My Last Night in Line Flight

There is an emptiness. A sort of, full and defeated emptiness that washes over a person when their very last strand of hope is snapped. It's dark. It's thick. It's suffocating. It's like a pit that you've fallen into and hit the bottom of. You begin to feel a cloth being dragged over you. First at your feet, then at your midsection, until slowly it is covering your face; your mouth. You can feel each individual strand of fiber as it is stuffed into your mouth and down your throat, sucking the air from your lungs, extinguishing you life. That's what it feels like when your last strand of hope is severed.

I've been to the bottom of that pit. I've seen the bottom and I have tasted that cloth. I have choked on those fibers. I have felt that last strand and suffered at its reverberations as it snapped and a calm chaos took over. The fight was over. The battle was lost. I admit, the encounter was shorter than I had expected. I thought I had more in me. Thought there would be more fight left in these bones. And I'm not mad, exactly, to be wrong. But I am scarred. Broken. And reassembled into something else.

It is no easy feat, to drag oneself out of that pit. To look up and see the daylight once again. To breathe the air that is there. To reach out and touch another human being, and to feel it. I'm not sure if it's strength, or endurance, or simple stubbornness  that brought me back into the light; brought me back to life. Hell, I'm not even sure it was me at all. And perhaps, if circumstances had been different, I fear there is a chance I would not have made it out alive...

I had been in line flight, in boot camp, for exactly one week. It was close to lights out, 2100. Earlier in the day our MTI's had said if we were good and finished our work in time then we might be able to open letters. They said that many of us had already gotten some letters. My heart swelled. It had only been a week and yet, I was so beaten down, I was in such disbelief that I'd make it out of this. But a letter! Words from home. Love from home. Home. Home. Home. I held onto that feeling all day. I was tired and I was sore and I was sick. And I was weakened. I was desperate for anything to keep me going. I was frantic for words of encouragement. I was starved to feel that I was loved and I was missed. I was at my wits end and absolutely desperate for the slightest, absolute smallest bit of hope I could wrap my tiny bit of strength around. Anything. I held tight. I prayed all day. I willed a letter to be waiting for me. I could see the image so clearly in my head. I was so sure I had one waiting... I needed it more badly than the sullen flower needs the sun's rays.

We were called into our day room of the dorms. We sat still and quiet and listened to the end of day briefing. And then, finally; finally. The MTI help up a bucket and announced that she'd be passing out mail. She took out the stack; and boy did it look big! Surely, surely I had one. I only needed one. I wasn't going to be greedy. I just needed one. It didn't even have to be long. Just a few words...

One by one they called out names. One after the other. I clenched my fists so tightly I broke my nails. I bit my lips raw. I held on so tightly that every muscle that didn't already ache, ached harder. Some girls got more than one. One girl got eight. She covered her mouth and let out a cry of wholesome relief. I watched her with tears of my own in my eyes. Thankful for her relief, but growing more and more desperate as each name was called that was not mine dwindled the pile smaller and smaller. Time seemed to stop. I held my vision in my mind; I pictured it clearly. I held out hope. I held on. Until... the last envelope held was called out.

Not my name. Not my name. Not my name. My name was not called. The air was sucked out of my lungs. My blood turned to ice. I felt the literal crack in my heart as it stopped. Everything that was there, just... fell apart. I fell to the ground, covering my face in my hands; sobbing. The MTI walked out.

Snap. My last thread. My last connection. My last hope. Destroyed. Gone. Depleted. I was shouldered back to my bunk where I crawled underneath the scratchy covers and sobbed. I cried for hours and hours, my tiny pillow unable to soak up any more tears, until I finally had zero strength left and I couldn't breathe. I thought for sure I was going into cardiac arrest. And I didn't fight it. I just gave up and gave in as I slumped to the floor. Dropped to the floor for the girl who was holding me up was not prepared to take my full weight. The world became blurry and cold. Even more so than it already was. There was tugging and pulling as someone attempted to dress me. There was talking. Someone calling a name. Was it my name? I had forgotten my name. There were stairs and cool air. Voices. Words. Anger. An ambulance. A hospital.