She sat behind the restaurant for a very long time until her cell phone range. With shaky hands, she pulled it out of her pocket and answered.
"Where are you? Some sort of freak accident happened at the Silver Dragon and you never called!" cried a frantic voice on the other end of the line. It took Elly a moment to realize where she was. Looking around with glassy eyes and haggard breath, she replied, "I'm behind the restaurant."
"Why on earth are you there?!" Hyacinth cried, then calmed herself. "Never mind, I'm closing up the shop and coming to get you. Stay put!"
The call cut out and she sat there in the cold ground rather lamely. Everything that happened seemed to
have left her feeling numb. The sirens, the commotion going on out front. What happened anyway? She was having a difficult time remembering. All she could think about was how nice it was to be taking full, clear breaths of air.
It took about 20 minutes for Hyacinth to find her and even longer to help Elly back to the flower shop. The entire time, she kept asking her what happened only to have Elly remind her that she didn't know. She remembered stepping into the restaurant, it being very crowded then she had trouble breathing. "I guess I just panicked?" she said, while they were both sitting in her apartment now with cups of coffee. Hyacinth put a big blanket around her shoulders. They were sitting in her small living room that also counted as her dining room. The apartment was decorated much like her room. There were little wind chimes and light catchers everywhere. "It sounds horrible."
Elly shrugged. "What about the shop?"
"I had some people come in early since it was an emergency." This meant she would be receiving a call from her aunt sometime that day.
Elly sat there quietly. She knew she felt better but also wanted to rest. Even though her job wasn't very difficult or stressful, she wanted a break. Hyacinth got up and took their finished mugs of coffee. "I'm going to run to the store and grab some stuff. You stay here and rest."
As Hyacinth left, Elly went got up to take a shower.
The hot steam only made her feel dizzy and smothered so she resorted to opening the window in her bathroom. Her first thought was to soak in a bath, but thinking about that strange hallucination, she decided it would be better to take a shower. Now wrapped in a towel, she began wrapping her hair when she noticed little flecks of dry skin. She scratched at it only to see the skin come off like a scab and underneath was a smooth but hard texture beneath it, sorta like a nail but it was pearly white. Elly found more while she was drying herself. They were everywhere, her arms, legs shoulder and some parts of her chest near the collar bone. Maybe it was stress? She really hadn't been stressed though. Other than the woman from yesterday, she had been pretty relaxed aside from wanting to take a break from the shop.
Fully dressed and hair dried, Elly curled up on the couch and plaid around with her cell phone again. The whole apartment seemed stuffy for some reason, so she hopped up and opened all the windows. The breeze was relaxing and it made the whole space breath better. Settling back onto the couch, the apartment door opened and Hyacinth came in with a bag of produce. "I know your lazy butt could use something that wasn't flash frozen." She smiled. This only made Elly roll her eyes while she walked over to help her friend with the groceries. "I don't like cooking Hye you know that." She frowned looking at what she brought. "I'll cook it, you need to rest anyway." Hyacinth seemed determined to fuss over her. Then she jumped mumbling about forgetting to check on the others in the shop below. She ran out the door leaving Elly with all the unwashed produce and other groceries.
Turning on the faucet, she started cleaning the produce until she caught a whiff of something that smelled wonderful. Her nostrils flared as she sniffed around for a bit. Her hands seized the delectable treat and she took in a deep breath of it's scent. It was enough to make her mouth water. She slowly opened her mouth and bit in, the texture was tough, but she tore it away and continued to chomp on it hungrily. It wasn't until she heard someone coming up the stairs that she realized that she had just bitten through the husk of a pineapple and pineapple juice was all over the floor as well as her mouth, hands and shirt. As the door was opening, she ran with the pineapple in hand to the bathroom and dripping juice everywhere.
"Elly? You ok? Where is the pineapple?"