Lost in the flood by P. D. Viner.
From a title by Julia La Bua
He is not sure if it is blood or water or a mixture of the two. He cannot feel his leg – the concrete bar holds it, crushes it. At least that is what he thinks has him trapped; he cannot see. Everything is pitch, and the air swirls with dust and dirt that claws at his eyes and throat. He coughs hard and feels pain and tastes blood. He can feel nothing below his waist. He can see nothing, just hear the drip, drip, drip of liquid falling a distance and then splattering on the floor. Blood? Is he draining slowly away? Not sure. He tries to recall the last hour or two but nothing is tangible, there are just clouds in his head. His mind drifts. Diluvian. Post and ante. He remembers that from school – History? He can’t recall. He remembers the flood, learning about Noah, but it’s all scrambled with the memory of a huge storm from when he was a child – maybe seven or eight years old. The roads around school were all flooded. He remembers the steps that led down to the playground; they were like a waterfall. The caretaker had to lay planks down, some kid shouted it’s pirate day. School was suddenly closed and they were all told to go… run… flee for your lives. Wouldn’t happen now. They’d let them drown rather than send them out to walk home alone. Kids are hardly left on their own now. He had his own door key when he was eight and Christ… he feels something shift and the drips turn into a deluge. If that is blood he will be dead very soon. He thinks he should pray, but if he doesn’t die he will hate himself later for cracking at the very end. Just breathe, breathe in the dirt and ash. A sound, the memory of a deafening firework, cuts through the cotton wool that crowds out the thoughts in his head. He remembers it was muffled, like it was wrapped in cotton wool – and then he dropped, like a stone – or like an albatross falling from the sky, pierced by an arrow. It was early. Early? What does that mean?
From somewhere far off there is a banging of metal.
‘I’m here.’ The trapped man opens his mouth but only a croak comes out of it. He cannot yell for his life. He tries to move an arm, find something to rattle or strike his tomb with but… He remembers Ray Miland buried alive, scratching at the coffin lid.
Not me, for Christ’s sake – that can’t be me.
He lashes his hands out to feel in debris around him, but there is nothing. Just metal, concrete and ash.
Where the hell is he? But his mind is empty. He wants to remember except – there is a sudden flash of knowledge.
Whatever happens, he cannot tell… must not tell them anything.
Suddenly, from some distance above him, there is the screech of metal on metal as a door or window opens high above. Light, like a searchlight floods across him revealing the tangled mass of metal and concrete that should be his legs. All around, the air is full of ash angels who dance as if they are about to ascend.
‘Is someone down there?’ a voice bellows.
‘Y – yes’ is the reply – little more than a whisper. His eyes dart over the wreckage, he can see nothing of himself down there. His heart starts to race. The man above him does not hear the thin words and turns to another figure behind him.
‘Please’ is all the man can whisper, hoping his rescuer will not close the door on him and leave forever. He feels a rumble in his stomach and chest and a howl erupts from him that is not human – feral and without language.
