Breach pt. 1

"Hello darkness, my old friend
  I've come to talk with you again
  Because a vision softly creeping
  Left its seeds while I was sleeping
  And the vision that was planted in my brain
  Still remains
  Within the sound of silence"

- Simon & Garfunkel

 

I convinced myself it would hold, but with each step I knew I was wrong. Dead wrong. First there was a feeling of weightlessness which was followed by the terror of falling. The one which lets you know you're not in charge anymore, if you ever even were. Next there's the pain. Like thousands of needles piercing through my skin, as the cold water absorbs me sending mixed signals through my nervous system. At the same time it feels like I'm boiling and freezing, a feeling that's impossible to get used to. Lastly becomes the darkness which consumes everything. It's not your everyday darkness but something deeper and consuming. It feels like being back in a womb again. A womb that takes your life instead of granting one. And during all of this I'm not afraid but rather satisfied; I deserve this. Then the dream ends.

It repeats itself pretty much the same every night. Sometimes it lasts longer and I'm just floating longer in the water and other times I wake up immediately when I start to fall. My doc says it's just a symptom of too much stress from work and I believed her - at first. Lately I've felt like there's something more to the dream but that something's just out of my field of perception. You know the feeling when you think someone's watching you, but when you try to look there's no one there? In the dream I have a similar feeling except there's only darkness, silence and pain. I'm probably just imagining the feeling just to forge some reason into this all. And day by day I feel like I'm losing my sanity bit by bit. That's probably the only rational thing in a place devoid of logic and rationality.

Not surprisingly my work has gone to shit in these past few months. I'm a journalist slash trying to be a novelist managing through life. First part pays the bills and latter feels more and more of a pipe dream. Journalism part is neither doing that well at the moment as I'm a walking talking automaton doing the bare minimum. Being tired all the time does that to people. In the beginning I was optimistic and believed the dreams and tiredness would eventually pass. After one month my boss told me to see a doctor but he only gave me pills for sleep. They did nothing - or rather I saw more of that same dream. Months passed and my situation slowly turned worse and worse. I was afraid to go to sleep like in that 80's horror flick Nightmare on the Elm street. Joke is that I'd gladly take on Freddy any time over the freezing water bullshit. 

Don't even get me started on my social life. Put it bluntly, there isn't one. I broke up with my fiancé last year before this whole dream shenanigan begun. If you're hoping for a dramatic break up story, there isn't one either. I guess we just grew tired of each other during the years together. My only real family is my dad who lives on the other side of the country. We call each other from time to time but mom's death really hit him couple a years back. Mom was basically dad's only social life outside of work and now that she's gone he's been busting himself even more at the factory. I don't blame him 'cos I miss her too. My only hope is that I'd sometimes dream of her and the good times.

In other words I'm very much alone at the moment. Most of my friends are busy either with their family, advancing their careers or both. And even when they do have time to meet I've been too tired to even think about it. Come to think of it there must be dozens of unread emails and letters from the past year from them. At some point they stopped writing and I didn't even notice. It's pretty easy to just disappear from social circles and it makes me sad. I guess the only one who gives a crap about me is Charlie, my cat, and that is as long as I feed him, pet him and keep his crapper clean.

The last couple of weeks have been quite stable, meaning that my life revolves around "sleeping", pretending to be a functional adult and eating meds. I don't even try to eat healthy or exercise and it shows. Can't see the reason why should I when I can very well be dead next week. But things usually go worse before they get better and that's also true in my case. I was at work yesterday watching outside when I realized everything was underwater. Or at least everything seemed to be underwater but there weren't any fish or other sea creatures swimming around. There was only water. I burst out laughing alerting my co-workers. I'd finally lost it and this was my breaking point. I started to wonder would I lose control of my body next or simply fall catatonic. Perhaps a giant sea monster would attack through the glass and eat me? Even though I was sure it was a hallucination I forced myself to study it closer. That's when I saw it - Way higher the water was capped with ice but there was a single hole in it. And someone trying to swim to the hole, someone who looked exactly like me. Then I woked up from my desk having drooled all over my left sleeve. It was just a dream or so I told myself. Once again I was dead wrong.