＃１１

She did not feel numb. Numbness is, after all, something that can be felt: a whole-body novocaine borne of heartbreak or shock, a complete dulling of the nervous system that nevertheless proves its continued presence. “I feel numb”, one may realise, and wield this thought as mental cattle prod — poking around for a reaction, half hoping to find none so as to extend the sedative.

But she did not feel numb, for she did not feel at all. She was not herself; she was no longer anyone. Her conscious experience had simply ceased to be, leaving neither sign nor scar of a prior tenant. All that remained of her was a flickering cognitive pilot light, the very barest glimmer of animacy, its only role to now and then shift her gaze an inch across the stucco ceiling.