Body (deviation two)
2003, Summer
june
She drags her eyes open and blinks in the green-tinged light. Her cheek is against something uneven, and slightly sticky; it smells of nicotine and corn syrup and blood. She blinks, trying to make sense of the shapes above her -- dim green light pouring through a window just above her head. She is cramped, enclosed -- her knees up to her waist, a soft barrier against her back and another just in front of her. She moves, and the pain forces her to squint her eyes shut and draw her knees up even further. It radiates from her chest, deep inside, and spreads through her whole fire-wracked midsection; the menstrual cramp from hell. She pulls in a breath, harsh, ragged, desperate.
thinkthinkthinkSydneythink
She opens her eyes and does not move. The soft barriers, the smell, the rough sticky plastic against her cheek -- car. Car. Small car. Floorboard, backseat. She twists her head and lifts it, trying not to move her burning torso. Her head throbs, her vision clouds, she squeezes her eyes shut and waits for the dizziness to pass. She opens them again, her vision clear. The light floods in from the window above her; when she cranes her neck just a bit she can catch the edge of something bright, glowing green -- neon, perhaps?
Next task. She shuts her eyes tight, ignores the overwhelming pain, and works on sliding herself up onto the seat above her. She moves slowly, inch by agonizing inch, slowing but never stopping, never giving in. When she can relax her weight onto the seat, she breathes in deep gasps, eyes shutting out the light, and when she opens them again she does not know if time has passed. She can see now, letters refracting through the window above her, an upside down inscription lighting the sky with ghostly green.
Two ghastly green palm trees flash, jerking back and forth in a crude, spastic reconstruction of a breeze. Just below them, in warm yellow letters: VA A CY. And above it, glowing green:
Santa Barbara Motor-Inn
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