"Come on," my best friend Anne Marie calls sounding like she's drank five espressos and dragging me by the hand. Anne Marie doesn't get it.
Carefully I place my feet, wondering if she is flipping her hair while smiling at some hot guy. That's what she did in the old days. The days before the accident. The days before I had to relearn everything. I miss seeing her wide grin and her flashing brown eyes.
"You're going too fast," I call fear tightening my voice, but it's too late. I'm tripping, falling, the world is completely dark. Logic tells me I'm about to hit cement. Experience says I'm descending down a never-ending black hole. My palms hit the pavement just before my face does.
"Sorry," Anne Marie says grabbing me by the armpits and helping me up. My hand reaches for the cane I dropped in the fall to my doom. Of course, it isn't there. It fell too. A moment of panic takes hold before Anne Marie is shoving it into my hand.
"Thanks," I say trying to smile, trying to hold back the tears burning at the edges of my useless eyes.
"You're welcome," a deep voice says. A voice that doesn't belong to Anne Marie.
I gulp. The voice sends a laser of heat shooting straight between my thighs.
Beside me Anne Marie squeals. "Who are you and where have you been all my life?" Deep Voice must be hot. Anne Marie only uses that line with guys gorgeous enough to melt ice in the middle of winter.
Maybe before the accident, I would have been eye guzzling the piece of man candy with the sexy voice right alongside Anne Marie, but this is now.
Now, all he can see is a blind girl who can't find her own cane. The tears I'd been holding back wet my cheeks beneath the sunglasses the doctor gave me. I turn away from Deep Voice. "Let's go," I say instinctively reaching for Anne Marie's arm only to find dead space until my knuckle comes down on something hard and sharp. I gasp.
"No," Anne Marie says grabbing my hand, "I said, I was going to cheer you up and I meant it." Anne Marie isn't going to take me back to the hospital until she's accomplished her mission.
"You look familiar," she says to the Mc dreamy I can't see.
Clothing rustles, did he shrug? "I hear that a lot." Mc dreamy's deep voice is getting muffled by the sounds of the crowd he must be walking away, fast.
Anne Marie grabs me again by the arm and the warm blood beaded on the back of my finger begins trailing down my hand.
"By killing me?" I quip, maybe it's time to get a new best friend. One who won't accidentally get me hit by a car. One who will let me lock myself in my room for the rest of eternity.
Anne Marie gives an exaggerated sigh and I try to remember the face she made with that sigh but even with my other senses working to compensate I can't quite imagine my best friend's expression as she says, "We're almost there, don't rain on the parade."
Cheap trick using a Barbara Streisand reference to get me to submit. The old me loved that song. 'Life's candy and the sun's a ball of butter.' Except without my eyes, the drums are silent, and all the candy is flavorless in a way that leaves me sick after the costumes and joy of the holidays are gone, except this time the sickness is never going away.
Anne Marie is pulling me along again. Like a rag doll with no will of my own, I follow.
A bell chimes and cool scented air hits my face. Anne Marie is leading me through a doorway off of the sidewalk. Maybe someone in here will take pity on the poor blind girl and call me a cab so I can escape Anne Marie's insanity.
"How may I help you?" A soft pretty voice asks.
"Two appointments scheduled under Sexy Babes, please," Anne Marie has been using that same cheesy handle for us since high school.
Flute music plays in the background while behind my thick sunglasses I roll unseeing eyes. I'm not a kid anymore, I can't see the eyes popping out of people's heads when Anne Marie pulls her silly shenanigans and there's nothing sexy about a grown woman who can't even get dressed by herself. I just want to go home and go back to hiding in my room.
A chair slides out, papers rustle, there's a thud as though a mug or a phone has just been set down. "Right this way," Soft Pretty Voice says.
I hear Anne Marie's footsteps following Soft Pretty's away. I want to use my cane to follow, but what if I break something. The soothing music clues me in we're not in a dive bar and the last thing a blind artist needs is to break some ancient ten thousand dollar Japanese vase or worse.
My hand tightens around the cane. I shift uncomfortably forever trapped in an unrelenting prison of darkness. Just as tears are about to fall a large hand cups the small of my back and presses me forward.
The glorified walking stick slips from my fingers in my surprise.
For all I know Anne Marie is off in some private room reserved for people with sight and I'm being guided to a dungeon or execution. My imagination runs wild with the idea of being sold into a sex slave ring or guided onto an alien spacecraft but despite sheer terror, my feet keep moving.
"Sit," a voice commands.
I feel behind me for a chair but clasp air. Then hands are guiding me down.
I want to beg them not to hurt me. I want to say it isn't my fault I'm blind. I want to apologize for not being able to see but the words choke together in my throat keeping me silent.
"Relax," this time the clearly male speaker isn't commanding me but instead using a tone one might use with a wounded animal.
I want to get up and fight and prove I'm not a wounded animal, prove I'm not easy prey, but locked in this prison of endless black, the only thing that would prove is that I'm a complete idiot.
And part of me knows the voice is right.
He clears his throat, "How long has it been?"
I swallow the lump forming in my throat. "Two weeks."
"Give me your foot," he orders, this time without the same pity in his voice.
His warm hand encircles my calf. My shoe is slowly pulled away.
"Your finger's hurt. I'm going to bandage it." He says stopping before my foot is completely free.
I nod hoping it's somewhat in his direction.
His voice is deep and sexy like the man's from the street who retrieved my cane. "I'm sorry but were you the one who retrieved my cane earlier?"
