Hyper-Sensitivity

I kept the window slit thin

—my first conscious act of self-protection as we entered the car.

A fumbled hop-and-shuffle to the back seat, with the inability to fully relax, given the shoulder position of my gunshot wound.

“Please don’t stain her back seat, ple-ease don’t stain her back seat...” I internally murmured to myself. I felt warm streams of blood finding fabric cohesion to the thin veil of warmth, my hospital gown provided.

Looking out the window, the usual visual flair of city night lights fell flat, like a soul-smothering display of naiveté to the truth of spiritual suffering I had experienced. Numb tears flowed as my mind raced through memories, of my muffled cries held within the traveling metal walls of the EMS. With each passing window, I was unusually jealous of the oblivious unawareness city citizens had to the robbery of my human innocence.

My bodily shock was heightened by the stinging breeze of warm Summer air passing through the insufficient warmth of my hospital nightgown. I worked to maintain my dignity and silent respectfulness, through an overwhelming volume of questions as we rode home.

Street view of Minneapolis: “Looking out the window, the usual visual flair of city night lights fell flat, like a soul-smothering display of naiveté to the truth of spiritual suffering I had experienced.”

Small talk was muted by my mind’s adjustments to new levels of energetic hypersensitivity. Paranoia chained it's home deeper into my psyche, with the break friction of each red stoplight.

1 green light, 3 red lights, 1 green light, 1 more green light, and 1 red light. Left turn–home.

“I’ll call you two tomorrow”, his Mom yelled casually out the window as we stepped onto the entrance steps of our brownstone apartment.

Exposure.

“Thank you”, we said as I painfully walked, with pace, up the steps to the front entrance door.

“Jasmine, hol-hold-on. Let me help you”, my partner said as he watched me nervously shuffle through my keychain in my efforts to identify the proper key.

My internal paranoia rapidly accelerated with the shift of space–from the unconscious safety of his Mom’s car to the illusive darkness of a June night sky. Our underdressed appearance by hospital gown and my stocking cap–were suddenly in view for 1 AM passerby-ers.

“I just need to get this blood off my arm”, I sternly whisper through tears as my partner worked to steady my hand and identify our front entrance key.

Re-enactment image: Brownstone apartment

Pushing through the doorway, our oversized nightgowns flowed against the fabric of the swirl-patterned carpet and stucco-textured, walls as we escalated the stairway of our building. The 3-story non-elevator charm of our brownstone was quickly overshadowed by the toiling physical feat of skin abrasion avoidance, to our freshly fired body wounds.

I could feel the anxiety of my homecoming anticipation increase, as we approached our door.

The weight of blood between my left shoulder wound and the sticky cohesion of the nightgown fabric was failing. Gravity had shifted the fabric’s captured pool of blood to a single spirit-dissolving stream, which eagerly dripped down my left arm, in an act of escapism.

Click.

I immediately ran to the bathroom.

“I REALLY need to get this blood off my arm”, I shakingly cried as I painfully shuffled myself out of the hospital nightgown.

Taking off clothes that weren’t my own. A tailored reminder of the removal of my joy, as all of our clothes, were cut and taken as evidence at the hospital.

Sharing our small bathroom was always a feat. Our one-bedroom flat bathroom was a 12x5 ft. vertical window-facing heat-bearing box. The right side lined by an in-wall sink, single mirror, and tub.

A white ivory clawfoot bathtub, requiring dual circular shower liner and curtain placement–which were often immediately felt on the body with the assistance of any gust of wind blowing from the single-hung window, on a warm Summer day.

“Okay, slow down. Let me help you”, he sighed.

I could feel my body resisting the speed of my needled composure. My mind mentally expected the unhinged, fire-scorched ligaments of my left shoulder to move faster than humanly possible.

Re-enactment image: “Our one-bedroom flat bathroom was a 12x5 ft. vertical window-facing heat-bearing box. The right side lined by an in-wall sink, single mirror, and tub.”

“I just need to stop this bleeding”, I say with frustration, as I forcefully turn on the warm water and grab a towel from the metal bathroom rack with my right hand.

With labored breath and hesitation, I slowly attempt to wipe the single stream of blood, upward, toward my gun-inflicted shoulder wound.

“Be careful!”, he yells with concern as he grabs my hand to stop my motion.

“I’m just trying to get this blood off!”, I scream at him through tears.

For the first time all night, I was able to see the brokenness of his composure. His mental disconnect from his own pain. I saw the guilt, shame, and disappointment in his eyes, at his inability to protect me.

He quickly grabbed a flat cotton swab from the metal rack in an attempt to assist.

“Oooof!”, I winch in pain from his touch on the rawness of my gunshot wound. “I’m just trying to help you!”, he yells in exhausted confusion.

The intimacy of our small bathroom was suffocating.

“I can’t take a shower! This blood keeps rolling down my arm and I’m tired!”, I shouted through tears. “I’m tired!”

In the unfair realization of our anger, he guides me to the window-facing left side of the bed, lays down a towel, and says, “Let’s get some rest.” I always sleep on my left side. The disorienting requirement to sleep on my back was an additional mental riot to the unrequested intrusion of pain by gunfire.

Photo re-enactment: “In the unfair realization of our anger, he guides me to the window-facing left side of the bed, lays down a towel, and says, “Let’s get some rest.”

Wounded himself, he grabs my right hand as he crawls into the bed with a gauze-wrapped right arm. A visually incomparable difference in treatment from the hospital-level finger band-aid I was given post-bodily trauma.

“I love you so much”, he says through tears, squeezing my right hand with his left as he lies in the bed.

“I love you too,” I say exhausted in pain.

From the corner of my eye, I could see my phone’s light-show display of text message alerts and calls from friends and family, I was all too exhausted to address. Power down.

We tap heads as we try to gather some rest. My parents would be on their way up north from out of state the next morning, and the house was a mess.

“I’ll worry about it in the morning”, I say to myself, as we drifted off to sleep.