Thing I Made

I Don't Like What I See

"Why is it?" I thought to myself, "Why is it that I can hear my own heartbeat? Why can I hear people talking about my appearance?" I
couldn't see anything and I think someone had tied weights to my limbs because I couldn't move them. I could feel myself trying to move them but they wouldn't budge.

Then, I heard someone open a door that desperately needed to be
greased based on the ear piercing creaking sound it made as it was
being moved. I could hear footsteps clacking on the floor coming
towards me. I could even smell what I presumed to be a mix of cherry and lime scented perfume. "They were right. You're tiny!" I heard a voice say. I then felt something moving towards my mouth. I let out a deep breath and I heard the same voice screaming as loud as it could repeating the phrase, "Oh my god! Put it out! Put it out! Please help!" I heard the voice growing more quiet as it ran out of the room and made its way down the hallway.

At that moment, my breathing became faster and louder and my heartbeat was increasing so much, it was practically vibrating. A few moments later, my eyes had burst wide open and I sprang out of the bed. I dashed out of the room as fast as I could. However, I noticed that my legs seemed rather stubby and door handles seemed to be out of my reach. I also had a hard time keeping my balance as the vanilla white linoleum floors seemed like they were covered in layers of wax. On top of that, my nostrils were assaulted by the overwhelming stench of sanitizer. Sure, there were hints of lavender in that scent, but it still made me cough loudly and felt like a two pronged fork had been thrusted into the inside of my nose. I had no choice but to put my hands over my mouth and nose if I didn't want to collapse to the ground.

As I made my way down the hallway, a thought had suddenly popped into my head. In this thought, there were two women and one man surrounding a peach coloured steel table with wheels that was placed in front of what looked like an ivory doughnut with beige colouring around the middle of it. Two of the women that surrounded the table were wearing paper white lab coats that went down to their knees. They each held a clipboard in their hand and they seemed to be jotting something down. The man that surrounded the table wore a Red Sox T-shirt and black jeans and seemed to be looking down at the table. On the table, I saw a little girl who had casts covering both her arms and legs. Her eyes were light green with a little bit of brown in the middle and they stared upward at the ceiling. "Are you sure this is going to help me daddy?" The girl said. "I hope so, sweetie. Otherwise, I don't know what else to do." Said her father as he gently clenched her hand.

Before I was able to figure out what happened next, I suddenly found myself inches away from a dark blue door with a black bar running through the middle of it. I leaped up and hit the black bar with all of my might. To my surprise, I had enough strength to open the door just wide enough for me to get through. The door lead to a room with dark blue walls where the paint had seemed to be chipped away in certain spots. The floor was made of solid grey concrete and unlike the linoleum floors in the hallway, I was no longer having trouble keeping my balance. However, the sound of my footsteps seemed to be amplified as they echoed throughout the barren room.

A few moments later, I made my way towards a small staircase and grabbed the thin wooden handrail beside it. I slid down the rail like a penguin with my arms and hands loosely gripping the rail. It didn't take me long before I landed on all fours on the front, nearly smashing my head against the wall.

I eventually found myself in what appeared to be a bathroom. Immediately upon entering, I knew something else was off. That chrome sink, how was I shorter than the sink? Sure, I wasn't the tallest person, but its angle for me was like the perspective from a dog or cat. I knocked over a grey plastic trash bin and jumped on top of it to reach the counter. When I looked into the mirror, my heart had instantly sunk and it seemed as though time had stopped.

There, in the mirror, I noticed that my skin was orange and my ears along with my hair were gone. My clothes were missing and I noticed that my stomach was a cream colour and it came up to my neck and acted as a border between my arms and legs. My fingers and toes were replaced with sharp, light grey claws and I had two little fangs that were visible, even when my mouth was closed. My eyes were a sea green type of colour and the shape of these eyes only formed half a circle. I still couldn't believe the sight before my eyes, even though it was staring me in the face. As I leaned closer into the mirror, I caught sight of something bright glowing behind me. The sight startled me, almost costing my balance on the sink. I fell back against the mirror. To my surprise, I realized the light was coming from a tail - my tail. I had a tail?

At the sight of my appearance, I curled up into a ball and started
sobbing loudly. The only question I had about the whole situation was "What went wrong?"

Written by Hailey Sawyer