“An unsolved mystery is a thorn in the heart” that bleeds paranoia from clipped arteries and burst bronchus. That jolts like lightning strikes through my veins and bleeds acidic metal across my palate. No matter the vacancy of my necrotic brain stem, nor the ear-gnawing, buzzing nothing of my rotten room, slumber does not claim me. Does not kidnap me from my bed and traffick me to flourishing hills rich with flora and fauna, does not whisk me into a bed of cumulonimbus and a pillow of shimmering solar.

 

I remain, suspended between a limbo of life and death, stuck in a prophetic vision of the future that will come–of biting the jellied = softness of my tongue, of choking on an agonal breath as glittering steel saws through my aorta. Of thrashing so violently I snap my limbic system and twist my brain stem into an unrecognizable heap, as red as the fountain that splashes flashing visions of roiling lava, adamantium gates and red, snow-capped mountains.

 

But I drift–drift into the rolling darkness, wispy and insubstantial. It provides enough for a pocket of protection beneath an onslaught of uncertainty.

 

Then I gasp as my eyes open, as they witness the swirling eddy that scoops me up. It carries me over the piles of stinking cotton and polyester, into the mildewed bathroom and tosses me into the boiling shower and back out as I sputter and spit. Shoves me against my emptied closet and tugs long-ago-fitting nothings onto my shivering being. Forces me to fit gangly limbs into itchy straps and ripped boots. Pushes me out the door into the dark white wasteland, littered with polluted mountains of smoky snow. Snarls at me as I board the dingy, dying-lightbulb yellow bus.

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Then it waves, wishing me good luck on my day. Tells me to remember to avoid entering the South and Eastern doors. Conceals a bloodied note, scrawled with chicken-handwriting that commands me to leave six-and-a-half minutes early from lunch. It convinces my sixth period teacher, a gullible young thing like yourself, to allow me refuge in her classroom until the bell keens my death note.

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I murmur my submission, and am whirled into a rotating world, where I am frequently reminded of my insignificance and importance. Of how I am speck of dust, and a trumpeting elephant that awkwardly hovers in the corner of his bedroom. Of how I am a ghost, floating through peer after peer, but appearing before him, a demon to be destroyed and banished. I am a juicy apple, shimmering in the noon sun, dangling on the lowest branch for him to pluck, to sink his canines in and tear my succulent, saccharine flesh apart. I am ripe and ready to be gnawed upon.

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But when will he pick me? I can do nothing but wait–wait for him to acknowledge me, to ache with desire for me, to scrabble with sinful hands for me as I hang there, swaying back and forth. I saw what he did to the last fruit, ate them down to the core and seeds and crunched those too.

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But I cannot dislodge myself from this tree. I must be plucked or fall to the floor and repeat the cycle of growth and decay. So here I will remain, a seer to my demise, awaiting for the day his hunger grows too heavy to bear.