sickness

I awoke unable to determine where I was. I was on a bed, so I couldn’t be at my friend’s house where I always slept on the sofa... but this was an unfamiliar bed and an unfamiliar room. As my eyes adjusted and I was able to focus I realised that I was in fact at my friend’s house and recalled that, after vomiting, I had fallen asleep in the bedroom whilst the others were still drinking and talking in the living room. For some reason, they had not woken me but had, instead, slept on the sofa themselves. I got up and went to the toilet. I returned to the bed (I’d slept on top of it fully clothed) and a few moments later my friend and his girlfriend walked into the room and got into their bed next to me. I got up and went to the sofa where I lay down for a few minutes before having to race to the bathroom to throw up once more.

                At 08:30 my friend had to walk to the office to work the Saturday shift. I said I’d walk with him and as I got up to put my shoes on I had to run to the toilet and throw up again. With this done, we walked to the office and spoke about the night before. Much of it was a hazy memory. Upon the walk I was feeling emotional. I felt alone. I saw a mother, with her child in a pram, looking at flowers, just before 9am, and it made me cry with a sudden feeling of love for every human being on the whole cruel planet. Everyone grasping for some form of happiness and contentment. Everyone trying to make it against the odds. I felt a tremendous longing to see every human being happy or, at least, to have the things that they need. It suddenly seemed that everyone I saw was sad. Even the young lovers in the back seat of a car smiling at each other as the car passed me... there was something in their faces that seemed tragic. Every young mother, every teenager, everyone walking to work, every old man or woman walking in pain with a walking stick... all seeking purpose... all clinging to their dignity... all still hoping for certain things and all deserving of peace and some flicker of happiness... all, at the very least, deserving of their basic needs being fulfilled.

                I arrived at my car, which was parked in the office parking lot, and realised that I was too sick to drive... I walked into the office and used the toilet. Washing my hands waves of nausea flooded through me and my body became enveloped in a cold sweat. I decided to use the lift to go upstairs to the kitchen for some cold water but as I stepped into the lift I had to run urgently back to the toilet... without time to close the door I began to vomit violently. Once done, I got back into the lift and went up for a glass of water. In the momentary lapse between fits of vomiting I felt okay and realised this was my opportunity to get into my car and drive as far as I could before the next wave of vomiting came over me. About ten miles from home I began breathing heavily in an attempt to hold the vomit at bay... and I succeeded. When I pulled up on the drive way I had to dash out of the car, across the garden, into the house and up the stairs to vomit. I poured a glass of water, got undressed, went back to bed, and fell asleep.