To Be:

Cold, Defenceless, Impervious, Disregarded

I am cold, like a piece of fruit mistakenly planted in the Arctic. I am an insect, defenceless. I am like a Grecian pillar, still standing despite numerous dents and chips. I am a chameleon, fading into my surroundings.

The scene is the same as ever. Blurs of colour zip past with impossible speed. White, blue, green, yellow, so fast I can hardly distinguish. Collisions are so extreme that I can't identify what belongs and what doesn't. Red joins the mix of colours. The walls surrounding me are both to far and too close. I wonder what Kentucky Fried chicken tastes like; there is an advertisement for it on the wall.

Then I see it. Faster that the colours, not a color though. It is black. It reaches for me like an infant for its mother. It is a bullet directed at me. Its approach is so direct that the only sign of its impending arrival is its growth. Then I feel it. The pain sears through me like water spreading across a kitchen floor.

My viewpoint changes too fast for me to acknowledge any measurement of time. I hear the wailing siren. My ambulance? I stare into the white light in front of me and wonder if this is how it ends. Four sets of hands grip onto me and lift. Apparently it is not how it ends.

I am returned to my constant position. The wailing has stopped and the colours blur more than ever. The air is filled with the bitterness of some and relief of others. The game is won. I facilitated the game, not that anyone cares. I am a constant fixture in this place. I am a fruit in the arctic, an insect, a Grecian pillar and a chameleon, but mostly, I am just a hockey net.