SHAKING… UNCONTROLLABLE…

It rattled my bones and my teeth…

Pounding… like drums…

Sounding in my temples until I ached. Not only my head—everything—every part of me.

The world didn’t make sense. Thoughts and truth jumbled until fiction became factual and reality became make-believe.

There were voices, Alton’s, Oren’s, and even Alexandria’s. They came and went in a fog of uncertainty.

Yet Oren and Alexandria weren’t really here; they both had to be part of a dream, my mind playing tricks, hallucinations. They came and went in my consciousness or was it my unconsciousness? The voices seemed real, taking on new tones and cadences.

The past mixed with the present until they blended into one. Had they really come? Oren and Alexandria? Or could it be that those were the two I longed for, wished for, needed, if only to say goodbye. Surely I couldn’t go on much longer, not like this.

Somehow the world around me became cold and sterile, a place I loathed—even more than my home and my husband. Those were familiar. This was not. Why would they leave me here? If hell were truly levels, I’d descended lower than ever before. I needed to go home, even wanted to go back, but I was sinking faster than I could crawl to the surface.

Please don’t leave me here. I’m not done.

My father and mother told me from the time I was young that I had responsibilities. I clawed at the darkness, needing to get back. There was more I needed to do. I felt it… but I couldn’t recall any particulars. The memories wouldn’t come. They stayed just out of reach…

Time passed in undefined segments. Yes, science may say it was all related to the sun and rotation of the earth, but that wasn’t true. There were times that I recalled that I’d wanted to last forever, yet greedily time moved forward at uncharted speed. Weeks became days and days hours. And then there were those instances that dragged on and on, as if the earth had slowed both its rotation and spin. Hours lasted for days and days for weeks. Weeks became months… months became years.

Wherever I was, in this sterile place seconds moved like hours, each one dragging on and on until years were passed, beyond my reach… or was it only days? The boredom ate away deliberation until nothing existed—no topics or thoughts—nothing except a void, a black hole of consciousness.

I searched for memories… faces… names. I tried to count, to recall events. I wouldn’t go quietly. I refused. Drowning in the pits was not my end. I would fight to return, claw my way up from the depths. No one else could save me, not this time, not that anyone ever had. As always, it was up to me, and I wanted it—for my daughter, for my love, but also—for the first time—for me.

And then…

I was present.

Tears filled my closed eyes with the relief. The bed beneath me was familiar. I was in my suite at Montague Manor. And yet, the familiar setting didn’t fully relieve my anxiety. It should have, yet the uneasiness was there, bubbling through me, twisting my world. Something wasn’t right. My sealed eyelids opened, if only a bit, as I stole a glimpse around the room. My stomach heaved as the lines of woodwork, doorframes, and molding weaved and bowed.

My suite that had forever been inanimate slowly came to life.

My rational mind told me it wasn’t true, yet I saw it. I felt it. The energy was real and stifling. The beige walls were once again covered with wallpaper from the past. The ivy print on the once stagnant wallpaper grew before my eyes. No longer contained to its parchment, it twisted and twirled, growing and filling the suite, creating a jungle of obstacles.

“Jane.” My plea was soft at first, but with each request my volume rose.

The one-word name sparked wicks of explosions strategically placed within my brain. Pain—like small detonations—obstructed my vision. I couldn’t see the vines for the blinding white light, but I knew they were there. I felt them touching me, my ankles my wrists, binding me.

I thrashed at their touch.

“Jane!” I called louder still, battering the vines away.

“Jane…”

Covering me, strangling me.

A low laugh rumbled through our suite. I wasn’t alone. Alton was here.

“Please,” I begged. “Please make it stop.”

“Laide, my Laide.”

I couldn’t see him, yet his touch was real. Knuckles caressing my cheeks, uncharacteristically gentle. I hated asking for his help, but I couldn’t refrain. “Please, help. Get Jane.”

“Jane isn’t here. Neither are you… neither am I. You’re delusional.”

No!

I shook my head, but this time it barely moved. The ivy had matured, its vines thick and coarse as rope covering the bed, wrapping me in their grip. “Get them off! Please get them off.”

“What? What are you talking about?”

