Challenge 10- Heartbeat
Characters: Danny Fenton/Phantom
Summary: Some insight on a sleepless night
I should be asleep.
This is the first night in a long time that I've had a peaceful night without having to get up to fight. I should be savoring this peaceful night with some much-needed sleep.
But, Fate is cruel in denying me sleep: I'm not tired.
I'm lying wide awake in my bed, trying desperately to fall asleep. I've got one hand behind my head, the other by my side.
After the third sigh in the last five minutes, I move my hand on top of my chest, by my heart. I feel it beating under my hand for a minute, savoring the proof that I'm alive.
But…sometimes that's not the case.
I wonder if people realize when they see the ghost-boy flying around town, that he's dead. Or maybe I look human enough that the thought never crosses their minds.
They say you never really appreciate something until you lose it. Well, I can certainly understand that.
My friends know that I'm half-ghost, but I wonder if they understand the magnitude of that…that I'm half-dead.
I wonder what they think when they see that cold doesn't bother me anymore. When I tell them I don't need to breathe underwater…that I can speak underwater…
…when I tell them that when I change…
…I have no heartbeat.
You would not believe how panicked I was when I first realized this.
I'd been resting in a tree one day in ghost form when I'd placed my hand over my chest…and felt nothing underneath it. I checked my wrist and neck for a pulse…and found none. I realized then that I wasn't breathing, until I forced myself to breathe consciously.
I changed back quickly and then, that's when I finally noticed my heart start beating again and the air going in and out of my lungs without my needing to focus on it.
I was so relieved, yet so freaked out. I think that's when I felt that I finally understood the magnitude of what happened that day I turned on the portal:
Being half-ghost means being half-dead.
Gradually, I got used to changing again without stopping to feel for my heart.
I've accepted it, but I'll always appreciate my heartbeat under my hand when I'm human.
It's a reminder that I'm still tied to this Earth…that I'm still alive, for the most part.
…now if only I could get to sleep…
Wow, this is probably the shortest story I've done so far. Oh, well. I came up with this while trying to fall asleep myself. The idea wouldn't leave my head until I wrote it. Once I did, I was able to fall asleep a little faster.