You'll Never Walk Alone
May. 11th, 2011 03:41 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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writing_shadows“Sometimes people carry to such perfection the mask they have assumed that in due course they actually become the person they seem.” - W. Somerset Maugham, 'The Moon and Sixpence'.
**
In Georgie Baker’s dream, there was a bleeping in her eardrums that wouldn’t stop. It was an electronic nag: a sharp, regular, high-toned emission perfectly pitched to worm its way into her brain and drive her mad. She ran, she screamed, she sang at the top of her lungs. “When you walk through a storm hold your head up high, and don’t be afraid of the dark.” She couldn’t make it stop.
When she opened her eyes the world was white and yellow light glared painfully from the ceiling. There was no golden sky, no sweet silver song of a lark. The whining tone hadn’t stopped yet, following her from sleep into her waking life: bleep, bleep, bleep, on and on, a metronome ticking off the seconds until she slipped away.
“I know who you are, Georgie Baker.”
There was a woman sitting on the chair by her bed, legs elegantly crossed. Her face was pale and indistinct like the rest of her, there but not there all at once.
“I’m sorry?”
The woman laughed. It was a soft, dry laugh: a laugh with no humour. “You should be.”
Georgie’s voice was weak and she couldn’t summon the breath to say anything else. The interminable bleeping began to slow ever so slightly, and she knew that she was dying.
The woman spoke again. “You were given a life, Georgie Baker. Just the one. The only one you’ll ever get. And what have you done with it, hmm?”
“I’ve helped people”, she muttered softly in reply, tears stinging to her drying eyes. “And if I die now, then in the eyes of the Lord --”
The strange, ghostly woman leaned in, crimson lips mere millimetres from Georgie's skin, and hissed her response menacingly into her ear. “Your God can’t help you now.”
Georgie was stunned into silence.
The fierce whisper continued, almost drowning out the beep beep beep of the monitor. “Stupid bitch. You’re a waste of oxygen, of course: there’s no denying that. But I might be able to use you.”
“Use me?” Every word was harder than the last, and Georgie Baker knew she didn’t have much time. “How?”
The woman pulled back and laughed that laugh again. “The answer to that is simple, Miss Baker: I can save your life. For a cost.”
Georgie closed her eyes and let the bleeping fill her mind again. She thought of the eternal reward she was soon to be granted, the resting place after a life of service and love. She thought of the warmth of coming home to the Holy Spirit, the freedom of her new body in Christ, the comfort of being reunited with her father and her Father. And then she thought of something that she couldn’t quite banish with her mustard-seed of faith, a spark of realisation that even the bleeping wouldn’t drown out.
She didn’t want to die.
She turned her head away from the welcoming glow, and when she spoke to the spectral stranger in the chair by her bed there was a new steel note in her voice. She peeled her chapped lips apart, croaked out the last words that Georgie Baker would ever speak.
“Name your price.”
**
In Georgie Baker’s dream, there was a bleeping in her eardrums that wouldn’t stop. It was an electronic nag: a sharp, regular, high-toned emission perfectly pitched to worm its way into her brain and drive her mad. She ran, she screamed, she sang at the top of her lungs. “When you walk through a storm hold your head up high, and don’t be afraid of the dark.” She couldn’t make it stop.
When she opened her eyes the world was white and yellow light glared painfully from the ceiling. There was no golden sky, no sweet silver song of a lark. The whining tone hadn’t stopped yet, following her from sleep into her waking life: bleep, bleep, bleep, on and on, a metronome ticking off the seconds until she slipped away.
“I know who you are, Georgie Baker.”
There was a woman sitting on the chair by her bed, legs elegantly crossed. Her face was pale and indistinct like the rest of her, there but not there all at once.
“I’m sorry?”
The woman laughed. It was a soft, dry laugh: a laugh with no humour. “You should be.”
Georgie’s voice was weak and she couldn’t summon the breath to say anything else. The interminable bleeping began to slow ever so slightly, and she knew that she was dying.
The woman spoke again. “You were given a life, Georgie Baker. Just the one. The only one you’ll ever get. And what have you done with it, hmm?”
“I’ve helped people”, she muttered softly in reply, tears stinging to her drying eyes. “And if I die now, then in the eyes of the Lord --”
The strange, ghostly woman leaned in, crimson lips mere millimetres from Georgie's skin, and hissed her response menacingly into her ear. “Your God can’t help you now.”
Georgie was stunned into silence.
The fierce whisper continued, almost drowning out the beep beep beep of the monitor. “Stupid bitch. You’re a waste of oxygen, of course: there’s no denying that. But I might be able to use you.”
“Use me?” Every word was harder than the last, and Georgie Baker knew she didn’t have much time. “How?”
The woman pulled back and laughed that laugh again. “The answer to that is simple, Miss Baker: I can save your life. For a cost.”
Georgie closed her eyes and let the bleeping fill her mind again. She thought of the eternal reward she was soon to be granted, the resting place after a life of service and love. She thought of the warmth of coming home to the Holy Spirit, the freedom of her new body in Christ, the comfort of being reunited with her father and her Father. And then she thought of something that she couldn’t quite banish with her mustard-seed of faith, a spark of realisation that even the bleeping wouldn’t drown out.
She didn’t want to die.
She turned her head away from the welcoming glow, and when she spoke to the spectral stranger in the chair by her bed there was a new steel note in her voice. She peeled her chapped lips apart, croaked out the last words that Georgie Baker would ever speak.
“Name your price.”
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no subject
Date: 2011-05-11 03:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-05-11 03:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-05-11 09:16 pm (UTC)I'm really glad you liked it! <3