Hall of Infinite Doors
You're not exactly captain of the wrestling team, but your overall good health and strenuous excercise program serves you well as you stride into the swarm of protesters. Some quietly address you, some more loudly, while the majority of them just watch as you step through them. You find in yourself a curious sense of pride, a self-satisfaction as more and more people notice you and where you're going, and crowd physically around you. Some physically block your path, others try to get your attention with little touches, but all of them are speaking, a confusing cacophony of mixed shouting and gentle reproach, mock care, worried glances and here and there a dark star of naked, unclouded hate. Still, you press further. You were always brave in the face of adversity, and you've already made up your mind.
It's still impossible to just walk through an angry mob, though. Soon people are all around you, pressed close, and you have to shoulder and shove your way through, gaining and losing ground almost in equal measure as you try to slowly ease yourself towards the clinic door. It seems the more progress you make the more difficult it is to progress further, until the crowd presses against you like a living wall, snapping at your posessions, pushing your body back, and always, always talking, shouting, cooing, cadjoling.
It isn't long before they begin throwing things. It starts with a crumpled wad of paper, then another, then more as the idea spreads through the crowd. People wad up pamphlets and signs and lob them in your general direction through the crowd. The people alternately surge forward and back as more and more things are lobbed: fruit skins, wooden pickets, a half-full bottle of red Gatorade that explodes stickily all over your left shoulder. A single boot bounces harshly off your arm; you try to move back, but the crowd is thicker behind you than in front, a single membrane, smiling, laughing, talking among themselves.
Someone begins throwing rocks. This idea becomes popular. Little pebbles off the street, nothing huge. One catches you in the scalp, and a warm red itch begins trailing over your face. A larger one smites you in the back of the knee, making your balance wobbly and sending unpleasant numb tingles up and down your leg. Worried, scared, anxious, you press more physicall forward, yelling at them to get out of your way, but now they're all around you again, tall and hot and STRONG, and your leg half-gives and makes you stumble, and then they're over you, too.
When you wake up, the first thing you see is the left end of a sleepy orange fluorescent light inset in a dimpled white ceiling. Something beeps nearby; you're laying inside something soft. You sit up, and find that doing so wakes up a riot of aches and pains in your back, hips and stomach. There is a dull, itchy burning in your abdomen, and your right leg is wadded up in a restraining, tense flesh-colored bandage. A hospital.
People have been literally crushed in the front-row press of concerts. People have been knocked down and trampled to death in the first rush of heavy shopping days. Crowds aren't just large, loud, hot and sticky. They're dangerous, dangerous even when they don't even notice you're there, and when they're all turned against you in furious or caring resistance, disaster changes from a probability to a stern likelihood. You were bowled over at the protest and nearly suffocated, half-trampled (half on purpose) and injured by the press of bodies and the willing and unknowing assault. Your injuries are numerous, and mostly not very serious; your leg is sprained and tight, and you have several bruised and cracked bones from violent contact. You had received a moderate concussion, and were unconscious for a day and a half. A part of your pelvic bone has chipped off, and your back is misaligned, and needs the care of a chiropractor.
It wasn't only your bones that suffered, though. During the confusion, you received several sharp kicks to the chest and stomach. During your period of unconsciousness, you quietly miscarried, passing a small spot of blood and fleshy yolk onto the hospital sheets. The pain in your abdomen is damage to your uterus, and in the years to come will threaten breakage and ulcers, not to mention guarantee extremely painful periods. If you wish to become pregnant in the future, it will have to be a very careful and expensivebusiness, constantly monitored by doctors, if it is indeed possible at all without risking your health.
Your friends visit you that night, your family the next morning. Even with insurance, the hospital bills are high, and you must take a part-time job to help pay them, which takes time away from your acting, and makes your recovery a longer and more arduous process. Your issue of pregnancy is resolved, but you can't help but feel it took more from you than a potential baby.
It's still impossible to just walk through an angry mob, though. Soon people are all around you, pressed close, and you have to shoulder and shove your way through, gaining and losing ground almost in equal measure as you try to slowly ease yourself towards the clinic door. It seems the more progress you make the more difficult it is to progress further, until the crowd presses against you like a living wall, snapping at your posessions, pushing your body back, and always, always talking, shouting, cooing, cadjoling.
It isn't long before they begin throwing things. It starts with a crumpled wad of paper, then another, then more as the idea spreads through the crowd. People wad up pamphlets and signs and lob them in your general direction through the crowd. The people alternately surge forward and back as more and more things are lobbed: fruit skins, wooden pickets, a half-full bottle of red Gatorade that explodes stickily all over your left shoulder. A single boot bounces harshly off your arm; you try to move back, but the crowd is thicker behind you than in front, a single membrane, smiling, laughing, talking among themselves.
Someone begins throwing rocks. This idea becomes popular. Little pebbles off the street, nothing huge. One catches you in the scalp, and a warm red itch begins trailing over your face. A larger one smites you in the back of the knee, making your balance wobbly and sending unpleasant numb tingles up and down your leg. Worried, scared, anxious, you press more physicall forward, yelling at them to get out of your way, but now they're all around you again, tall and hot and STRONG, and your leg half-gives and makes you stumble, and then they're over you, too.
When you wake up, the first thing you see is the left end of a sleepy orange fluorescent light inset in a dimpled white ceiling. Something beeps nearby; you're laying inside something soft. You sit up, and find that doing so wakes up a riot of aches and pains in your back, hips and stomach. There is a dull, itchy burning in your abdomen, and your right leg is wadded up in a restraining, tense flesh-colored bandage. A hospital.
People have been literally crushed in the front-row press of concerts. People have been knocked down and trampled to death in the first rush of heavy shopping days. Crowds aren't just large, loud, hot and sticky. They're dangerous, dangerous even when they don't even notice you're there, and when they're all turned against you in furious or caring resistance, disaster changes from a probability to a stern likelihood. You were bowled over at the protest and nearly suffocated, half-trampled (half on purpose) and injured by the press of bodies and the willing and unknowing assault. Your injuries are numerous, and mostly not very serious; your leg is sprained and tight, and you have several bruised and cracked bones from violent contact. You had received a moderate concussion, and were unconscious for a day and a half. A part of your pelvic bone has chipped off, and your back is misaligned, and needs the care of a chiropractor.
It wasn't only your bones that suffered, though. During the confusion, you received several sharp kicks to the chest and stomach. During your period of unconsciousness, you quietly miscarried, passing a small spot of blood and fleshy yolk onto the hospital sheets. The pain in your abdomen is damage to your uterus, and in the years to come will threaten breakage and ulcers, not to mention guarantee extremely painful periods. If you wish to become pregnant in the future, it will have to be a very careful and expensivebusiness, constantly monitored by doctors, if it is indeed possible at all without risking your health.
Your friends visit you that night, your family the next morning. Even with insurance, the hospital bills are high, and you must take a part-time job to help pay them, which takes time away from your acting, and makes your recovery a longer and more arduous process. Your issue of pregnancy is resolved, but you can't help but feel it took more from you than a potential baby.
