Perpetual Rain ✓

Solace

Your knees buckled under your weight as you came crashing down to the ground, hands flying to your stomach as you curled in on yourself. A scream threatened to crawled up your throat and erupt from your lips like a valve bursting from pressure, but your jaw clenched too tight to allow it to escape. It felt like your insides were being crushed, held in a vise grip by the devil himself as he rolled his fingers, attempting to turn your organs to mush. The pain was like nothing you had experienced before. Everything ached, from the top of your head to the tips of your toes, bones feeling as fragile as glass, some even feeling as though they had already shattered and the shards were now scraping at the muscles and shredding them like paper. An intense sensation of heat seared your body, like you were on fire. Though your extremities felt as cold as the winter ice and that chill was starting to radiate upward as if no longer having access to sufficient blood flow. Teeth gritting, you tried to bare the most excruciating pain you had ever felt in your life. You'd give anything to make it stop.

Your bloodshot eyes forced themselves to open, trying to see if there was someone, anyone, who could help you. But as soon as your lids lifted, it all stopped. The pain and anguish seeped out of your pores in an instant.

You shot your head around, looking for answers. Where was the truck that just hit you? Where had the pain gone? Where... were you?

Confusion was the first thing to creep in and replace the pain. This wasn't where you last remembered being, the street was foreign to you, and not even the glow of the street lights through the downpour of rain seemed the slightest bit recognizable. It was dark, shadows were cast over everything and the only light source was the beaming street lights that lined the roads endlessly.

You were facing an alley, kneeling before it as if in prayer but that couldn't be further from the truth. You were lost, in every sense of the word. Getting your bearings, you realized you needed to stand. You pulled one leg from under your body and stomped it onto the pavement, stretching out as you unfolded your body. You were cautious, though the pain had dissipated, and you worried one wrong move and it would all come rushing back.  You being on your feet did nothing to clear the metaphorical and literal fog you could see straight down the unending alleyway you faced and the hailing rain did little to clear the haze. 

Your umbrella, where was it? The fabric of your hoodie was starting to absorb the rain like a sponge. You looked at the crosswalk, but there was nothing there, just the ominous ripples of raindrops as they hit the ground. Maybe you put it back in your bag?

Your eyes went to your hip, reaching for that maroon messenger bag you had brought with you, but your hands only met air. There was no bag, no acid washed jeans that you put on that afternoon, the hoodie wasn't even a hoodie. You were in a completely new set of clothing than what you were wearing just minutes ago.

They were still your clothes, but now your body was covered in black ripped jeans, that were soaked straight to your skin, and a baggy overthrow long sleeved shirt with a hood, tie-dyed purple, and blue. You remembered these clothes, you knew you owned them, but why were you wearing them?

You quickly began to side step, looking around you in hopes of understanding where it was you ended up, your attention was drawn to a single car, parked at an angle just down the alley way. There was a man standing beside the vehicle, he wore a coat that stretched to his thighs that was hiked up a few inches due to his elevated arm. He was holding his hand above his eyes, looking in your direction as he tried to shield his vision from the cold rain and street lights.

Was he looking for you? You took a step forward, venturing from the striped white lines of the crosswalk and closer to the baleful alley.

"Hello?" You called out, though you were unsure if your voice even stretched across the length of the alley to reach the man. You didn't know what possessed you to call out to the man in the first place, you didn't even know where you were. Was that choice really a smart one?