helloooo. i'm still alive, fyi

tissue warning for this one, i think. i'd say sorry, but i'd be lying. all aboard the angst train! :*

Illusion (Prompt 043)

She sits, slumped under the street lamp, blood on her lips, flowers in her hands. Her feet are stretched far out in front of her, shoes worn and caked with mud. She glances upwards: dark clouds hover overhead, an ominous omen (if one believes in such things). The street is silent, save for the muffled, faraway city bustling. A few hundred metres away, a lone car's headlights shine.

Sniffling, she buries her head in her hands, her curls twisting around her fingers as she hugs her legs to her chest, the flowers she'd held a moment earlier scattering across the sidewalk and onto the road, a violent splash of red and pink across the dull grey of the pavement. A rumble of thunder echoes in the distance. She wipes her eyes with her sleeve, trying to ignore the sting of tears.

Her vision blurry, she doesn't even notice headlights wash over her as the car screams over the curb and into the street lamp she leans against.

For weeks after she's home from the hospital, Anti-Cosmo's afraid to let her out of his sight. He doesn't sleep, barely eats, wakes up at three a.m. sweaty and biting his lip to keep from screaming. His dreams are tortured memories of crash sites and panicky ambulance rides, of sitting next to a too-white hospital bed and breathing along with the blessedly steady beep-beep-beep of the heart monitor.

Remembering isn't the bad part, though. The bad part is when those dreams veer off course and he finds himself facing a gravestone with hands that never stop shaking. Those are the nights the guilt nearly crushes him.

It's not really his fault, he knows. It's the weather's fault for making the streets slippery; her fault for sitting on the curb in the first place; the driver's fault for not being more careful. But he's the reason she was there to begin with, and thus, in some small, twisted way, it's completely his fault.

The worst part of it all, he thinks, is that Anti-Wanda doesn't blame him. Not one bit. Accidents happen accident'ly, right? 'S why they's called accidents, she says. She blames it all on fate, on destiny, like it's something that was supposed to happen. When she looks away, his lip curls, disgusted with the insinuation.

Anti-Wanda's still re-learning a lot of things, like how to hold dishes without dropping them on the floor, or open chip bags, or press the buttons on the remote, so he spends a lot of time helping her turn the pages of books and other tiny things that really shouldn't worry him but do, for one reason or another. Thankfully, it only seems to be her fine motor skills that've been affected.

Which is how Anti-Cosmo finds himself swatting frantically at the fire alarm, the smell of burnt popcorn in the air. Anti-Wanda's not very good in the kitchen, but she's nowhere near as bad as he is. He's a bloody awful cook. He manages to shut the alarm off and find another bag, but he can still hear her stifled giggles from the living room.

When he finally settles down beside her on the couch, bowl of popcorn in hand, the movie's already started.

"Really, dear? The Matrix again?"

Anti-Wanda shrugs and leans into him, grabbing a handful of popcorn. He's pretty sure she only likes it because she thinks Neo's attractive (he doesn't swing that way, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have eyes). Still, he's never been one to turn down a classic-even if they have watched it at least six times already.

As Trinity flips, kicks, and shoots her way away from the Agents, Anti-Wanda steals the popcorn bowl and shifts, leaning back between Anti-Cosmo's legs and with her head on his chest. It's all got an oddly domestic feel to it.

Surprisingly, he finds himself nodding off only minutes later, just as Morpheus starts his speech. Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? Laurence Fishburn asks. He pulls off the creepy mysterious-hero-slash-mentor vibe pretty well, Anti-Cosmo has to admit. What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?

Occam's Razor, Anti-Cosmo thinks sleepily, his eyelids heavy. You would not.

He doesn't dream.

