Non-fiction / In the absence of sleep (Analysis)
The ceiling fan’s soft hum lulls me into a superficial sleep. The cool air moving across my shoulders, making me burrow deeper into pile of pillows and an oversized duvet. Sleep comes easier than expected, all the commotion of street lamps and A/C units kicking on at irregular intervals; failing to push it off. The light show created by the cars on the street, a lighted mobile and shapes to count instead of sheep. Palms on the headboard; anchored, comfortable, warm and asleep.
Sometime in the night, I am fitfully throwing the comforter off, subconsciously fighting sleep. I toss and turn from my side of the bed and the cool surface of the wall, then over to the far edge before cracking my wrist hard on the IKEA side table. The impact wakes me with a sharp pain and loud bang, both obnoxious reminders that it is 3 a.m. and the world is silent. I blink to focus in the dark, but even my eyes refuse to adjust at this unholy hour on a Friday morning. Stumbling across the floor, avoiding the imaginary clutter of the day before, I fall into the door. Forehead pressed hard to its center, groping absently for the light switch on my left. I fiddle with the three switches that show no sign of effecting action, with the exception of the one controlling the thin silver lamp with a rattan shade.
The light of the floor lamp was blinding me as I lifted my forehead from the center of my bedroom door. The askew lampshade the only sign of the chaos of 12 hours ago; when suitcases, boxes, clothes and various other sundries littered the borders of my space. The depressions in the carpet denoted the phantom presence of a guitar and neon yellow suitcase, reminding me that I wasn’t alone last night or the previous eleven nights. Those are the symptoms of a house guest that visits too long.
Coming home to an empty room is always heart breaking, waking up sporadically in an empty bed was worse. I quickly get use to the company and take forever before I am accustomed to the solitude. It will be weeks, months, or even over a year before he passes through here again; a side effect of not wanting to settle, and not having a reason to stay. Still I let him stay, blowing off boyfriends and future prospects for two weeks of company, he is the only one who ever gets to stay the night.
I wander over to my bathroom sink with one eye cocked and the other eye shut tight against the offensive 40 watts stretching from the far left corner of the room. Once sequestered in the recesses of the bathroom vanity, I am again in the tolerable shadows, I feel exhausted and strangled. I grab my glass from, who even knows how long ago, my counter and turn on the tap. The water is not cold, it is not refreshing, and it is only a step above drinking straight from a public pool but it eases some of the tightness in my throat. I am too sober for this emotional outburst of sentimentality.
Contemplating the bed now, it is forever far away and just on the other side of the oppressive glow of the lamp. The perfectly coordinated shades of brown and teal ease from the bed to the curtains, to the random knickknacks. My room is oddly reminiscent of a model home in its lack of humanity. Few personal touches and fewer things out of place make it seem so surreal in the glow of that irritating lamp. As I gaze around the room, which was once annoyingly covered in someone else’s things, I realize how barren and sad it is. And really cold! The soft billow of my curtains is an absent minded comment that my window is still open. Not yet willing to brave the light of my room I walk into my closet in search of something to take the chill from my skin.
The dark blob in the corner would be any small child’s or my mother’s worst nightmare, for me it was a goal. Discarded clothing, never worn or hung up, haphazardly filling the corner of my walk in. I blindly attack the beast, feeling awkwardly for my tattered NAU sweatshirt. Grabbing at the torn kangaroo pocket, to yank it from the bottom of the lumpy mound of work slacks, I cause the pile to collapse to the center of the small space; now consuming the greater half of my closet. As I am kicking the pile of monochromatic business casual back into submission, I notice the empty side of my closet that held some of his things, nostalgia makes me feel sleepy. I hate this period of adjustment, he consumes all my organized spaces with crap, making every corner claustrophobic, yet I miss the infuriating mess. I quickly pull my sweatshirt on, not wanting to miss a moment of the now clear spot in the floor of my closet.
Longing for the most simplistic of distractions, and not wanting to dwell further on the nooks and crannies now viewable due to the absence of things, I trudged over to my bookcase. Braving the glow of the lamp, I peruse my selection of novel entertainment. Not wanting to put my contacts back in, and remove the dream like haze settling on all things around me I forgo the copy of Neverwhere for something that doesn’t require vision. I select the nicer of two journals and crawl over the foot board of my bed.
I situate myself into a nest I create of my bedding, in the corner made by my bed and the wall, and I begin to write. My creative edge gone, just perfunctory Suessical ranting gracing the pages that were marred with the indentions of much more passionate works. This is me giving up on distracting myself from the inevitable train of thought, I have had enough moping, enough “awake” time, and I need to rest.
I throw my journal forcibly at the wall switch and the light cuts off. I curl up in my blankets, sweatshirt and all, staring at the faint shape of my alarm clock. The curtains still tapping the headboard, snaking into its metal work, and letting the cold in. I am now sufficiently bored with myself, my emotions, and this stupid situation I ease to my side of the bed and turn over to face the wall, this was the hardest thing I had to do today. Knowing that no body would be at my back, and when I roll over in the early hours of morning that space next to me would be chilled from the air and as empty as when I went to sleep.
These things are not breakups, because we are not together; they are not losing your best friend, because we are not friends; it is the loss of a companion and a playmate. The time apart from the one person that makes you normal and yourself. It is the sense of loss that time does not heed,
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This 32 word review has not been unlocked.
As “Simon” says, “This is awful!”
Much too wordy. Misspelled words, changes of tense, totally disorganized.
It needs a complete rewrite, try using sentence fragments and much less detail in every sentence.
It was very difficult for me to ‘get into’ it.
Good idea, tho….try again.
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‘Palms on the headboard; anchored, comfortable, warm and asleep.’
This is just a personal pet-peeve of mine, but I’m pretty sure it’s optional. I always use a comma after the next to last word in a list. So instead of what you have I’d put ’...comfortable, warm, and asleep.’
You don’t HAVE to do it, but it makes less people crazy. I see this several other times as well, but again, it is your choice.
‘Coming home to an empty room is always heart breaking, waking up sporadically in an empty bed was worse.’
Your tenses change here, and I’m not sure why. Consider changing ‘in an empty bed was worse’ to ‘in an empty bed is worse.’
‘The time apart from the one person that makes you normal and yourself. It is the sense of loss that time does not heed,’
Where’s the rest of the story!?
“I toss and turn from my side…” this sentence feels disjointed and think it would be best if you re-worded it so it can flow better b/c even with the comma it doesn’t seem to come together.
You provide a lot of descriptions but the story still seems jerky. For example, ” I feel exhausted and strangled. I grab my glass from, who even knows how long ago, my counter and turn on the tap.” This is the perfect example of sentences that just don’t seem to be work. I wish there was smoother transactions from one line to the next.
Also, is this a short story with fictional characters or a non-fiction piece with real events. Is this a ficitionalized account of real events. I needed to know so I could rate/critique this depending on what this should be.
Also, I’m getting a lot of descriptions about the characters movement w/in the first 3 paragraphs but I’m not getting a lot of details about who is this person. Why is the room lonely, why is the character by themself? I’m curious to know, please drop hints. The last paragraphs is great but I wish I got more of this throughout the piece.
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