#hslq

RIVERWAKE : chapter 01 : sleepless : page 8

and we finally make it to the chapter page!! yee haw!! in the background we have pictured Copper Falls HS, which definitely doesn’t look almost exactly like my old highschool.

(Hmm.... these taste kinda stale. 

What’s the date on ‘em....? Ah well, maybe I’ll just eat some of Hewitt’s too later. 

....wonder if he’d notice if I - )

( okay, cool. what are the odds that you’ve missed the last bus again? it should’ve been by ten minutes ago...

- but oddly enough, it doesn’t connect. 

The grip is back on your arm, now, holding your form above the concrete by inches. So caught off-guard by this - this motion of being jerked back from an impact you were bracing for, and your glasses have definitely slipped off ahead of you, and you absently grab them with your free hand - it almost shakes you out of realizing that there’s still someone touching you, their fingers tight and strong on your shoulder. 

Almost. The grip is like lightning tingling on your arm, on your scars, and as the person pulls you back upright, you find yourself ripping it out of their protective grasp, turning your back in perhaps a sad attempt to save some sort of face. Trembling hands do their best to replace your glasses on your face, but your movement is difficult, clumsy and holding your spectacles like they were an earthquake. 

It does suddenly become apparent to you, though, that the person behind you is speaking -

“Ah, sorry there!!”

- and it drives your thoughts out, suddenly, the voice you hear. 

Where before your own thoughts, they had been swarming continuously like a thousand corpse flies, like a thousand maggots to consume your charred husk, suddenly - there’s just this voice speaking now, not your own, and it’s - 

“I, are ya gonna be okay there? “

It’s suddenly as if the panic from the car’s long screech had never existed, and a new sort of feeling (very similar) was enveloping you whole, a sensation you had never experienced before. (Or maybe had, once, but the memory had faded, because it was-) You became painfully aware of your position, of your being, of your sweat and tear-stained face and disheveled appearance, and that your back was turned to this person who had stopped your fall. (-a borrowed memory, a moment that had not taken place for you but it had taken place for you, but -) 

And their voice continued, a lilt with eagerness in every word, even as you could tell they were doing their best attempt at cautious, god could you tell they were trying but it wasn’t in their nature initially, but they were trying and could learn, you knew this, you knew:

“It’s, ah, it’s gonna be okay! I don’t know what’s gotcha but, uh....”

You want to cry. You want to laugh. Your voice comes out, bypassing your brain first: “I’m fine”, you croak in an embarassing tone that sounds exactly like a lie, and the person lets out a small laugh that betrays that they believe it to be so as well. Your glasses have finally made it onto your face, though, and it occurs to you that you should probably turn around, to face this person. Even though your feet feel suddenly like they weigh ten times more and made of stone - you take two steps, one to the side and one to the side and then you’re facing this person, who stopped you from falling. 

He, you think somewhat hysterically - his laugh is still on his face, in his eyes and mouth. He has a lit cigarette in his one hand, and the other - the one he had grabbed you with -  is behind his own head, a sheepish gesture as he rubs it. “Ya sure?” he says back to you, eyes fixed on your pitiful form with doubt, but not harsh doubt - concern, you realize, a foreign sensation still to be on the receiving end of, even after years of it.

 He continues: “I’m, ah, I’m sorry if I scared ya there... ya looked like ya were, uh, freakin’ out, ‘n I didn’t want ‘cha ta get hurt or nuffin’!” (A drastic understatement.) He gestures with his left hand, the smoke flittin through the night air. “Ya sure ya alright? Do ya need me ta, I’unno, call a doctah f’ya?” 

No, you respond quietly. No, you don’t need a doctor. 

He smiles more, sheepish and clearly confused. “Ya sure?” he says. 

You became aware only on the periphery of your conscious that someone was next to you, trying to - what? You couldn’t hear them, couldn’t hear anything but that screech of tire that had surely ceased in reality but was echoing around your head now, a remix almost seven years later - the nausea was held back by a thread now, and it was taking all your willpower to avoid making a disastrous scene here at the Truff-Fuel. Sensing your knees being about to give out, though, you lean against the glass-paned wall behind you, the cool of the interior seeping through your shirt and doing a bit to try to draw you back in.

Breathe, Lowan. Breathe! Breathe. What did Dr. Mishna say to do in this case? What did she say?!

Are ya okay? Breathe. Breathe. Where are you? Ground yourself. Reality check. Mom’s not here, she’s been not here for a long time. Are ya hurt?! You’re not hurt. You’re physically - you’re stable, you’re fine, you’re 100% not on fire. Feel the glass behind you - it’s cold, it’s hard, it’s not water - hey, hey! - it’s, the ground below is solid, you’re not there, you’re not there. You’re in reality.

Closing your eyes tightly, you do your best to slow down your breathing - and then realize that you hadn’t been breathing, and no wonder everything felt like it was spinning - so you do your best to resume it. Slow and steady, through your clenched teeth, hissing like a popped balloon as your attempts to return to the present begin to take hold.

You’re not on fire, you’re not at the river, you’re not even being - wait - 

Someone- 

 is touching -

your arm -

You’re aware of an embarrassing yelp escaping your lips as you find yourself flung away, watching almost as a spectator as your ebbing fear rushes back to claim you in its tide. With a surge of terrific energy you stumble away blindly, and before you know what’s happened to cause it (the stinging in your foot being a solid but unreachable clue), you see the concrete of the sidewalk - rising up to meet you - 

All things considered, you should’ve been proud of yourself; aided by a combination of stable predictability and a strong cocktail of medication, you hadn’t had a severe panic attack in a few months time! Before right now, at least.

It was a sensation that was all-too familiar to you, though, as the old invisible hand of your anxiety took its heavy grip upon your chest and seemingly squeezed all the viable air out of your lungs in one swift second of sheer overwhelming terror. The screeching of tires close by cut through your being like a hot knife, burning and burning and burning, and severed the tether of yourself in a way that had thankfully become a touch more unfamiliar than when you were younger. 

You pitched forward, covering your mouth with your hand, as your panic went down the list: sudden shaking, check. Sweating, check. Vision blurring, check. Nausea? Oh boy, check - you struggled to swim through the panic with your logic, with what Dr. Mishna and you had been practicing for the past year, but it wasn’t coming to you quick enough it felt like, couldn’t be summoned now that you were in the thick of it, being pulled under by it, and drowning, drowning, drowning - 

You were 100% unconditionally about to die right here, right now. About to drown to death, and burn to death, and drown and burn and drown and burn. And she was about to die too. Right infront of you, once again. Once again. Once again-

RIVERWAKE : chapter 01 : sleepless : page 6 

a gloomy night...