In The Blink Of An Eye

I don't know how or what just happened. All I know is the following happened so fast that I don't remember half of the story.

I do know that we haven't been travelling long. We may have been on the motorway for about five seconds, and now here I sit in the car, trembling with a pounding heart.

We were happily cruising down the motorway, all packed up and ready for a holiday.

"No, silly...not that way!" were the last words I heard from my friend Jess, who was arguing with her boyfriend, Allan, who was driving the car. They were arguing over where we should turn off once we reached the end of the motorway to get to the beach.

I remember we stopped the car at a pub to ask for directions.

Was Allan driving for five seconds or five minutes?

I really can't remember.

I hear a voice, but it sounds muffled. My friends are extremely quiet in the back of the car.

I want to check on them, but my neck feels paralyzed and burning hot. I can't turn it.

I stare out of the window. Blue lights appear before me, though they appear to be nothing but a blur of colours.

I stare blankly.

I do not know how we got here.

"Are you alright, madam?"

A police officer speaks to me, but I don't reply. I just tremble and stare at nothing in particular. Everything just looks blank, and I can't speak.

"Allan? Jesse?" I try to call, but no reply.

I can hear the car door opening, and people are moving in the back of the car, but my mind is too confused to think what just happened.

"She's gone."

I think I heard someone say that, but I am not sure whether it was what they said or whether I'm hearing things.

Somebody puts a blanket around me and tries to lift me.

I scream in agony.

When I regain my focus, I realize I am sitting in a wheelchair.

Two paramedics are pushing two stretchers holding a young woman and a man.

I freeze.

Were we in a car crash?

My mind shakes the thought away as soon as it comes in.

"We can't do anything else."

I overhear these words from a male who had been looking after the female patient.

"Could it be Jesse? Please, no," my mind silently screams at me inside.

I can't speak aloud.

I sit there, staring into space as if my mind is trying to erase all memories of what just happened.

I close my eyes.

When I wake, I am lying in a hospital bed with a drip in my arm and an artificial breathing apparatus over my mouth.

A nurse visits me, and she tells me that Jesse died today.

I stare at the ceiling. My mind has been warped by today's terrifying events. I don't hear the rest of the conversation.

Everything happened so fast.

One minute, we were enjoying ourselves, and then, in the blink of an eye, I was here, unable to recall anything that just happened.

"I am so sorry to bring you this news," I finally hear the nurse tell me.

"Your friend Jesse passed away today."

"What?" I ask, shocked and unable to process my thoughts.

It feels like I am hearing things, not in my own reality, but in a completely different reality.

"But, I saw her a minute ago," I exclaim.

"Can you tell me anything about the accident?" the nurse asked me.

"What accident? I don't know." I reply.

I shut my eyes.

I open them again within a minute.

"Jesse," I call my friend's name, I shut my eyes, and I never wake up.

We need to enjoy life while we have it.

It can be taken in from us in the blink of an eye.

Seconds, or minutes.

"In the blink of an eye, anything can happen."