"You recognize my voice?"
Carefully I place my feet, wondering if she is flipping her hair while smiling at some hot guy. That's what she did in the old days. The days before the accident. The days before I had to relearn everything. I miss seeing her wide grin and her flashing brown eyes.
"You're going too fast," I call fear tightening my voice, but it's too late. I'm tripping, falling, the world is completely dark. Logic tells me I'm about to hit cement. Experience says I'm descending down a never-ending black hole. My palms hit the pavement just before my face does.
"Sorry," Anne Marie says grabbing me by the armpits and helping me up. My hand reaches for the cane I dropped in the fall to my doom. Of course, it isn't there. It fell too. A moment of panic takes hold before Anne Marie is shoving it into my hand.
"Thanks," I say trying to smile, trying to hold back the tears burning at the edges of my useless eyes.
"You're welcome," a deep voice says. A voice that doesn't belong to Anne Marie.
I gulp. The voice sends a laser of heat shooting straight between my thighs.
Beside me Anne Marie squeals. "Who are you and where have you been all my life?" Deep Voice must be hot. Anne Marie only uses that line with guys gorgeous enough to melt ice in the middle of winter.
Maybe before the accident, I would have been eye guzzling the piece of man candy with the sexy voice right alongside Anne Marie, but this is now.
Now, all he can see is a blind girl who can't find her own cane. The tears I'd been holding back wet my cheeks beneath the sunglasses the doctor gave me. I turn away from Deep Voice. "Let's go," I say instinctively reaching for Anne Marie's arm only to find dead space until my knuckle comes down on something hard and sharp. I gasp.
"No," Anne Marie says grabbing my hand, "I said, I was going to cheer you up and I meant it." Anne Marie isn't going to take me back to the hospital until she's accomplished her mission.
"You look familiar," she says to the Mc dreamy I can't see.
Clothing rustles, did he shrug? "I hear that a lot." Mc dreamy's deep voice is getting muffled by the sounds of the crowd he must be walking away, fast.
Anne Marie grabs me again by the arm and the warm blood beaded on the back of my finger begins trailing down my hand.
"By killing me?" I quip, maybe it's time to get a new best friend. One who won't accidentally get me hit by a car. One who will let me lock myself in my room for the rest of eternity.
Anne Marie gives an exaggerated sigh and I try to remember the face she made with that sigh but even with my other senses working to compensate I can't quite imagine my best friend's expression as she says, "We're almost there, don't rain on the parade."
Cheap trick using a Barbara Streisand reference to get me to submit. The old me loved that song. 'Life's candy and the sun's a ball of butter.' Except without my eyes, the drums are silent, and all the candy is flavorless in a way that leaves me sick after the costumes and joy of the holidays are gone, except this time the sickness is never going away.
Anne Marie is pulling me along again. Like a rag doll with no will of my own, I follow.
A bell chimes and cool scented air hits my face. Anne Marie is leading me through a doorway off of the sidewalk. Maybe someone in here will take pity on the poor blind girl and call me a cab so I can escape Anne Marie's insanity.
"How may I help you?" A soft pretty voice asks.
"Two appointments scheduled under Sexy Babes, please," Anne Marie has been using that same cheesy handle for us since high school.
Flute music plays in the background while behind my thick sunglasses I roll unseeing eyes. I'm not a kid anymore, I can't see the eyes popping out of people's heads when Anne Marie pulls her silly shenanigans and there's nothing sexy about a grown woman who can't even get dressed by herself. I just want to go home and go back to hiding in my room.
A chair slides out, papers rustle, there's a thud as though a mug or a phone has just been set down. "Right this way," Soft Pretty Voice says.
I hear Anne Marie's footsteps following Soft Pretty's away. I want to use my cane to follow, but what if I break something. The soothing music clues me in we're not in a dive bar and the last thing a blind artist needs is to break some ancient ten thousand dollar Japanese vase or worse.
My hand tightens around the cane. I shift uncomfortably forever trapped in an unrelenting prison of darkness. Just as tears are about to fall a large hand cups the small of my back and presses me forward.
The glorified walking stick slips from my fingers in my surprise.
For all I know Anne Marie is off in some private room reserved for people with sight and I'm being guided to a dungeon or execution. My imagination runs wild with the idea of being sold into a sex slave ring or guided onto an alien spacecraft but despite sheer terror, my feet keep moving.
"Sit," a voice commands.
I feel behind me for a chair but clasp air. Then hands are guiding me down.
I want to beg them not to hurt me. I want to say it isn't my fault I'm blind. I want to apologize for not being able to see but the words choke together in my throat keeping me silent.
"Relax," this time the clearly male speaker isn't commanding me but instead using a tone one might use with a wounded animal.
I want to get up and fight and prove I'm not a wounded animal, prove I'm not easy prey, but locked in this prison of endless black, the only thing that would prove is that I'm a complete idiot.
And part of me knows the voice is right.
He clears his throat, "How long has it been?"
I swallow the lump forming in my throat. "Two weeks."
"Give me your foot," he orders, this time without the same pity in his voice.
His warm hand encircles my calf. My shoe is slowly pulled away.
"Your finger's hurt. I'm going to bandage it." He says stopping before my foot is completely free.
I nod hoping it's somewhat in his direction.
His voice is deep and sexy like the man's from the street who retrieved my cane. "I'm sorry but were you the one who retrieved my cane earlier?"
"You recognize my voice?"
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