Sleep (the lack of, rather) is the curse that I live with. Insomnia they call it. It keeps me here when all I wish to do is leave.
This struggle is not something new. When I was a little girl a good night’s sleep was something I often had. However, it became a less and less common occurrence as I entered my mid-teens. Now it is something I have given up on. I have accepted the absence of sleep in my life. I no longer try to rest. Yet I still lie in my bed at night, the only reason being my desire to dream.
The dreams keep me going. Life is a repeating routine driven by stress, and I always look forward to something new and interesting to experience each night. Whether or not I actually get to dream is determined by my ability to make it over that hill of consciousness. It is a large hill, but the possibility of exciting fantasies on the other side is my motivation.
Whenever I do dream it’s very random. In the moment it seems very real and rational, but then I wake up, and it feels like I have returned from an extraterrestrial encounter. Amid the chaos there is a figure that is present in every dream. I don’t know who this faceless, nameless shadow of a person is, but my guess is I won’t ever know. Really, it just adds more excitement to the dreams. I never know where it may be, but I always find it.
In the meantime I don’t worry about it. I just let it be there. I am too busy to have time to think about it, anyway. My schooling and work have become my life. Every day is a rushing river tossing me to the next day, the next week, the next thing I have to worry about. While it is very stressful it is something that is important to me. I have always been a student that strives to get good grades, despite my lack of sleep. I have always cared about my future, and I am still making it. Being accepted into a good university has given me so many opportunities that I have been working towards. It it just a matter of staying afloat until I get to the end of the river. But I am determined, a little downhearted, but determined all the same.
One day I will have a proper career, a nice home, hopefully people I want to be with and the time for it. But all of that takes hard work first. It takes focus. It takes all I have, but at night I can rest. I can let my mind wander and create things I can enjoy now, in the present. It gives me the strength to swim when I feel like I’m going to drown.
When I can’t sleep my thoughts turns to memories of previous dreams. It’s like watching films while I lie in bed. Each one is different, but I have noticed change in the past week and a half of dreams. It seems my mind is playing a Cinderella story every night, and it’s very fun. The past few times I have had dreams I went to the ball. Each time I have had a different dress, ridden in a new coach, met other people. Different music from the Disney version plays in the background. It all makes the experience so much more fun.
However, I have noticed that the shadowy figure is always there and always when everyone is dancing. A song ends, everyone bows or curtsies to their dance partner. The next song begins and everyone finds a new partner. I am dancing with whoever I find and having a wonderful time. The curious thing is that the song abruptly stops, and everyone quits their dancing. They all move to form a pathway to the the dais. And that is when I see him, the shadowy figure.
Everyone stares in silence as he walks steadily towards me. The first time this happened I was actually quite frightened: he had never done anything but stand at a far distance in all of my other dreams. As he walks he has an air of mystery and power about him. He comes up to me. He bows. Then with a voice deep and rich as dark chocolate he asks me a question.
“May I have this dance?”
I had heard so many stories. It would be bright and warm. Everything, all of it would shine. I couldn't contain my excitement. After all, summer only came around every twenty years.
That morning I bolted down the stairs, dashed through the kitchen, and ran out the door. The clouds had disappeared to reveal a blue sky. I stood. I twirled. I leaped under the sun, taking in my first day of summer.
This Heart
This heart is broken
Battered, shattered
Crumbled and crushed
It has been lost
Desecrated, isolated
Abused and abandoned
Never again shall it be used
Tied to those strings
Controlled and contorted
It has been put away
Not loosed or free
But cloaked and concealed
It feels no longer
It has learned not to
From torture and torment
It has fallen apart
Broken down
Decayed and degenerated
In nothingness it now resides
Once alive and beating
Now rubble and ruin
But it must be better this way
It prevents hurting from returning
History from repeating
For you cannot break what is already broken
Thrown around, beaten down
Denatured Demolished and destroyed
Never again shall it be pierced
With that sharp edge of betrayal
The past is passed
Though phantoms linger
Haunting, taunting
The hollow echoing walls of the mind
They carry old memories
Reminding, demoralizing
Though fading, however faintly
This heart cannot feel it
Confined Treated unkind, left behind
Damaged and decayed
This heart is gone
Devastated, desolated
Forsaken and forgotten
This Time...
Many friends and relatives came to the funeral. On this autumn day we all stood silently, watching the eight soldiers carry the casket veiled with a flag. They arrived at the hole and set it down. The flag was lifted off and folded with care. One of the soldiers walked over to us and presented it to my mother who had tears running down her face. The casket was then lowered into the ground deep below. After the burial the servicemen left us, and we stood around the grave. Solemn reverence radiated off of us. Not a word was said. We stood wordlessly as the trees blew in the wind seemingly mourning with us. Gradually people began to leave, and the group thinned until my family was all that remained with me.
