I'm sitting in the waiting room with my eyes fixed on the lined texture of the rug when my mind escapes me. I don't blink. I don't move. I hear people's friendly murmers around me. They're talking about their family, and their work, and their gardens that they've planted. They laugh.

But I can't move.

Moments past, it feels like years.
My eyes are stinging, and tears are slipping down my cheeks. When I look up I can't see because the room has filled with black smoke. Their polite chatter has turned into frantic flutter and I feel the heat from flames engulf my skin.

But I don't move.

Everything that was normal is now on fire, and I sit back in my chair unable to flea, or save myself.

And that, that is my own personal black hole. A hole in which somtimes I slip into, quietly. Nobody notices because my body is still in this chair and they still have those pleasantries to whisper amongs themselves, but I am currently being burned alive.

I've died 100 times.

The therapist calls me into her office.

-Mae