Cartastrophe AKA: Death of a Honda

Scrt-BANG! That is the sound of me dying. Or so I thought. Somewhere, not so far away, a teenaged girl is speeding and sending a text message. She doesn't see me. A sound, a jolt, and momentary blackness. Then I am flying into the parking lot, hitting the brake, barely remembering to park, and, somehow, on the ground in the parking lot. I'm hyperventilating. I know that. I know that I need to stop. That that isn't helping. I walk in a circle, sit down, and rock. Try to tell myself not to do that. That it looks abnormal. People swarm me and speak him-chee-nee. I say whatever I think will get them to be silent and leave me to my rapid breathing. I try to call my mom. My priorities, as usual, are screwed up. I want to apologize for getting the car she bought me broken to bits. I assume that she will be furious. Because inanimate objects are super important and irreplaceable, m'kay? I ooze panic everywhere. More him-chee-nee is uttered in response. My phone is taken away. A stranger calls, and freaks out, my mother. My hands take on a life of their own and another strangers holds them at my sides. Keeps them still. Stresses me out. More strangers stroke my head. Rub my back. Pat my arms. My skin crawls. No. Convulses. The stranger keeping my hands immobilized has to expend more effort into the job as a result.

I cry in front of a crowd of strangers. Ask about the other driver. Promptly forget the answer and ask again. Ask what the back of the car looks like. "Don't think about that right now." Panic because any answer other than "not too bad" is horrible. I get up and inspect the car. Burst into tears. Squeak for good measure. Decide that my mother will murder me on site. Look at the other car. Decide that the driver has to be dead dead dead. My boss appears out of nowhere. I ask if I need to clock back in. I'm late now, probably. I am told that my job is fine. That I don't need to worry about it.

My mother arrives. Paramedics arrive. Police swarm. The police as questions, witnesses say things, the other driver says contradictory things. Paramedics take my vitals. My heart rate is ridiculously high. My blood pressure is 190/120. That's bad. I panic. I'm dying. Oh God. "No, no", the paramedics say, "your blood pressure AND heart rate are up. That is normal! If ONLY your blood pressure was high, then we would worry." I don't buy it. My grandmother arrives. I follow her around. Cling. Make sure that she is very well away of the fact that I love her, because I don't want to die with her thinking otherwise. She assures me that she already knew that and that I am not, in fact, dying.

Onlookers talk. More people come out of the store to see if something blew up. They crowd around. Make conversation about the wreckage. Both cars are totaled. A tow truck comes to take my car to the graveyard junkyard. Tells us we can come get anything that survived in the trunk (everything, amazingly enough) tomorrow (Thursday). Everyone says "go to the hospital. you may not feel anything NOW, but you will once the adrenaline wears off."

Fast forward 10 million years. I'm in the truck. Freaking out. Someone is going to hit us. Finish what she started. Interstate? INTERSTATE?! We are all going to die! My grandmother peers at my face in the mirror. Tells me to calm down. That we're fine. Nothing will happen. I don't buy it. I just hope that only I am killed. It won't be so bad as long as they aren't taken with me. They are important. Needed. I check my ears every five seconds to make sure I'm not bleeding or oozing brain matter. More convinced that the next time will be "it".

We get to the hospital. I forgot every shred of ID in my mother's car. She goes back for them. Meanwhile, my grandmother sits in the waiting room while I have my vitals checked again. 113/70. Heart rate still too damn high. We get a room. I get naked. Put on a gown. Shiver. Receive the Gift of Blankets. Doctors and nurses are in and out. Asking questions, bringing paper work, drawing blood. A billion x-rays are ordered. I get to ride a bed in there. After that, we chill in my room. Well...my mother and grandmother chill. I panic every few minutes because the heart rate monitor keeps losing my pulse and screaming at us. We're there for 5 more hours. Psychiatrists come in. Ask me things. Ask my mom things. Mom brings up AS. Specifically whether I could have it without her noticing for years. "Absolutely!" and then symptoms that I meet are listed. Back on topic, they want me to see someone because it's be over 6 hours and I am still not calm. Appointments are made. We are sent home. My x-rays come back. Nothing broken. More paperwork and I am sent home with instructions to come back if pain persists.

Pain persists.