“We’ll be waiting for you in the car, sweetie,” my mom spoke quietly in my ear. “Come when you’re ready.”
“Okay,” I muttered. She kissed my head and took my brothers and sister back to where we had parked the car. His death had been so hard on us already. I didn’t know how we could live without him for the rest of our lives. I just knew I had to stay strong for my siblings, help them through this as was my duty as their older sister.
I got tired and sat down on my knees. The ground felt so cold and wet as I cried. I looked at his headstone. I couldn’t help but wonder why he didn’t come back this time. The chilly breeze ran through my hair. My tears were hot on my face. Why did it have to be like this? Why couldn’t he have returned home safely as he always had before? I pulled my sweater tighter around me, but it couldn’t warm my grieving heart. I knew I needed to go; I needed time to heal. I set my flowers on his grave. “I love you Dad,” I whispered as I stood and left.
Alone in the Dark
I walked in the dark, listening to my music, on my way home from a friend’s house. I was there for three hours but studying our science notes was all we did. Even with so much review I’d probably still fail the test.
That’s when the street lamps went out.
“Really?” I muttered. I plucked out one of my earbuds and stood for a second, wondering if the lights would come back on. They didn’t. The new moon did nothing to help. As my eyes adjusted I compromised and stuck the earbud back in. “Guess I’ll walk in the dark, then.”
I stepped with the music as I walked. I hopped off the sidewalk and into the road. My eyes caught the light shining through the front window. My parents must’ve been waiting for me to get home. I observed the time and thought, Pretty late to-
My thoughts were swiftly interrupted. I was thrown on the ground before I had even noticed the car driving towards me. I opened my eyes. Everything was blurry but I could make out a person jumping out of a truck with blasted headlights and running towards me. I heard them yelling, maybe crying out for help. I heard the front doors of neighbors’ houses swinging open accompanied by gasps as people came to where I was. And I heard the voice of my mom getting louder and louder, very quickly.
“Max! Max!” she screamed in despair. She shouted as she talked. It sounded so fuzzy. My drowsy eyes saw her frantically type on her phone and put it up to her ear. “Hello! My son is-”
Everything shut off. It was black, and it was silent. There was nothing.
When I finally opened my eyes it was still dark. I wasn’t on the ground anymore, but I didn’t know where I was.
“Hello?” I called. No response. I called out louder. “Hello!”
At last I saw where I was. I was on a street. The moon and stars were bright against the dark sky. It must have been late, but how was I okay? I felt fine despite being hit seemingly minutes before. I also found it very strange that I was on a street that I had never seen before.
A speeding car turned the corner, and I had no time to react. I watched the bright lights as it drove right through me.
I was shocked. I wasn’t on the ground. I also wasn’t hit, but I was in pain. It felt like I was burning. I looked to my hands, expecting to see fire. They were fine. I walked over to one of the houses and knocked on the door. I waited and hoped they would answer. It felt like hours.
When someone finally did I was bombarded with bright, burning light. I yelled in pain and jumped back, getting out of the light as fast as I could. I looked back to where the person was standing.
“Hmm?” A confused look was on their face.
Did they not see me? I was right in front of them, I wondered. They had to have at least heard my yelling. No one could not hear that.
They looked around for a moment before shutting the door.
I went down the driveway and sat on the curb. What happened? I know I was run over by a truck. I already thought that I could be dead. Maybe I was a ghost or something. But that wouldn’t explain the imaginary fire that burned me whenever I was in the light.
“Light equals pain,” I muttered to myself. “So…light kills me?” I ran my hand through my messy hair. It felt like I was playing Twenty Questions. “So...I’m like...the dark now?”
It was all I could come up with, so I left it at that and stood. I walked around the town. It was odd to be wandering in the dark late at night and to not feel cold or sleepy at all.
I came to a grassy park. There were some kids playing night games.
I heard a quiet voice next to me whisper, “Mommy, I’m scared.”
I turned to see the little girl clinging to her mom’s leg.
The lady dropped her bag off of her shoulder and searched through it. She pulled out a flashlight and handed it to her daughter.
“I thought you might want this,” she whispered.
I bent down to comfort her. “It’s okay. It’s just the dark.”
The girl smiled and switched it on. I fell back and out of the searing light. The pain wasn’t nearly as bad as the sadness and isolation I felt in that moment. She was scared of me.
I stood up, my heart torn. I watched them walk away.
“It’s just me…”