Back at the table, I sit for a minute, then I say, “We have to go…” I say with urgency. I say it with meaning. I say it so that Ian understands that I don’t mean in five minutes. That we need to go right this very fucking minute.
I think I am going to vomit. My head is hurting even more. The echo is ten times worse. I see a lattice work, the kind that roses climb. It flashes before my eyes in quick bright strokes over and over again.
Ian says, “It’s okay, baby… just one minute. The food is almost here. You’ll be okay.”
“No, I have to go now…”
It is here that I try to stand up. I make it about half way, when I realize I cannot. The weight of it is too much. Gravity is so heavy. How does anyone stand up ever, I wonder? As I start to fall, two women at the next table say, “God, call 911 .. NOW!”
Imagine being at the bottom of a deep lake. You open your eyes and see people above the blurry green surface. Their faces are morphed into colors and sunlight dapples around, making strange shapes. Sound is muted and soft – everything is far away. None of the sound, the hub-bob of the world above could possibly have anything to do with you. Not you. You are too removed from that world. You are apart from it.
The sound comes in and out. What at first was muted, begins to sound like a speaker that is being hooked up. The sound fizzles in and out, echoes.
Then it happens: you realize that you have forgotten to breathe. Damn it. How stupid. You try to drink in a huge gasp of air, but instead find that you choke. It is like water filling your lungs. You are surely drowning. You want to cry, Help, help! But the words won’t come.
Finally, someone leans over you and puts a mask over your face. Nectar! Hallelujah, you can breathe again. You drink it in in long, greedy hungry swallows. You have never tasted oxygen this sweet, this delicious, this wonderful. You wonder, How could I not have noticed before now what a gift it is to breathe?
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