I am NOT Electricity - Julie Steimle (good book recommendations .TXT) 📗

her broken left arm strapped down and her skin feeling like it was still burning. The rest of her body ached in a way that was too painful for her mind to comprehend. But the blood on her shirt was not hers. She stared up at the dark sky thinking of nothing as her head throbbed.

Stars above twinkled. There were no clouds though the smoke blocked a portion of the sky.

What caused the turbulence? Hanna wondered, blinking. Why did they crash?

The sounds around her muted in her ears. Many rushed, pulling and pushing the stretcher she was on into a brightly lit back of an open ambulance. She could feel them drop then lift her up into the vehicle. Hanna stared at the white ceiling of the van, joined by another stretcher. She turned her head to look at her neighbor. His face was red and black with white splotchy marks of raw flesh. He smelled awful, but then so did she. The smell of burned hair was everywhere, and it grew more profound in the small space. The vehicle started with a painful jolt. Over her head she heard the sirens go again, wailing like the pain in her heart. It was telling her something she did not want to hear.

“Daddy?” Hanna choked, feeling her stinging throat fill with saliva.

“Keep still,” a manly voice said to her left.

Hanna did not look at him. She closed her eyes. “Mom?”

The siren continued its painful call to the world to get out of its way, digging deeper into Hanna’s consciousness. She tried not to hear it.


The siren faltered at one intersection. She heard a curse come from the driver’s seat. Hanna opened her eyes and looked up at the suddenly dark ceiling. The vehicle was slowing, rolling to the side of the road.

“What’s going on?” The EMT called forward. He got up.

“The engine just stalled,” the driver called back.

He tried to start it again, turning the key and pushing the gas.

“We have people dying back here. The engine can’t stall!” The EMT hopped to the passenger side.

“Well, it stalled! I think the battery just died.” The driver swore again, kicking the floor. “We need to get it jump started.”

Huffing, the EMT opened the passenger door. He ran out and popped the hood to the ambulance. The driver climbed out also, heading to the back for the jumper cables. Hanna could hear them bickering as the traffic sped by. The whish of the cars and the honking of impatient horns blared as the men attempted to wave down a car to start the emergency vehicle up again. Lying there, Hanna felt an itch go down her back. She tried to shift somewhat to relieve the pain. Scooting once, she took a breath, feeling a strange yet comforting sensation. Her aches felt less and her ears stopped buzzing. Looking once more at the man lying next to her, she heard him panting from pain, sweating large drops through his charred hair.
Closing her eyes, Hanna sighed. She wondered how bad she looked. If it was anything like him, she didn’t want to see it.

The EMTs eventually got someone to stop and jump-start the engine. Soon they were off again, speeding into the city up to the hospital. But as if with very bad luck, the engine died again. Hanna saw the lights flicker overhead, and then shut off. A crackle of electricity snapped with a flash to her stretcher.

The driver swore again. “What is wrong with this thing?”

Luckily they were already in the parking lot.

Wasting no time, the EMT popped open the back doors and called for assistance to heave out the two stretchers so they could take them to the emergency room. Three large men scrambled out to help them. Hanna saw the burn victim’s stretcher go first, zipping into the swinging doors. Her stretcher followed. She never saw him again after that.

They took her to get x-rayed right away.

The x-ray technician was very thorough. She had Hanna lie still. Her arm was obviously broken, twisted in a funny angle. There was blood on her arm where her bone stuck out like an odd joint, but there was no break in the skin as far as the technician could see. Moving the machine arm, she proceeded with the x-ray. And just as hastily, she had Hanna moved to the next room so she could take care of the next patient.

Hanna stared up at the large lights this time. She didn’t want to think about the bones they would have to set, or how many might be broken. Her arm throbbed bad enough that she knew it was broken in more than one place.

Hanna tried to move her fingers. They hurt. She couldn’t.

She tried to move her arm. It twisted, a twinge of shooting pain jolting her, so she stopped, panting.

The lights flickered over her head.

Looking up at them, Hanna felt her heart pound in her chest. It was happening again.

A rivulet of electricity flickered through the air then leapt to the gurney she was lying on. She jumped upright, clutching her arm. Falling back down, Hanna stared up at the strobe light show, wondering if somehow the hospital was possessed with a poltergeist. Two other electrical streams crackled across the room with a jolt, shooting straight from the light above to her broken arm.

“OW!” Hanna sat up on the gurney, grabbing her arm.

The light bulb overhead popped. Then three others went out in succession, leaving her in the dark. By then, the electrical show stopped.

Sitting in darkness, Hanna blinked, still panting hard. What was happening?

