It feels like it should be different: it should all be different.

 

Last night, the growing storm in my head reflected the growing storm outside: fierce, stinging darts of rain. A ‘lazy’ wind blowing right through me: strong, powerful, cold. Disorienting and unstoppable, a whirling dervish.

 

Eventually I tried to huddle in on myself to keep warm and sheltered and I prayed it would soon end. I could not close my eyes in case I was lost, but eventually both the storm and I collapsed exhausted.

 

This morning I stretched widely, then curled back in on myself due to the pain and foreboding.

“Has it all gone? Is it lost?!”

“No.” The reply is puzzled, a little dismissive. Incredulous: “The garden enjoyed the wash, I think.”

 

A ‘wash’! That torrent of torment that still echoes in my skull?! ‘Enjoyed?’ Is it not in desperate pain, as I am!? Ow! I should stop shouting so loudly.

 

I look out and the garden is clean and calm, crisp and cool.

 

Did I take on its pain?? What’s happening?

 

The red wine still slowly spills from the upturned glass beside me; the bottles surround it like a moat. 

 

Oh.