Anna didn’t know if it was life, death, dreams, or something altogether different. As in a dream, occurrences that would have been staggeringly bizarre to the waking mind, felt ordinary. Zen. That thought wafted through the utter darkness inside Anna’s skull. In dreams one was truly in the moment: no worries for the future, no regrets from the past, no expectations, therefore no surprises. The entire universe created in the mind, and the mind created in that universe. A sliding sensation followed by a hard whack to the small of her back startled Anna free of philosophy. Pain was real and actual. Pain made a person care, and damn quick, what was going to happen next, and what had happened a second ago. Pain meant she wasn’t dead and she wasn’t dreaming. Life was happening. Further than that, she couldn’t fathom. “Breathe,” she told herself. ABCs: airway, blood, circulation. Breathing was first. Of course she was breathing. Alive, one did that sort of thing. But it wasn’t easy.
