San Francisco by Night
Adrien Griever
His breath came rapidly...the little gasps for and puffs of air
entering and fleeing his lungs moving much faster than the traffic jam on the streets
below. It was March 28, 1996...and Adrien Griever lay bleeding to death in his bathtub.
The self-inflicted wounds on his wrists and the gash on his forehead bled surprisingly
slowly to him. He nearly collapsed when he had seen his own blood flowing from the
wounds...and had fallen face-first into the mirror over the sink. The impact shattered the
mirror, and the shards of reflective glass and silver had lacerated his his head from brow
to temple.
His eyes, as gray as stones blinked slowly...and a slow smile curled at his paling lips.
He would be with Lilly again soon, and their daughter who didn't live long enough to have
a name. The pain had disappeared now, and Adrien's eyes slowly fluttered shut for what
should have been the final time.
His eyes snapped open once again...and he was being rushed down the sterile hallways of
the Emergency room. Hypodermics being slammed into his being every few seconds, keeping
the near-dead man alive for those few precious minutes it would take to give a
transfusion.
He heard one of the EMT's say that his landlady had phoned in, apparently old Mrs.
Stevenson upstairs heard all the noise he had made. There were orderlies and nurses all
around him, and Adrien could see with bleary vision enough to see that his body was
stained crimson with his own ebbing life. They had no chance to save him now, he had lost
far too much blood. Adrien Griever, the lost soul, closed his eyes again...that same smile
returning to his lips. Lilly was calling...
Adrien spun around, clean of his blood now, clean of everything for that matter. And as
his vision cleared, he saw the apartment he had been in moments before. And Lilly stood
before him, their daughter in a warm bundle in her arms. Lilly smiled and told him that
she loved him.
Those same three words were a breath from escaping Adrien's lips when he felt a bright
light in his face...blinding...and a sore, numb feeling in his forearms.
When he opened his eyes, he found himself in a tranquil blue room, a florescent light
overhead boring through him. He tried to sit up, but found himself bound to the white,
clean-smelling hospital bed. The smell of sterlilizing agents assaulted his
olfactories...and in seeing his forearms, he laid his head back down. They were thoroughly
gauzed, and beneath their were no doubt stitches. The EMT's, doctors, and nurses had saved
the life of Adrien Griever...but he had no desire to continue living.
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