It's funny in a not funny, that was sarcasm sort of way. She's the one who was hit by a literal truck, but he's the one with the PTSD. She has no problem at all falling asleep (he should know; he's awake all night more often than not), no compulsive flinches whenever one of their neighbours' car alarms go off, no paralyzing flashbacks. Although, the doctors had said that she was most likely unconscious throughout the entire ordeal, so maybe there's nothing for her to remember in the first place. He's grateful for that, at least. He's not sure if he could cope if he had to fight off two sets of nightmares.

It's the middle of the night, probably about four; he doesn't want to check the clock. His head is pounding. With eyes wide open, he wrings his hands in his lap, clenching and unclenching his fists to the rhythm of her breaths. He's well aware that this shouldn't be soothing, but it is, for whatever reason. Uncharacteristically, he doesn't feel like analysing it.

Stifling a groan, he manoeuvres himself out of bed, careful not to wake his sleeping spouse. He stumbles into the bathroom and pops two zaleplon, avoiding his own gaze in the mirror. He slips back under the covers and closes his eyes. Somebody's beating a bat against the inside of his skull, and he swears he can hear the thunk-thunk-thunk of it in his ears.

But the pills are starting to work, and the pounding's somehow bearable, if a bit deafening.

It's so loud, he can't even hear Anti-Wanda's breathing.

He panics suddenly, scrambling to lean on his elbows and look over at her, the irrational need to make sure that she's still there, that she's alive and breathing and not gone overpowering any common sense he might have. She's there, of course. She was there two and a half minutes ago when he got up, thirty seconds ago when he laid back down. She's fine. Absolutely, perfectly, completely fine.

He lays down again, heart racing. If he wraps an arm around her and pulls her closer just in case, it's nobody's business.

They're having breakfast, bacon and pancakes and sunny-side-up eggs, and everything's just so 1950's American Dream-esque that Anti-Cosmo's half-convinced he's fallen into one of those mediocre sitcoms where every problem, no matter how big, can be solved in half an hour (minus commercials). He's staring at the newspaper but not really reading it while Anti-Wanda munches on another piece of her—admittedly drool-worthy—bacon, trying to focus on the print, but ultimately failing. It's just a big black blur. He sighs, removes his monocle and wipes it, but it doesn't make a difference. Resisting another sigh, he folds the paper neatly and sets it down.

Birds chirp, irritatingly cheerful, outside. It's the dictionary definition of a nice day, but sunshine and blue sky have never improved Anti-Cosmo's mood before, and they certainly don't now.

Anti-Wanda's stopped chewing and looks at him curiously. "If I hadn't died, where do you think we'd be?"

He freezes. "What?"

"I said, if I hadn't died, where do you think we'd be?"

"You—You're not dead," he protests, furrowing his eyebrows. "You're not. Close enough, but you survived. I was there when you woke up; I drove you home; we've stayed here ever since." He starts to contemplate calling the doctors again. She'd supposedly—miraculously—walked away without brain damage, but maybe it'd just taken a while for it to surface.

She looks at him with something akin to pity, and it makes him feel dirty. "Nobody would survive something like that."

"You did!"

"No, I didn't! You're not listening to me!" She shouts finally, her chair squeaking against the floor as she stands, slamming her fists on the table. They don't make a sound. "I'm not here, I'm dead, and you're hallucinating, you idiot! When have I ever been able to cook? When have I ever spoken English with any semblance of accuracy? I'm not even talking with an accent, for God's sake!"

Anti-Cosmo squeezes his eyes shut. "No."

With something that sounds like weariness, she says, "What do you mean, no?" There's no heat behind it, no scorn, just exhaustion.

"I mean, no. I'm dreaming right now—strange, disturbing dreams are a side effect of the sleeping pills, correct? It's just a dream," there's no other option. She's alive. She can't be d—

He's not sure of much nowadays, but there's no doubt in his mind that Anti-Wanda's alive and well.

The impostor stares him down, sinking back into her chair. "Fine. If this really is a dream, wake up. Or bend the rules of space-time, or something impossible like that. Really. Please, do it," she says, and Anti-Cosmo looks for some sign of mockery, but there's nothing but genuine hope in his wife's double. "I am on your side, you know. I don't want her to be dead any more than you do.

