Seeing Yourself in Others

It started early this morning. I woke up and rubbed my eyes to clear them of gunk accumulated during the night. Usually, this is an insignificant habit that clears my sight so I can make my way to the bathroom, but today, today it was a different matter altogether.

When I rubbed my left eye, a gooey, stringy substance stuck to my fingers and, the more I pulled, the more goo came out. I ran to the bathroom where I scared myself half to death by looking in the mirror. The goo was greenish brown and thick. It filled my eye socket and trailed down my cheek. Needless to say, I no longer needed the toilet after seeing my reflection.

Cleaning yourself up one-handed isn't easy, but I managed. I had no other choice because the gooey stuff was stuck firmly to my other hand. I pulled some pants on and headed to the ER, hoping not all my brains came out on the way. I figured it was brains anyway. What else could it be?

The usually busy streets were deserted. Actually, abandoned cars littered the roads everywhere I turned on the way to the hospital. I knew I'd drank too much the night before, but couldn't believe I'd been so out of it I'd missed the destruction of the entire human race. It sure looked that way though. I did not spy another living soul all the way to Mercy General.

I only hit one car on the way to the hospital. Pretty good for someone not used to driving with one hand, I thought. After I parked, I checked the mirror to make sure everything was still the same. It wasn't, it was worse. My eye had swollen to twice it's normal size and the goo was coming out in clumps. When I tried to push it back in, more just stuck to my fingers.

My stomach started crumbling while I walked to the entrance, reminding me I had skipped breakfast. Who wouldn't after seeing what I'd saw in the mirror? The parking lot of the ER was full as usual, giving me hope that I wasn't the last person left alive in the world after all. Once I entered the hospital, all hope was lost.

Shuffling around, vacant eyes staring at nothing, were what used to be people, but were now something else. I was scared at first, until I realized they were paying me no attention whatsoever. They all seemed to be heading in the same direction, so I decided to follow.

By the time we reached our destination, there were over one hundred of us in the crowd. I had noticed something on our journey that left me cold. All of my fellow hall mates had the same gooey substance coming out of their eyes. I had tried to talk with some of them, but they didn't understand me, even though it looked as though they were trying to respond. When we reached the end of Hall C, twenty or so of the strongest men in the bunch rushed the double doors blocking our path.

I forced my way through the group to see what was so important behind the doors. Once I got there, I looked through the Plexiglas windows and spotted doctors and nurses, all terrified of the commotion on my side of the door. Their fear seemed to fill the room. I could actually smell it, and worse, it smelled good enough to eat.

Disgusted with myself, I rushed from the doors, but it didn't matter. As the doors ever so slowly gave way, and the smell reached me, I felt my hunger increase. When the doors were thrown open, and screams filled the hall, I no longer cared about the gooey stuff in my eye, only that I get to the doctors and nurses in the other room before all the rest. My hunger had grown and, somehow, I knew only they could sate it.