Paralysis
Well. Here we are. The computer screen is bleary as I type. My right eye doesn’t blink so I have to anoint it with thick goo. My open eyeball stubbornly faces the muzzle of the eye-gel, watches the distended drop descend. Never have my eyes been so brave. Amazing what paralysis does. I watch the drop fall onto my vision and then I pinch my eyelid together with my fingers to mimic a blink. My eye doesn’t care. It stares me down even as I try to tape it closed or cover it with an eyepatch. It just stares stubbornly into the dark. My eyelid does twitch, though. A little hitch of involuntary movement, like a dead frog kicking under the knife. Makes sense, those amphibious nerves have died. If “Died” is too dramatic a word, then -- they have been amputated. Pinched off and killed like a lizard’s tail. My right ear is… strange. Imparied. As though I’m listening to the world from under the water. As if all of the sounds are flattened to be at the same level of intensity/volume/for...