"But one of us has to be the rational one," she says, taking a deep breath. "So go on, then, wake us up."

He pinches himself, once, hard, on his forearm. It hurts. No. He pinches himself again, harder, wincing at the pain. Again. Nothing.

Again.

Again.

Again.

His arm's covered in dark nail marks, and it burns, and he looks up fearfully, but the impostor is gone.

ONE DEAD, TWO INJURED IN NIGHTTIME CRASH

One person is dead and two others have been rushed to the hospital after a crash occurred late last night at the corner of Smithfield and Norbert. The incident, which took place at approximately 1:45 A.M., involved only one vehicle.

The vehicle, a 2010 Chevy Silverado, was travelling down Smithfield when the driver lost control and allegedly hydroplaned, due to the downpour that had taken place earlier that night. He then crashed into a streetlamp beside the intersection. The driver and his passenger, a married couple who had been out celebrating their thirtieth anniversary, were taken to the hospital in stable condition and are expected to make a full recovery. One pedestrian, a 27-year-old woman, was critically injured and rushed to the hospital by paramedics, but did not survive the night.

Police have not ruled out impaired or reckless driving as a cause for this crash, and investigations are ongoing. Charges may be pressed if the driver is found to have been inebriated or speeding. Authorities have since reminded the public that speed limits are the absolute maximum a car should travel, and only apply in ideal conditions. If the road is slippery or visibility is reduced, it is highly recommended that drivers travel below the limit.

There has been no mention of repairing the road, which has been described by some as "cursed", as there have been no less than five collisions in the last two months. Smithfield street is notorious among residents for its many potholes, cracks, and large puddles post-rainstorm.

a few things:

1. this is titled as 9906 Illusion (ANGST. DEADLY ANGST (PUN NOT INTENDED)) in my doc manager.
2. occam's razor is a line of reasoning that says that the simplest answer to a question is often the correct one.
3. zaleplon is a sleep-inducing drug that can cause nightmares/extremely strange dreams, but doesn't usually.
4. this is 2009 words long, so a bit less than the previous ones, but this was more of a warm-up to get me back into writing these two than anything. i actually started about three other drafts of different 'shots before i started this, and i really wanted to finish one of those first so i didn't come back with a huge angst-fest, but what can you do?
5. i did a nice bit of foreshadowing in here, which i'm pretty proud of. just thought i'd mention that.
6. sorry for the pain. here, take some of my kleenex. it's allergy season, so i've got plenty to go around.
7. screw you, american-english spellcheck.

i feel like i should explain this one a bit? i dunno. essentially, in the beginning, i imagined anti-wanda as just coming from a date gone wrong with anti-cosmo, who probably ended up saying something horribly insulting because he's a bit of an ass sometimes, lets be honest. i don't know what he did, but it was rude. so anti-wanda's sad and mopey and sitting on the edge of a curb (bad idea) when this car comes out of nowhere and—well.

anti-cosmo gets the call and rushes over to the hospital-unfortunately, anti-wanda doesn't make it through. for lack of a better phrase, anti-cosmo flips his fucking lid.

and then he starts hallucinating. he starts creating fake memories of anti-wanda waking up and getting better, of movie nights and life generally being okay. of course, the rational part of him eventually realises what's going on and tries to snap him out of it, hence the anti-wanda 'impostor' in the second-to-last section.

p.s. if i don't post for a while, know that i haven't abandoned this. the muse is just fickle. i'm also very sorry for the hiatus, but there's a bright side: i'm a much better writer now than i was two years ago. if all goes well, expect the next update to feature anti-wanda kicking some serious booty, because i feel like i've neglected her a bit. i'm excited. are you excited? it's gonna be great.

a wild tumblr appears! galaxybriel . tumblr . com