I wake up. Where am I? There are trees; I can hear birds; a squirrel just jumped from one branch to the other. A forest, that’s it. But which one? And why? I do not get it. Nothing makes any sense.

My head hurts. My back hurts. Everything is sore. There is a rock wedged into my spine. The smell of dirt and pine fills my nostrils. Leaves and grass are tangled in my hair. I sit up, and my head throbs in protest. I rub my face with the back of my hand, and something hard and dry cracks on my skin. I peel it off. It’s blood. My blood. I know; I can feel the cut on my head.

I stand up. It is hard; my legs feel like they are filled pudding. I stretch my arms over my head. Not good. My side sears with pain. I take off my jacket. Blood is caked on my shirt, still wet mostly. Carefully I lift it up. There is a cut in my side, only about four inches long cut kind of deep. It has stopped bleeding. But there is a lot of blood on my shirt and jacket. It explains why I feel so weak.

I put on my jacket again. It is breezy and looks like it might rain. I pick a certain direction and hope that it takes me back home or, at the very least, to a path.

As I walk I try to remember what happened, how I ended up here, but nothing comes to me. I do not know how long I walk. My watch was not on my wrist when I woke up. So I just keep walking, but it seems like this path only goes deeper into the woods. That will not help me.

More clouds gather in the sky. The wind starts to pick up. I do not want to be in here when it starts to rain. I zip up my jacket and begin walking a little faster.

There are no more chirping birds. The rustling of leaves is the only sound that fills the gaps between trees. I do not want to be here. I want to go home. I want to sleep. I do not like it here. It starts to get cooler.

After walking farther along the path, I can hear something else. I stop and listen. Water. Running water. A river. I leave the path and head toward the river.

There it is. A river. I cannot get to it; I am on a ledge that is too high. On the opposite back there are more trees. But I know this river. It’s near my town.

I turn left, upstream, and start following the it. Soon it will lead me back. I weave my way through trees and dips in the ground. I walk through pricker bushes, and the thorns catch on my shorts, scratch my legs. A few yards ahead of me there is a path leading down next to the water.

At least I can get some of this blood off me, I think, and I climb down.

My foot snags a tree root and I pitch forward, landing face first on the ground. I push myself up and brush the sand off. A few feet away, half in the water, pulsing in the current is my watch. Its hands read 2:11. The water must have killed the battery.

I set it aside, unzip and take off my jacket. I did not realize how much blood there was. I wring out the bottom, and a light trickle of red leaks out. I dip it in the water and wring it out. Dip it in, wring it out. Dip, wring. Dip, wring, dip, wring. The blood mixes with the water, curling like red smoke, and floats away. I wring as much water out as I can and lay it down on the embankment.

I pull my shirt over my head, wincing as this action pulls apart the skin around my gash. Lots of blood. Too much blood, almost. Dip, wring. Dip, wring. Dip, wring. I put the shirt on my lap and try scratching the caked blood off with my fingernails. It helps a little bit. Dip, wring, dip, wring, dip, wring, dip, wring. I put it on the ground next to my jacket.

I notice there is blood on my shorts, too, and I debate washing them off to. I do. I sit on the sand in my boxers, shivering. I remember the blood on my face and crawl back to the water. I cup some water in my hands and rub it into my face. It is cold and numbs my fingers. I watch more blood wash away with the soft stream.

I see my reflection in the water. My skin is paler than usual. No surprise there. Most of the blood is gone from my face. I cannot see how bad the cut on my head is. Nothing much I can do there. My eyes look different. I cannot tell how. I wish I were not so scrawny. My hair is shaggy and brown. I start picking out leaves and pine needles from it.

Now I can feel blood in my ears and hair, sticky and drying. I do not want to put my entire head under the water, so I scoop as much water as I can in one hand and rub it into my ear.

There is a clump of dead branches half-in half-out of the water. I can see that there is something stuck there; something big. Wearing clothes. Still only in my boxers, I climb into the freezing water and wade over to the lump.

Or him. His hair floats gently in the water. Brown hair. His clothes are clean of blood, the river has long since washed that away. He is wearing a jacket. His eyes are open, staring up at nothing.

ME. MY hair. MY clothes. I am wearing a jacket. I am staring at nothing.

No wonder my skin is pale. No wonder my eyes are different. No wonder I stopped bleeding.

No, I whisper.

I reach out to touch him/me. My hand touches nothing.

Nononononononononononononono, I chant, making my way back to the embankment.

Nothing makes any sense. This cannot be real. I am dreaming. This is impossible.