Broken Windows

The nightmare was already fading as I lifted my head from the pillow with a jolt. My eyes were wide, but there was nothing but dead blackness all around. Then I heard crickets chirruping in an insistent chorus outside my window. Logic took over. It was probably sometime past midnight; the birds usually started not long after. If my windows weren't broken, I probably would've seen a quicksilver moon shimmering among the stars.

A breeze slipped over my cheeks, making them cold. I wiped my eyes, feeling a bit ashamed. I never knew when I cried in my sleep these days, even though I was happy to be asleep after days of insomnia and fear. Too much time spent hating sleep, hating nightfall, because it meant another day was gone and I still wasn't better.

But over a month's worth of endless, hopeless hours had passed now, and the details of the accident were no longer so sharp. Now when everyone left me for their beds and I was alone with my thoughts, my brain tortured me with regrets and taunts and "what-ifs" only occasionally.

Now I liked the night. It made everything anonymous.

Invisible.

Equal.

I stared at the ceiling. I listened to the hum of the refrigerator down the hall, the hesitant muttering of the cracked watch on my headboard. Floorboards groaned. The neighbor’s air conditioner grunted. A car coughed somewhere in the distance.

I turned on my side and stared at the wall against which my bed was nestled. Water gurgled in the pipes behind it. When I was little, I used to follow its sound up and down the wall with a fat paintbrush dipped in water, tracing long shiny paths that would then become imaginary roads in a giant fantastical city. It never crossed my mind that a future me, a broken me, would ever think back to those days with longing.

I thought about the accident. I thought about the basketball games I’d never play again. The bike rides, snorkeling trips, video games. The hours of sketching outside by the tire swing. Tv. Art school.

All gone, swallowed in blackness.

***

The buzz of the alarm clock was unnecessary because even now, I still always woke up to the birds long before the clock. I could already feel the heat of the sun on my head; gonna be a hot one today. Face buried in my pillow, I fumbled along the headboard for the big snooze button. It made a satisfying chunk and the racket stopped.

I had once had a debate with my friends after an amputee talked to our class about the dangers of drunk driving. We disagreed on which was worse: being born with no legs, or losing them after the fact. I’d said it was worse after the fact. And now I know I was right.

Better to never have had than to have and lose. Better to imagine than to reminisce.

I sat up and took a deep breath. "Be thankful," I said out loud to the blackness. "At least you’re alive. Got all your fingers and toes. Could've been a lot worse."

My fingers slid along the edge of my bed until I felt the loop of my cane, already warm from the morning sunlight I knew was pouring into my room. Still had to get used to it, but that was ok. I had plenty of time to learn how to live without windows in my life anymore.

One of my random thought-scenarios fleshed out into a short story.
--V.Y.C.