When I wake up, the headache isn't as bad, and it smells like hospital. But instead of scrambled, my brains feel like they've been stuffed with cotton -- it's a familiar feeling, and I know they must have put me back on the medication. They. Who is they?
My face hurts, and my hands are bruised, purple blooming like sick flowers in white earth. There's blood caked under my fingernails. What have I been doing?
I remember the subway, but nothing after that until now.
A man comes into the room, holding a clipboard. I don't trust him. "I'd like to ask you some questions, Miss Sinclair."
I nod.
He asks me my name, the current year, the name of the president. I answer correctly, a perfect score. Then he asks me how I came to be here; I tell him that I was in the subway and I fainted.
He tells me he'll send someone else in to talk to me, and leaves.
She's a young woman, pretty, maybe not more than twenty-five. "Do you remember what happened last night?" she asks.
"I was in the subway and I fainted," I say, no longer sure that it's the truth.
"Do you remember being in a fight?" she asks.
"No," I answer.
"Someone at the bar called 911 for you," she says. "You're a very lucky girl."
"I don't remember that," I say.
Her face is too familiar, and I remember where I know her from. She's one of them. They don't have a name. Just... them. Against us.
I jump her when she turns to leave. The adrenalin running in my system gives me the confidence to fight back when the doctor tries to restrain me. I thrash like a fish, trying to slip out of his grasp, and then he manages to get me on the floor, so I start biting at him when he reaches near my face -- oh God I don't want to die -- and then I realize it's not worth it anyway.
So I let the darkness in.