part six.

dear musty sneakers, dear dry heat, dear crack of spine,

Insomnia is a beast which punishes for too much sleep. The scales must be maintained. It is not fair to indulge so much, and our bodies will not let us forget that. Stay tuned next for the feeling of dry melatonin pills lodged in the back of your throat. 

Exit Stage Left 

Lately, you have felt a second skin growing. It is around you or it is within you, but never both places at the same time. Plumes of wood smoke on the air smell like your new skin. The touch of mushroom caps feels like your new skin. Dust motes passing through a beam of golden afternoon light looks like your new skin. Honey tastes like your new skin. Empty meadows sound like your new skin. You have not told anyone about this yet, but when you stare in the mirror it stares back.

You are lying flat on your back on your bed. The sheet is pulled up to your chin, your hands rest loosely at your sides. The plaster on the ceiling moves the longer you stare at it, shifting in splotches of red and yellow and blue. In another universe, you are sleeping. In another universe, you are dead. In another universe, you are not yet born. Reality is troublesome, reality is flickering like the lightbulb in your kitchen. On. Off. On. Off. On. You remind yourself to change the bulb tomorrow. You will forget this in the morning.

Your eyelids feel heavy but your brain is awake, synapses firing rapidly, the steady pulse of cerebrospinal fluid circulating through accompanies the staccato of your heart. You are a miracle of working parts, you cannot sleep. Still, your body persists — rallying cries ring from sore muscles, legions of exhaustion pull you deeper into the mattress. It is futile to resist. You cross the threshold from wake to sleep like a lamb to slaughter, lulled with a sense of security you know is false.

You dream of a strange submarine. The walls are a dull, grey metal, lined with huge windows. The cabin is lit with soft, pink light. You sit on a wooden bench and press your face against the cool glass. Outside the submarine, you watch as mechanical arms cut through rock and steam bubbles up. Strange, luminescent fish drift by you, all with many eyes and thick, sinewy bodies that drag through the water like a knife through soft butter. Speakers in the ceiling of the submarine play a droning static, interspersed with snippets of dramatic symphonic compositions. Your father is at the front of the cabin, standing behind an impractically large wheel. He is wearing an old-fashioned deep-sea diving outfit. His face is blurry through the circular glass at the front of his helmet. His oxygen tank puffs mechanically. You do not acknowledge one another, although you are certain of each other’s presence. The submarine begins to fill slowly with water. You watch the mechanical arm move rocks and the gargantuan fish swim by. The water climbs up your legs like the roots of a tree. You are immobilized with cold, you cannot move. Your father drifts by outside the window of the submarine, the lights of his suit flickering. He raises his gloved hand in farewell before drifting off with the current. The water reaches your heart. Your body jerks awake.

The window beside your bed is open wide, and a cold breeze ruffles the curtains. The moon is full, her omnipresent radiance turns the insides of your eyelids pink. You whisper questions to her, but she is cold and inorganic and distant, and she does not reply. The girl who lives on the moon, however, is listening to you. She hears your questions, but cannot reply. You are not ready to hear her yet. This moment is not the moment of transformation, where language takes on new meaning, where understanding is reached. Your inner ear is not yet attuned to her soft voice. The glowing ember that lives in all your soft spots flares up, its warmth spreading through your bloodstream right beside oxygen, bound to hemoglobin. This light is vital to your continued survival. Eventually, you drift back to sleep with your hand outstretched to the moon.

parts one through five of this story can be found in the archive.