Angels

By Emmie

My eyes are open, I can tell they are, yet I can’t see anything. It’s as if someone has placed a giant hand right over my eyes, making everything black. No matter how hard I try I can’t push that hand away. I try to blink, hoping to wipe away this temporary blindness, but my eyelids won’t move. I try to breathe but I can’t. Panic sweeps over my still body as I struggle to fill my lungs with oxygen. I know I must keep trying. I need to break this spell that Tom has cast over me. I need to live.

I can’t see anything, but I can hear. I can hear everything. At least my ears are still working – the rest of my body doesn’t seem to want to respond to the messages that my brain is sending - I can’t move a muscle. I hear music playing – a song I know but I can’t put a name to it, not right now. I can hear footsteps clanging up the stairs and echoing shouts bouncing off the walls of the corridor outside. The door crashes open and the footsteps come closer to me. I tense up, or at least I would have done if I could actually move. It’s Tom, come back to finish what he started!

I try to move – I need to escape his clutches. But yet again I am reminded that I’m paralysed. I am about to give in, ready to surrender to him, when I hear a voice next to me. And it’s not the voice of the man I fear more than anything. It’s not who I thought it was. “He’s drugged her, she can’t breathe.” My heart does a summersault as the sound of that familiar Yorkshire accent travels to my ears. Thank god – Patrick’s come to save me!

I feel the warmth from his face as he bends down closer to me. “Alright Holly, I know you can hear me. You’re gonna be alright.” I’m going to be all right. I’m going to be all right. I repeat it over and over in my head. I am going to be okay. Patrick will make sure.

I feel his soft lips press up against mine. I know he’s giving me mouth-to-mouth resuscitation but it doesn’t seem to be helping. My body is just as rigid as before and I still can’t breathe. Even sounds are fading. I hear Patrick shout, “Come on Holly!” but it’s faint. I’m starting to slip away, I know I am. I don’t want to, not now! I’ve just patched things up with Patrick, things are starting to get better! I can’t die now!

I sense Patrick still desperately trying to resuscitate me. He tries again, and again. I keep on fighting, trying desperately to breathe.

All of a sudden I blink. I can see! I still can’t take a breath but I can see! “Holly?” I see Patrick’s worried yet hopeful face appear above me as he leans over to try one more time. As he pulls away I blink again. I begin to cough and splutter as I take that longed for breath and refreshing air fills my lungs. I take another breath, I’m all right! I can breathe! I’m not going to die after all.

Patrick takes my hand and I sit right up, flinging myself against him and holding on tight. My hands grip onto his shoulder as a waterfall of tears stream down my face. For the last few minutes all that I had been thinking of was staying alive. All of my thoughts had been directed towards that. It was all that mattered.

Now that I no longer have to worry about that, other thoughts start to run through my mind. I remember how I came to be in this situation in the first place. I tense up as I think about Tom and what he did. As a response Patrick holds me closer and I grip on tighter to his shoulder. I don’t know how I will even begin to get over this and move on, but I know one thing – I have to do it. I’ve got to live my life. And I hope that the man I’m clinging to now is going to help me. I hope that we can at last be together, forgetting the haunting past and all the problems and stumbling blocks that we have encountered before. Just me and Patrick, and our new life.