Lifeline

It hurt. It always did. Even having practically a lifetime of experience being held against my will to give blood, it didn’t minimize the sheer agony the needle inflicted on me each and every time. Every month it became more fearsome and painful, oh so painful. It wasn’t until I reached the age of four, however, that I adopted the phrase “Silence is golden,” realizing that silence worked more in my favor, than my desperate cries to be set free.

Although I always found it daunting when I was alone in the woods, left to my own devices having to retreat into the cave of my deterring thoughts for comfort, that’s also when I felt the safest. From an outsider’s perspective, I could see that being rather frightening to adopt such a twisted mentality at such a young age, but once you’ve practically had the life sucked out of you a handful of times, your thoughts become the only thing you have control over, so you’ll do anything to cling on to them.

It’s rather sad, but for me, as well as many others it’s our reality. This time was no different..

I fought to stay awake, refusing to let them win this time. The more I fought, however, the more they probed and life supply they took, and I was already hanging on by a string, going in and out of consciousness. Although I was practically in hysteria in the back of my mind, on the surface, I was too busy trying to maintain consciousness. Every waking second, I could feel my life slowly slip away as my breaths became more hollow;everything around me looked like one big blur, as my eyes rolled in the back of my head, creating a never ending black hole of darkness.

Right before my body gave out, what I thought was a low murmuring sob crept into my ringing ears. It wasn’t until I woke up in the hospital hours later, that I realized the low murmur was actually a shrieking sob. Once I gathered my bearings and recognized where I was, I overheard two nurses quietly murmuring in the next room over. Although their voices were very hushed, I managed to make out most of what they were saying, and even though most of it was random stuff, one thing that was said, made me instantly wish I didn’t have such heightened hearing.“ Poor girl. No child should have to be in the state she’s in. Hopefully she pulls through.”

I quickly put two and two together and realized the girl I heard screaming was in critical condition. I felt an immense amount of guilt for not doing more to help her.

That night as I laid helplessly in my hospital bed, I prayed with endless tears and blubbering words that the girl would make it out of here alive. The sad thing though, wasn’t that I was a higher risk patient than she was given my history, or that I couldn’t give the police the vital information they so desperately needed, but rather that this was most likely the girl’s first time getting brutally attacked. She had her entire innocence snatched from her, whereas I had it taken away way before I could even attain it. No five year old should have to go through what we went though. It just wasn’t right or fair.

I examined my arm, which was not only hooked up to an IV and many machines-probably to transfuse blood supply to my body- but also revealed very weak veins and countless faded scars from over the years. As I further inspected my them, I couldn’t help but wonder how many tries it took to find a viable vein to insert the IV. I was most likely out of it while they were doing it, which I was grateful for because I hated needles.

There were times I would lie to my mom, and tell her I was fine, when in reality, my body was hurting so bad, that I couldn’t breathe. Sometimes I could put on a good front and fool her, but most of the time she could see through my facade.

When we were alone, she would take my arm and trace my veins. Her touch barely grazed my skin, and what should have felt like a little tickle, felt like an explosion of pain. Every night before bed, she would kiss my forehead and tell me they were my love marks. The irony of her statement was so uncanny, that it put a foul taste in my mouth. I never had the heart to tell her, however, so I would just smile and say I loved her.

Flash forward eleven years, here I was nearing 17, and while most people my age were already driving and living life to the fullest, I was living on borrowed time and reflecting on my past attacks in my spare time. My mind instantly reverted back to when I was seven. My two year anniversary of not being in the hospital was coming up, and my parents were planning a combined surprise party for our family friend, and anniversary party me.

I remembered being very giddy as I stepped off the bus that afternoon, only to be tied down and brutally attacked moments later. Apparently the bus driver had witnessed my disappearance and phoned my parents, who rushed to me as fast as they could. Unfortunately, they were too late to catch the culprits, but were able to get me to the hospital before my condition became too dire. As if being completely paralyzed on the left side of your face and having involuntary spasms wasn’t dire enough..

I was prescribed medication for the spasms, but sadly nothing could be done about my paralysis.

My parents were devastated, and although I didn’t show it for their sakes, so was I. Not many seven year olds could say they couldn’t move half their face. Despite the discouraging news on my health though, I couldn’t help but feel absolutely terrible about ruining my friend Carter’s surprise party. Although she smiled and said it was okay, practically a decade later, I couldn’t help but think she still held a grudge against me.

Not only did we go to the same school, but we were also in some of the same classes, and every time I saw her she would just glance me over once, then look the other way. Just by her body language alone, it was evident that she was still upset.

I slumped into my seat two rows behind, and exhaled a long, exasperated sigh. Apparently I had been holding my breath and my lungs needed to make this dramatic production in order to function properly.

I leaned over, practically on the floor trying to retrieve my green binder from my bag. All my binders were different colors for each class. It helped me stay somewhat organized, and helped me maintain some sanity- just some. As I started taking notes on the laws of gravity, or something related to science-it might as well be a foreign language like math- I couldn’t help but think about mine and Carter’s childhood. I remembered when we helped our parents build our treehouse when we were four, and created our own secret club. To this day, that tree house stood strong and proud in her parent’s backyard.

I frowned at the memory. Guess seven was a very monumental year for her or something.. It was important enough to practically shun your friend you’ve known half your life, after something that was out of my control landed me at the hospital...

It’s not like you could really do anything at that age anyway. It wasn’t like she could vote or drink like you could at 18 or 21. Or drive like she could now at 16. I knew her birthday consisted of a huge birthday bash, a brand new car and a later curfew, whereas mine consisted of being in the hospital recovering from my recent attack. Happy birthday to me..

At the end of the day, I couldn’t help but envy the girl, because even though we were only a month apart in age, she had everything everyone else had that I couldn’t.

Unlike me she wasn’t damaged goods, and didn’t have a deep dark secret looming over her head. She didn’t have to sleep with one eye open every night, afraid someone would fly through her bedroom window and suck the life out of her until her face was white as snow, or her lips were as blue as her veins. She didn’t have to worry about how to pay for all the doctor bills because they have skyrocketed in the past sixteen years. I suppressed a sigh. Man, if she only knew…

Although it saddened me that she and I weren’t friends anymore, last night’s events clouded my mind, and an unnerving chill crept down my spine. I couldn’t help but wonder how many more people like me were out there- how many of them were lurking around, preying on poor innocent souls. It sickened me to the core to know there was possibly someone out there suffering.

My mind instantly went to the girl I encountered when I was five. Where was she now? Was she dead? Alive? Still in critical condition? Incapacitated? After all these years, not once had my mind wavered from her well-being. When I was finally let go all those years ago, I hoped she would have come with me, but I guess they weren’t done with her yet. If only I knew her name, then I could search information about her on the internet.

Part of me hoped I would find her one day and tell her how deeply sorry I was for not saving her. Even though we were very young and frail, doing something was better than nothing. Questions that I wanted to evade crept into my mind. Questions like: what did they do with the blood once they acquired it? Were they illegal blood donors? Why not just go to the doctor if you needed a blood transfusion?