Ernest Hemmingway

It is fall.

He sits at his desk, eyes glazed in some far-off thought, face drawn as dark things best left buried begin to stir in the late hour; begin to open their coffins and rise from their beds of grave dirt to haunt the hollow hallways of his mind. His hands are stilled, in their usual position: thin white fingers curled over a black keyboard. They are silent and waiting. They are nervous soldiers, standing at attention for orders that may never come.

And the commander lets out a latent sigh, no longer seeing his walls; this weary creature struggles only to discern the future, or what little he has left of it. And time and time again, his divinations fail, returning blank and empty handed. The crystal balls are cracked, in the wake of his cheerless shadow. The cards are burned. Teacups smashed.

If previous episodes of this nature had any evidence to show, several hours would have passed like this,

were it not for the sudden jab of  pain in his chest.

The tired eyes suddenly flicker from their barren visions, and a pale hand rises, presses against his heart as another blow comes. This time, worse. The breath leaves him, and his shoulders bow inward as his heart flutters wildly like a bird trapped in the maw of a bear-trap.

And he can only see blackness.

It’ll pass, he says to himself. It’ll pass, it’ll pass.
Ignore it.

Breathe.

Following his own demand,  he draws in a shaky lungful of air, but suddenly stops, holding it, as his ribs seize too. A long string of curses erupt in his mind, when a flood of pain takes over.

It stabs, stabs, stabs, with every white-hot heartbeat. It radiates to his back. His shoulders. Through his ribs and up his neck. Like a wildfire, it spreads, eating at every taut muscle and sinew like dry kindling. Trapped in its clutches, he can do nothing but ball his fist against his chest and try to breathe once more.

He turns his head to search for an orange medication bottle - but oh, a terrible mistake, as he hits an absolute burning wall, and his throat closes in; he gasps with the motion and nearly chokes. Rolling his eyes with a frantic frustration, he grits his teeth and tries to stand, groaning with the effort.

The agony brings him to his knees, chair crashing to the floor behind him. His arms wrap around his chest, and his eyes shut tight, a high, pathetic sound escaping his broken throat and clenched jaw. And he waits. Head bowed. Legs crumpled beneath him. Frozen from where he fell, too terrified to try to move again.

He knows when he is beaten.

Several minutes pass, and at length, the grip of pain lessens. Tentatively, carefully, he moves his head, and finds it free of consequence. His heart still rails against its cage, his hand never moving from its aching position, but there is enough freedom now to jump at the opportunity. Dizzy, he climbs to his feet and finds the orange medication bottle mixed in with its many brethren, all in disarray on the coffee table. Shakily, slowly, he removes his hand from his chest only long enough to pry off the cap. He accepts the white pill on his tongue, like a wafer from a priest, and he takes it with a sip of afternoon-warm water, bitterly wishing it were wine.

...He knows that the ache will remain for several hours still, but the seizing muscles finally rest after a handful of minutes, and at last, he exhales heavily, his shoulders dropping with some relief. He presses his face against the cool wood of the chipped coffee table for a moment and just enjoys the act of free breathing, as his heart begins to slow its mad pace.

At length, he remembers his original task - answering a single email - and he returns to his desk, trying to forget about the episode, trying to move on. Thoughts begin to reform, lines connecting from point to point, where they had been interrupted. Threads reunited.The chair is hauled upright, the papers reorganized.

And one sticks out from the rest.

A small yellowed note, once taped to his monitor, some years ago. Scrawled in a calligraphy ink, when he’d gone through that particular artistic phase.

Write hard and clear about what hurts.

He swallows, and moves like a sleepwalker, laying the paper down with gentleness, letting a bitten fingernail linger over the words as though a long forgotten lover’s letter. A familiar forlorn look enters his face. Recognizing the famous quote and the implications its had in his life over the course of a decade.

Sinking into his chair, his hands return to their usual position, standing at the ready.

Alright.

What hurts? he asks himself.

Everything, comes the reply.

But it was too much to tackle as a subject, and his fingers leave their black keyboard to rest at his temples, and brush away the sudden, surprising beginnings of hot tears. Everything was overwhelming. Everything was his harrowing past, his luckless present, and his desolate future. Everything threatened to drown his lungs in dark water and chew through his stomach with horrendous angler-fish teeth.  His anxious heart rallies again, and his breath catches in his chest, this time free of physical pain, but, in pain nonetheless. In a routine mental exercise, he shoves it all away, crams all the noise behind the wrought iron doors in the hallway of his head. He shouts at them until they quiet,

and at last, his eyes are dry.

But.

This is not what Hemmingway meant, he thinks to himself. His head is still in his hands.

There is another note.

He pulls the yellow corner free from the pile of loose drawings, watercolor splashes, and overdue bills. The same inky hand is scrawled here too, and he sighs.

There is nothing to writing.

All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.

His mouth twists, and he grips his shoulder still raw with last night’s self-inflicted wounds.

Truth, he says.

He lays the two notes side by side, and his hands are restored for the third time to their keyboard. He bows his head, thinking.

And ultimately,

reluctantly,

the doors are swung open,

the orders given,

and the weary creature is honest with himself.

----------------------------------

don't know if I should own up to this, but. 

true story. 

esophageal and diaphragm spasms are a real bitch. believe you me. 

they often cause heart palpitations and panic attacks.

medication mentioned is hyoscyamine, a muscle relaxer.

quotes are all from ernest hemmingway.