step into the shower. I take a deep breath of steam and let my muscles relax. Bliss.

I kneel on the cubicle tiles and close my eyes. I smile at the thoughts that dance in my head, I'm not really here. I'm somewhere else, sitting on a porch, in a light blue cotton dress and smoking a cigarette, feeling the sun against my skin. I'm just happy. Nothing happens in this daydream; it's just nice to be somewhere else. Somewhere that isn't a hospital, forever waiting for a terrible TING! to go off in my head; making me bear witness to yet another death and then to make it worse, I watch them go off into a brilliant light while I stay right where I am. Forever trapped in a recurring loop that is my life, or death, or whatever this is.

I'm crying.

I open my eyes and wipe away a tear and decide I have to get out of here. Out of this hospital, whether it's through the invisible wall that separates me from reality, or through a portal into the afterlife. I can't go on living like this, every day exactly the same routine...