That night Anne slipped her hand down the front of her underwear and rubbed herself to one of her usual orgasms, then cried herself to sleep.
She dreamed of glaring headlights and screeching brakes. Of being in the passenger seat of her father's pickup when an oncoming Mack truck had run the stop sign, slamming into her door, into her body. In a flash of agony, her thigh bone snapped in two, the break puncturing her flesh in a compound fracture that sprayed blood across the interior of the cab. The view through the windshield had been dizzying. Trees. Houses, street, houses, trees as they'd spun around and around. Her head slammed into the window before she was knocked into the centre console. The little trash bucket, shattered, cut into her cheek.
The scene shifted, and she was in a hospital, out of her head in agony as her broken leg was placed in traction. Waking up from surgery, unable to speak or cry, only scream over and over, the morphine unable to subdue the pain where two metal pins had been screwed into her femur. Jagged stitches marred her skin where the compound fracture had been fixed. More incisions from the operation, straighter, but just as much a disfigurement.
The doctor, grey haired and grim faced, informing her and her parents that she would need physical therapy, and might never heal.
Two days later, infection had set in, sending red lines streaking towards her heart. The flesh around her wound turned puffy and oozed horrible smelling fluids. Then had followed antibiotics, more surgery, skin grafts to cover the raw places. The jagged scar had become a mass of uneven tissue, ugly and twisted.
Her estimated recovery time had extended from six months to twelve, and she'd missed a whole year of school trying to heal. By the time she'd been well enough to attend classes, she'd been so far behind that there had been no choice but to retain her. Her classmates went on and she remained, joining a younger group who had never been her friends and made fun of her, and made the rest of her academic career miserable, so she didn't go on beyond the minimum, didn't live up to her potential…
Anne sat up, gasping for air. She hated that dream. Just what she needed to make her lovely evening complete.