his star

𝐗𝐗𝐗𝐈

𝐀𝐝𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚

For how long can you hold your breath until you die?

Twenty seconds are over and I already feel the tight sensation in my throat, feeling like I'll have to gasp for air any second now, but it's still bearable. I'm looking at the ceiling and sometimes my eyesight switches towards the now dark-green window, observing the bubbles and the outline of the few animals which are passing by my dorm.

Twenty-five seconds have passed now, my mind still counting but I notice that the voices in my head grow faster and faster, wanting to reach a higher number even though I'm way slower in real life. My hands are holding onto my blanket tightly in hope of receiving a bit of air in return which is completely stupid because I know that nothing will reach me, but I do it anyway.

I'm getting slightly nervous, feeling how the space in my chest is narrowing, getting smaller and smaller, and I know that I can stop, I know that I can open my mouth and take in as much oxygen as I need, but I don't do it.

Why? I don't really know.

Maybe I want to challenge myself, want to prove myself that I'm stronger than I might think and that I can do things which seem impossible just because I want to hold on to my life. It's like I started a competition with myself and the air which is filling my room. I want to win, of course I do, but the air wants to win too. It wants to expand my lungs again, wants to fill my body with the oxygen it needs and it wants me to lose, but I don't want that. I want to win, want to show everyone that I can beat whatever and whomever I want event though it's completely foolish because doesn't that mean that death would be my prize?

If I would win, if I would be strong enough to persuade my brain that it doesn't need oxygen anymore and that I can hold my breath for thirty, thirty-five or maybe forty seconds, wouldn't that be contra productive? I mean of course I would win the bet I took with myself and I would have a tiny bit of success, but would I even feel it? Would I even feel that success because after all, I would've won but would have to pay with my life?

No, I wouldn't.

Thirty-one seconds pass until I part my lips which where pressed together so tightly, now taking a deep breath and feeling how my chest is rising up and down, feeling how my lungs are screaming 'thank you! thank you!' at me for giving them what they were so badly craving for.

I didn't win but didn't lose either, not necessarily. The last time I've tried it I was worse and I now have improved by two seconds which can be seen as a small success.

Pansy is lying in her own bed next to me, being fast asleep and I try to be as quiet as possible.

Maybe it's the time which is messing with me, the boredom that is filling my head with stupid ideas but in the moment the thoughts cross my mind, they seem unbelievable funny or exciting which is the reason why I can't resist to try them out.

With wide eyes and slightly parted lips, I sit up a bit, not wanting to lie flat on my bed anymore because as soon as I started breathing again, it's like I have just woken up from a seven-hours sleep.

I'm awake and want to do so many things now even though I have the chance to do them tomorrow, it somehow must be tonight.

"Pansy." I whisper, deciding that I could at least try to ask her if she wanted to join me.

Two more times I whisper her name in her direction, but she doesn't move in the slightest.

Of course she doesn't. It's two in the morning and every normal person would be sleeping, being captured in one of the dreams in which they are living a completely different life, a life they might want to escape or maybe they want to stay in this reality forever.