Think happy thoughts

My thoughts are in agonised throes, semi-conscious shrieks of frenzied speculation and terror. I tear my gaze from the rollercoaster of flared cat’s eyes passing in the murky night, look towards the alien woman beside me gripping the steering wheel in grim determination, look down at the raw marks rubbed by the rough twine binding my wrists before glancing away as the pain is acknowledged afresh. The broken back window invites screams of chill wind inside the cabin, turning skin to gooseflesh, colouring bruises and half-healed wounds the ugly shade of the stale wine pooled in my cramped stomach. If there were a record playing from the silent speakers, it would be haunting, dissonant, soul-swallowing. I imagine, as I black out from force-fed narcotics-delayed exhaustion, a deafening crescendo arising from the swell of static.