Lyn's Death

Lyn could hear the people around her, but couldn’t respond, which naturally frustrated her. What further exasperated her frustration was their apparent pre-conceived notion that she was in fact dead, when she herself knew quite certainly she was not. True, she admitted, she was not breathing, but that was hardly her fault, they were the doctors, and at this point after such a terrible accident, her breathing was their responsibility, right? True, she couldn’t move or talk, or blink or anything, except think, but surely this thinking must be a good sign.

“Ah, you need to relax, hay. It’s no good letting it go to waste. Don’t look at me that, like you never thought about it.”

“Cover her up, man, you’re freaking me out, and look, she looks all pissed off.”

The second man swung the sheet back over her and they wheeled her out the lift. They banged through swinging doors, and jostled the gurney into the morgue. If Lyn could have moved or spoken or done anything, she would have done it, and to them, and made it hurt. Jerks.

All of this she thought should have made her very anxious, under normal circumstances. It had to be shock. Her body just wasn’t responding. Being able to see smell and hear now was a good sign, right? Her eyes had opened earlier to give that little necro-perv a fearsome death-stare. That seemed to have worked. Maybe she could pull herself together before this got out of hand. Little by little, with concentrating.

Nearly three hours ago there had been bustling activity all around her. That would have been her chance, now she was all alone. Madness rushed all around her as she raced into the hospital and became surrounded by scrubs and white coats. Machines had beeped and whined and breathed for her. Doctors came and went. They called her time of death at 11:21pm. She cried out at them, but to no avail.

Get things moving again, that was what she should be doing, but how? She told herself to take a breath, but nothing. Try through the nose, she thought, but again nothing. How the hell do the lungs work? Diaphragm muscles. But where the hell are they? Move a finger yes, good idea. Baby steps, she thought. Now, move, she commanded.

The sheet was thrown up off of her by the pathologist, a fat little man, balding, and with bad breath. He and his assistant surveyed her.

“Such a waste,” he muttered.

He checked her chart, “Alright, wash her down.”

They moved her from the gurney onto the autopsy table for rinsing.

The assistant worked without fuss. He wore rubber gloves and used a scrubbing brush to clean Lyn’s skin. She didn’t feel ashamed, or embarrassed, just a little sad. Her vision was becoming clouded.

With lazy movements he easily moved Lyn from the table to the gurney, and then over to a tray that extended out of the cold storage. The Pathologist handed the assist her ID tags and the assistant attached the tags to her toe. Without hesitation he slid the tray into the unit and closed the door, an air-tight seal, cold, and completely dark.