наркотическая интоксикация

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All these days were a big blur to me. I know everything about drugs, I've had that monkey on my back for long enough to know it all.
What they gave me was not heroin, but some effects are similar. The numbness. But heroin, after all, was a great painkiller, and their drug is not. It works right the other way round. It is designed to bring pain, and it does that job really well.

I'm lying here, on the floor, where they left me. I guess they gave me too much. I'm crying. I tried to hide it, but I couldn't do it any longer. Screaming of pain was not possible, most of the times. I couldn't breathe well enough to have enough air to scream. But when the tears came, I didn't fight them any more, at one point.

I feel like a little child.
I'm lying here, crying. Like a child.

In the beginning, I was embarrassed, embarrassed that Audrey could see me that way.

What a stupid fear - she was a product of my mind! I don't have to be embarrassed, I don't have to hide how bad I feel, not from a ghost! Not from my own mind!
I guess I'm mixing up reality and my hallucinations again, especially the ones that concern her. Ever since the Chinese have started giving me drugs, the hallucinations got worse. She's here again, with me, all the time, in my mind. I can see her clearly, I can talk to her, in the moments when I'm back in my cell, I can even feel her touch me.

She's not real.
She is a product of my mind, caused by my solitude and the guilt that I'm still fighting. The drugs have only increased the intensity. How long will I still be able to part reality and imagination?

She runs her fingers over my skin, tenderly wiping away my tears that still embarrass me somehow. Why do you keep telling me that you're okay when you're not?, she's asking me. It's not an accusation. It's just a simple question and I don't have an answer. Why don't I want her to worry? Is it because I somehow believe that she's really here in this hellhole and I want to cheer her up and give her the feeling that we could make it out of here alive, the both of us?

I'm sorry, I answer, silently. It's hard to find any other words.

She cups my cheek with her hand and I feel her warm skin on my cold one. They are doing awful things to you, Jack, things you don't deserve.

I do, I tell her. Should I tell her everything? That I am glad that I can pay for my sins, to see her in heaven one day? I want to see you in heaven, Audrey. That's why I have to pay for my sins in this life.

She vehemently shakes her head. You see me now. Not then. You shouldn't suffer like this.

I do. I have to pay.

I see how she shakes her head. Is it my mind, subconsciously reminding me that I'm crazy, thinking that there is an afterlife after all? You don't have to pay. You did nothing wrong.

I killed people, Audrey. Many.

They deserved it.

Not all of them. She doesn't believe me. I have to make her believe, no matter how hard it is. So I add one name, telling her: Paul

She pulls back her hand at once.
Should I regret saying that name? Did I hurt her?

It's all just a blur, with the drugs that they've given me. I can see her face, three feet away. She pulls back from me. She pulled her hand back. I can no longer feel it.
Seeing her pull away from me is worse than the pain I feel. It is even worse than the guilt that I feel.

I have to pay, Audrey, I sigh, and as she pulls away, I feel lonelier than ever before.

She sits there, shaking her head.

Now I have the time to watch her. It's hard to move, but I try to reach out to touch her- I can't.
Finally I realize that there are metal bars, parting us. I must be in a cell.

I slip closer to the metal bars, but even when I stretch out my right arm, lying directly at the bars, I can't touch her. She's too far away.

Bringing my body there got me exhausted.
I keep lying there, fighting the with to close my eyes. Sometimes, back in my cell in Russia, I lost sight of her completely, after I closed my eyes. I have to keep them open. I don't want to lose her.

But after a few minutes, the exhaustion and the pain get the better of me. I can't stay awake for much longer. The've kept me on drugs for the past five days, a few hours in that room, with an IV bottle, and thereafter with some injections, back in my cell. I haven't really slept in all these days. I guess I was unconscious for a few hours, when it just got too much.

Right now, it's gonna happen again.
Fuck seeing Audrey. I can take no more. I hope that she'll get back to me in the future.
That's the worst thing: not knowing if I'll ever see her again.

I keep lying there, in the position I am. Moving back to the other side of the cell, where the blanket is, it too much of an effort.

Right as I'm falling asleep, I can feel something.
She took my hand.

I open up my eyes and then I see her. She came back over to me, holding my hand in hers.

I am too tired and too afraid to say anything, so I wait for her to begin.

You didn't do anything wrong, she says.

I did. I killed him. He didn't have to die, I answer.

You did what you thought was right.

I always did that. But I was wrong, so many times.

Slowly she seems to understand what is bothering me so much. I forgave you, long ago, she breathes.

I just smile as an answer. Her forgiving me, that doesn't make it better. God has to forgive me for the things I've done. My enemies have to forgive me, or, if they don't forgive me, they need to have the chance to take revenge.
She can't forgive me. She can't absolve me from my sins.

I love you, Audrey. It's all that I can say. I always did.

She presses my hand, tighter than before.

Don't leave me, I add, talking to the picture of hers, which is only an illusion.

She answers nothing. Of course she doesn't.

I savor the touch, it keeps me from slipping into unconsciousness.
My whole body still hurts like hell. I feel like burning and freezing at the same time. My muscles have been seized with convulsions so many times in the past hours and days that everything hurts. The last injection was two hours ago. I guess they'll come again in an hour, unless they let me sleep, this time.

You are suffering, because of me, Audrey finally tells me.

I rip my eyes open and look at her. No! I'm suffering because of her. I'm suffering to see her again, in heaven - she's my reason to stick it out!

You are, she finally sobs, but again, I'm trying to tell her that she's not right. Oh god, that twisted mind. Those twisted thoughts, complicated by drugs and hallucinations.

They do this to you because of me, I hear her say.

I try to shake me head. God, that makes me sick. I shouldn't move my head like that.

Finally, there's a light behind her. I've always seen her face against the darkness in the back, but now there's a light. It gets bigger. And then her face slips away again, away from me, into the light.

Her hand is no longer here to grab mine. Suddenly, she's gone.

The light disappears, she disappears, and back here is only the darkness, together with my pain.

But in the end, I can finally allow myself to let the unconsciousness take over. I can no longer fight it, anyway.

The last thing that I hear is a scream. I sounds like it's Audrey's.
It goes right through me, waking me up again.

I lie there, wide awake.

This all is an illusion, damnit, a hallucination caused by my brain and the drugs. She's not here. She's not the one who has screamed. It could have been anyone. Maybe there wasn't even a scream at all.

I'm starting to confuse reality and imagination.

She's not real, I tell myself, she's not real. she's not real. she's not real.

I treasured her, all the time. But my head is turning against me now. She's better off dead. I don't even want to think about her being here, in China, again, probably being tortured. That would be even worse than death.

I listen into the darkness, trying to listen out for another scream.

Of course, there is none.

She's not real, I tell myself again. I have to believe it.

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