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PROLOGUE | THE AWAKENING
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something is wrong with me. it all means nothing. / only for a long time now our hearts / have seemed like dead scorpions / in our bodies sealed like jars of spirit.
-sappho: a play in verse // lawrence durrell
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Jackie Hanlon knew something was wrong when she woke up under her bed. Yes; that's right — under her bed. Not on the floor beside it in a tangle of blankets. If that had been the case, she wouldn't have blinked an eye. In years past, she'd fallen off her bed in the middle of night plenty of times. This, however, was completely, utterly, totally different.
All over her body, she could feel nothing except the itchy sensation of pins and needles. With a dry mouth and throbbing head, Jackie rolled out from under her bed and sat up with a loud groan. One hand pressed to her forehead, she raised her other to press down on her bed for assistance in standing. But her hand fell through air and the oddest sensation rushed through her veins.
"The hell?" she grumbled, staring down at her hand.
This time, Jackie watched as she moved her hand to her bed. Her hand went down to touch the mattress, but as soon as her skin touched it, her hand went through the bed. Letting out a small yelp, Jackie scrambled up and clutched her hand to her stomach.
"You're imagining things," she told herself, trying to grip onto sanity. "That didn't just happen."
