The day I died.

The car that hit me was doing forty-eight miles and hour. I know that because that was the speed that the police car chasing it had recorded. It was the noise of the police siren that made me turn around when I was crossing the road. He was only a few feet away then – I had looked before I stepped out into the road, so he must have screeched into the street from a side turning. For some reason, in that split second I had left, I decided to jump out of the way, consequently when he hit me, I rolled onto the bonnet making a huge dent in it before hitting the windscreen so hard that it broke but there was still enough momentum while the car braked for me to roll up onto the roof, slide along it and fall off the back into the road. Luckily the police car driver was really good and he saw all this coming and swerved to avoid running me over. The police car went off the road and through the window of a shoe shop, setting off its alarm which added to the noise of the accident.

I had a broken leg, a broken arm, a number of broken ribs and a punctured lung. Because of the rain I was also soaked right through, wet and cold, very cold. There is a lot written about dying and people often say they saw a tunnel or a bright light or even loved ones calling to them. Some people say they felt that they were floating above themselves and could look down when say, an operation was performed – I think they call that an OBE, an Out of Body Experience. Well that might be true for them, but not for me. There was an OBE for sure but not the sort of peaceful kind you read about.

At the time of the accident I wasn’t yet dead, but I was standing next to a bloody and twisted body that was laying in the road; me. I could hear the sound of an ambulance and the police had got out of their wreck to see what they could do. The driver of the car that hit me was long gone. As soon as the car had stopped he had opened the door and ran off into the shopping Mall where I suppose he lost himself in the Christmas crowds. Thanks a bunch Santa. I soon found that I could walk through things, that I was me and so was that thing on the ground. When the ambulance finally arrived the medics stuck some drips into me and boy, did those needles hurt! Hang about, they hurt me, but I was dying in the road. I took a deep breath, no problem, jumped up and down, fine, but those needles ? One of the medics said “he’s still alive, there is a feint pulse”, and I shouted back of course I am you twat, I’m over here! That was when I had a great idea. In the films the OBE, let’s call it a spirit, sort of lays down on the body and melts back into it and everybody lives happily ever after, so I thought I would give that a go.

I went over to me and sat on my chest. The medic shouted, “Oh shit! We’ve lost him”, and started doing something to my chest which really hurt and then he punched me twice, right near my heart, which made me yell so I thought, bugger this and stood up. As soon as I did that the medic said, “He’s back. Get him in the ambulance”, which they did and off it went. Charming, I thought, standing there in the road. Well I knew that the nearest Hospital was about seven miles away and to be honest I am not the fittest of people. There was a bus at the bus stop but when I tried to get on I walked right through it, so I started to run. After a mile I was knackered, and I stood gasping for breath with a terrible stitch down one side – I felt so bad then I thought I was living. I kept on going when I had got my breath back. It was odd, I could run through anything but every time I ran through somebody they always turned as if they had seen or heard somebody, but they never looked at me. Weird!

By the time I reached the Hospital I was in a sorry state so I went to a water cooler because all I wanted right then was a long cold drink. Great idea! I walked right through it. I don’t know what would have happened if I had been upstairs, but the emergency ward was on the ground floor which is where I found me. They already had me in surgery and that was terrible. I screamed when the surgeon cut into me and I passed right out from the pain long before they set my broken bones. When I came too I was all alone again, but I wandered around being careful not to walk into anybody now, until I found my bed.

There I was. All manner of things stuck into me. There was a machine like a pair of bellows that was huffing and puffing air into my lungs and another thing that was driving me mad – blip, blip, blippety blip the damn thing was going. I had had enough now, I felt dreadful from the operations and I hurt so much, which I hadn’t until they started cutting me about and so I thought it was time to be me again. You would think that I learned the first time, but no, I sat on my chest again and expected to sink back inside me. That blippy thing went into one long beeeeeeeeep, and a nurse came running shouting, “Crash team!”. Before I could get off the bed they slapped two paddle thingys on my chest and gave me the mother and father of all electric shocks. Now I am an electrician by trade so I have had a few shocks in my time but this one was a real doozy and the broken me jumped right up off the bed, throwing me to the floor. The nurse said “Adrenaline, five cc”, and stuck a needle in and then that blippy thing went, blip..blip........blip..blip..blip, and I was back, again.

This was very confusing for me because I was thirsty and hungry and hurting too. In the end I fell asleep in the corner which was really stupid because the next day I woke up with an awful cramp and a headache. To make matters worse, the unaccustomed running the day before had made both my legs painfully stiff. I was wondering what to do when my wife came in to see me – they had not allowed her too, the night before. She sat by my bed chatting and I answered her but of course she didn’t hear a word so I walked through her but all that did was to make her shiver. She stayed until the nurse said she had to go and I made my mind up to finish our new kitchen as soon as I got home.

You know that feeling you sometimes get like in a roller coaster when your stomach seems to drop through the floor ? I got that same sensation on the fourth day. That was four days now with no food or anything to drink. My mouth felt like it was full of sand and I was so hungry. Then my stomach fell out. A long time ago I was in an aeroplane that was doing aerobatics and so I know what it feels like when two or three ‘Gs’ are exerted on the body, and that is how it was then. I tried to cross the room to me and I could hardly move my legs, they were so heavy. Then that machine went off again, beeeeeeeeeeep! Here we go, I thought and I was right too. Wait for it, Yeoooow! Whoa! Now that was some shock. Blip..Blip..Blip... Enough is enough, this just is not funny anymore. Somehow I made it to my bed and looked at me, and I was pretty well pissed off, if you will excuse my language. Then my eyes opened and it happened all at once. The nurse rushed in and saw me and was able to take away the ventilator because I was breathing on my own. I took a deep breath and in the blink of an eye, I was me again. It was that quick. Whoosh! I tried to speak but I couldn’t because my mouth was so dry. I hurt all over but I was so glad to be me.

Looking back I suppose it was not really my time then but now that I have been dead I am not so bothered about it any more. I worry about how you get to eat and drink because I needed to so much. There may be some trick to that or maybe its to do with the body bit of me. It could be, I think, that when the body is gone and it no longer needs to eat and drink that the problem goes away. Dunno really, well not for sure. They never caught the young lad who stole the car that hit me, which was a shame because I would like to have told him to his face that he killed me. Anyway, its all behind me now. I’ve changed my job because I am frightened now of electric shocks and needles terrify me. I just hope I never have to need an operation again because I couldn’t stand that again, I would rather live.