Beeping. That was the first thing. Steady, annoying, somewhere to the left. Then the smell-clean. Too clean. The kind of clean that made her nose itch and her throat feel dry.
Hospital?
Urara lay there for a while. Just... existing. The beeping counted seconds for her. Her body felt weird. Heavy. Distant. There was pain somewhere, ribs maybe, but it was far away. Muffled. Like it was happening to someone else.
Why am I in a hospital?
She couldn't... she'd been somewhere. With someone. The details kept sliding away. Water through fingers. Annoying.
The sheets were scratchy. Gross. She rubbed her thumb against the fabric and made a face. Hospitals always had terrible sheets. When she got home she'd wrap herself in her fleece blankets, the good ones, and sleep for like a week. Maybe two.
When I get home.
She had an apartment. She remembered that. Small kitchen, clothes everywhere, her sewing machine by the window where the light was good-
Something about that thought felt... wrong. She couldn't figure out why.
Her head hurt. Thinking was hard. So she stopped. Just lay there, letting the beeping fill up the silence.
She was so tired.
Time passed. Minutes, maybe. Longer? Hard to tell. At some point it occurred to her that she should probably open her eyes.
She blinked.
Her eyelashes moved. She felt them. But nothing changed.
I'm tired. That's all. Too tired to focus.
She blinked again. Tried to look around-left, right, up. Her eyes moved, she could feel them moving in their sockets. But there was just... nothing. Empty static where stuff should be.
The lights are off. The room is dark. That's all.
But there was warmth on her arm. Sunlight. From a window, probably. She could feel the heat of it soaking into her skin.
The lights are...
Her hand came up. Slow, clumsy. Found her face. Found her eyes. Open. They were open. She traced her eyelashes, felt them brush her fingertip when she blinked.
Open.
The beeping sped up.
"I can't-"
