Caged - I pressed my fingers together, questioning whether they would touch, or simply pass through each other. This act taught me that I was a not a ghost; for my gleaming fingers met, casting a shiver through my limbs as they did so.

met, casting a shiver through my limbs as they did so.        There was a stirring beyond the door, a scuffling of feet. It was no doubt the nurses flurrying to another patient, however I did doubt; and I scrambled and scurried quickly away from my barren body like it were the most perilous of contagious diseases. I panicked. If the nurse re-entered my room she would find my body, unstirring, soundless... dead?        It struck me then, as the silence had returned. It struck me that I had to acquire a way to re-enter my own body, before someone found it and took it from me. I gaped at my empty body- dull, grey and face-down on the floor. I wasn’t sure on what to do. I crawled, cautiously, towards the figure(?); once home to the sequestered soul I had become. I pushed into my back, praying that my soul would flow straight into it, as though it were aqueous; but, alas, for it did not, and I found myself resting upon it once more; the azure blue illuminating the bleak, colourless form.        I rolled around, I prodded it, I tried to lift it to find my way under it, but to no avail. I sighed to myself in despair, contemplating the reality of truly being dead. Once again, thoughts were hastily speeding through my mind; I became panicked and abruptly felt as though I needed, desperately needed to find my way back in. I demurred at even the fortuity of being dead. That grey, skeleton of being could not be a corpse, I wouldn’t allow it.         I felt anger rousing within me; frustration that I had become so unable. I pushed my cold body away, screaming thoughtlessly at it “let me in! Why won’t you just let me in?” I pounded at its side, tears now cascading down my face, causing the thin cloth around my body to become damp. Then came a quick permutation(contrast?) of emotions, as I embraced it apologetically, though still wailing fearfully.         The scurrying noise from before had returned; the nurses were coming back, past my door. I attempted to stifle the sound of my sobbing; I didn’t want to attract their attention, I didn’t want to be left without my body.         There was a click, a muffled, faint click, as the door to my room opened. I looked at the old nurse and turned away, my head still buried into the cold, damp body. I assumed that my existence would elude her, for I were merely a soul and she was merely a human, but she looked straight at me.“Lisa, what are you doing?” she asked me in a dull, yet inquiring tone.I gripped the body tighter and began to cry harder.“Lisa, I asked you, what are you doing?” her voice remained calm and professional, but her expression had become hostile.A moment passed, I couldn’t say how long, and the nurse let out a sigh. She bent down next to me, and tried to lift me away from my body. “YOU CAN’T. YOU CAN’T. YOU HAVE TO LET ME BACK IN.” I shouted at her, squirming and struggling to escape the grip of her torrid, white hands. The nurse let go of me, and pressed her slim finger against the red button on my wall; the one placed there to alert other staff that urgent help was required, but I didn’t care. I just needed to not let go of my body.         Two other nurses came quickly to her help. I watched as the first nurse (we never got to learn their names) conferred with the second two, probably about what to do. I couldn’t understand why they weren’t confused at my blue appearance, or the fact that I had my own body cradled beneath me. “Look! You need to help me back into my body!” I shouted at the first nurse, who was looking at me again.Instead of responding, she nodded at the other nurses, who both advanced towards me; reticent, yet clear with the intention of taking me away. I couldn’t allow it, I simply, utterly couldn’t. I kicked out, twisting and shifting to try and escape their grip but I couldn’t. I failed; they were too strong, too determined.         So I became limp; apathetic in body and in mind. I’d given up, they had me. My body was going to be left without me; alone. They carried me to the opposite end of my room and sat me in my brown, leather chair, holding me down with painful force. The third nurse came towards me, I didn’t notice her departure, but I noticed her arrival and the two pink pills in her hand. “I need you to take these” her voice was firm, “open up.”I considered refusing, but I recognised the futility of such an action and let her place the tasteless pills in my mouth, one by one, washed down with a mouthful of water.         The two nurses kept a tight hold on me, whilst I watched the third dispose of the cup from which I’d drank. She then walked over to my body. I felt dazed, confused. Was it common to see a soul separate from a body? Was I truly crazy? I watched, as even more strangely, the nurse bent down and then sat on my body; just sat. “What are you... Why?...” I couldn’t articulate a sentence. The room had become hazy and bleak, and before I had chance to say any more, I drifted helplessly into a deep sleep.                                                                             ***I awoke, my head was screaming and the burning bright lights blazed upon my retinas, causing me to blink uncontrollably. I then remembered my body, and looked across the room. I thought they’d taken it, it was gone; there was just a bed, a bed with grey sheets which were now torn with what appeared to me fingernail marks. I ran my own pink fingers across them, noticing that the material was slightly damp. Without another thought, I left my room in search of new sheets. All was forgotten.