Warm tears leaked from my closed eyes. I couldn’t pry them open, the light was too bright, the pounding too severe. That didn’t mean I wasn’t aware. I was. Like insects scattering across my skin, the vines continued to weave and wrap; alive and possessed, they tied me to the bed, covering my legs, body, breasts, and arms. I couldn’t move.

Oh God!

The foliage was infested. True insects scattered with tiny legs and feet, crawling, eating, and nesting… on me… in me. I feared speaking, afraid they’d enter my mouth. My nose was vulnerable as I blew from my nostrils. Like a bull, I tried to keep them away. My ears and hair crawled with hundreds of thousands of bugs.

I spit my request, “Help! Please, make it stop. Not my face, don’t let them on my face.”

No one answered. The only sound above his fading laugh was the buzzing and hissing as the infestation continued.

My heart thundered in my ears as I struggled against the vines and insects. With my energy depleting I waited, scared to live and terrified to die.

Did I lose consciousness? I wasn’t sure. The buzzing was gone, yet my skin was on fire. Every inch itched with the venom the tiny beasts had left behind.

I was still bound, unable to ease the growing need to scratch. My screams and pleas echoed in the distance until the explosions in my head became literal flames, burning my skin and hopefully the vines.

“Help me. Make it stop. Put it out!”

If only I could move, unwrap the vines, but I was bound in a fire… a sacrifice to a god I didn’t know.

“Please, not my face.”

“Mrs. Fitzgerald, no one is covering your face.”

I blinked once and then twice: the suite was gone and so was the fire. Yet the stench remained, deep within my lungs, the odor of burning flesh. Was it mine or the insects? Had the fire scared them away?

No longer hot, cold water lingered upon my skin. Chilled to the bone, the trembling resumed. My dressing gown clung to my breasts and legs. Yet the moisture did little to relieve the itch and burn that I’d endured as a result of the abusive vines and insects.

Still bound, I turned from side to side, seeking relief. “It itches,” I tried to explain. “Please free my hands.”

“Do you promise to leave the IVs alone? You’ve been pretty out of it for the last few days.”

“Days?”

My eyes slowly opened, expecting the excruciating pain. Instead, my vision was met with a dull ache. The explosions had ended. My open eyes found only destruction and devastation, the remnants of a battle lost.

“Jane?” I asked, though I knew I wasn’t in my suite. I prayed she wouldn’t leave me.

“No Jane here,” the man’s voice replied.

I wanted to cover myself. It wasn’t proper to be in this place, wherever it was, with a man I didn’t know, wearing a dampened gown. I couldn’t. My arms were trapped and body heavy.

“Please, I won’t touch the IVs.”

Each second that I waited irritated my skin. It crawled with the memory of the infestation. Surely I was covered in marks, bites, and scratches. Like the flames, I longed to soothe it; my entire body prickled. If only I could scratch. If only I could soak. That was what I needed, to soak in a bath.

I needed Jane.

My left arm was the first to be freed, yet it weighed too much to be of any use, falling to the bed and refusing to move. My mind sent instructions, telling it to move, to scratch, to abrade my irritated skin. If only I could, I knew it would bring relief. But, alas, my own limb laughed at my inability.

Pushing with my feet I was able turn my entire body, a little bit at first and then more. The movement helped my back. No doubt the ivy had wrapped totally around me. There wasn’t a place that didn’t need relief.

“Mrs. Fitzgerald, you need to hold still.”

“Itches. My whole body.”

“You’re soaked in sweat. DTs do that.”

DTs?

I couldn’t comprehend what he meant.

D and T, what was that?

And then it began… the rumble of an impending earthquake. Starting at my toes, a tremor like I’d never felt before. It grew until my entire body quaked. Loud and primitive, a roar filled the room, its vibrations threatening to shatter the windows and still my erratic heart.

Was the jungle back? Were there animals?

Alarms and buzzers… voices… so far away.

Oh God.

My teeth were going to break: they chattered so hard. I couldn’t stop them from gnashing until my jaw became rigid.

All control was lost.

I was here. I felt it. I knew it was me—even the roar—and yet my body was an entity of its own. Tension faded, expelling my bodily fluids…

Oh dear Lord, please help me.

My heavy arm was lifted and then…

Blackness… and calm.