“Oh, what are you doing here in the dark?” One of the doctors stood in the doorway, reaching for the light switch. The light from the hall flooded in forming a silhouette around him.

Hanna peered at his shadow, still clenching her arm. What could she say? Should she tell them they had a poltergeist?

He flipped the switch again. Nothing.

“The bulb blew,” Hanna said, mustering a voice.

She heard him give a tired sounding sigh. His silhouette turned. He called out into the hall. “Take this girl to the next open room.”

Promptly, a large man hurried insider her room to her gurney then urged Hanna to lie back down. She did, watching the ceiling again as he pushed the gurney back through the doorway into the hall. Unfortunately, there were no more free rooms. It was one of those bad nights at the ER. So bad that they eventually took her to a curtained space and set her on an open bed. Hanna could hear others around her moaning and weeping from pain.

“Now then,” the doctor said as he joined them two seconds after. “Let me look at that arm of yours.”

Hanna held it out.

“The broken one,” the doctor said, smirking somewhat.

Blinking, Hanna glanced at her left arm. Her fingers moved. It was no longer bent. In fact, it no longer hurt. Her right arm was perfectly fine.

“Nurse!” the doctor called out as he looked at Hanna’s arm with an annoyed frown. He tromped back out of the curtained divides then marched towards the x-ray room in a brisk stride. “Nurse, let me see her chart.”

A woman walked over and handed a folder over to him. He lifted one of the x-rays to the light, then the other. The doctor blinked and then peered down at Hanna. Turning back around, he said, “These are not hers. She doesn’t have a broken arm.”

The lights flickered above again.

Hanna cringed, bracing herself now. Already she could feel the static in the air, all pulling towards her.

“What is going on?” The doctors and nurses peered up at the ceiling lights. Even the machines around her were halting, the heartbeats pausing as if every one had the same glitch.

Murmurs echoed from the patients. Hanna could feel the static grow closer to her, the electrical rivulets tingling her skin like medicated shampoo. She sat still and closed her eyes. Taking a breath, she shook her head then wished the lights and power would just stop acting up. Clenching her fists, she willed it.

And strangely, the lights above and the machines obeyed. The machines beeped in rhythm again, as the noise in the room went back to normal.

Turning towards her again with a shake of his head, the doctor looked once more at her chart. He turned to the nurse and spoke frankly, “Find this girl’s chart. And find the person these belong to. This woman is in critical condition.”

He then turned to speak to another orderly. “Take her to the burn ward.”

The man obeyed immediately.

Told to lie down once more, Hanna sighed, looking up at the ceiling.


It was strange, staring at the repeating florescent lights above, the air vents and the faces with an up-the-nose view. Hanna felt somewhat calm. Shock still wrapped her in a surreal cocoon. Her mind was not on the crash but on the bizarre events after it: the flickering lights, the stalling ambulance, the blown light bulbs, the static electricity—and mostly the strange tingling feeling that filled her body and took away all her pain. When they hefted her to another bed where the attending doctor came over to check on her burns, she was thinking of nothing but the mystery before her.

“Hello there. Hold on while I look for your chart,” this doctor said, smiling genially at Hanna.

She drew in a breath and waited.

The doctor peered over her bed, talked with the orderly that took her there, and then he walked down the hall to look for a nurse. He did not come back for at least five minutes, during which the lights had started flickering again even as Hanna grew nervous. The man walked over to her, holding a clean chart in his hands.

“Ok, I need you to answer some questions. I’m afraid your chart was lost.”

Hanna sat up.

“Now, what is your name?” he asked.

“Hanna Evelyne Eber,” she replied, taking a breath.

The man nodded, jotting it down. “Ok, who brought you here? Are your parents in the waiting room?”

Hanna shook her head. In her mind’s eye she saw her parents in the dark of the burning wreckage. The voice of the fireman came back to her. ‘Lie still. You have been in a plane crash.’

She swallowed. “I don’t know where they are.”

The doctor looked up. “Were you in the same accident?”

Hanna nodded as her face flushed. Panic gripped her. “Yes. They were on the plane with me.”

He stared, his eyes lifting to her face. “On a plane?”

Hanna started to cry, nodding. She covered her face with her hands, black ash rubbing into her palms. “They were sitting next to me.” Her sobs choked her throat. “Where are they?”

The doctor stood up. He swallowed then gestured for a nurse. “Where is that other chart again?”

The nurse pointed. “Dr. Grishom has it. They still haven’t found that patient.”

“Bring it here,” this doctor said. “And bring Dr. Grishom also.”

Looking up from