Chasing November

Chapter 15: Haywire

It's one o'clock in the morning. Every light in my apartment is out and the city is sleeping, whispering with errant cars that still drive through the lonely streets. I'm so exhausted, but at the same time, I don't want to sleep. I want to keep writing. Just one more page, I tell myself. One more page and I'll get some rest.

Given that I have to get up for work in four hours, it's stupid of me to be doing this, though I don't have much of a choice. When I make progress on my book, my brain kicks into overdrive and forces me to make even more.

What a shame.

I'd give anything for a good night's rest, but at this point, I'll have to take a few sleeping pills and force myself to drift off. Second winds can be a real pain in the ass sometimes.

As I sit at my desk and type on the laptop, my mind goes back to those days of overwhelming seclusion, back when all I did was hide from the world, avoid sleep, and write. Back then, I was scared of going out in public. I believed everyone was staring at me, judging me, laughing at me when my back was turned. I couldn't eat in front of other people, nor could I look them in the eye. I was always bitter. I rarely bathed. I hated myself. And while I'm not perfect now, I've shown a vast improvement, though I seemed to have traded isolation for a lack of emotion, which leaves me feeling nothing but hollow as I drone throughout my daily, stultifying routines.

I lean back in my chair and sip from a mug of coffee—my fourth one tonight. Beyond the laptop and outside my living room window, the city's gone dark, with just a few lights burning on each skyscraper like the front of a 1950's computer. So many people are out there, and their lives are just as hectic as mine. How well do they sleep at night?

All it takes is one wrong move and I'll slip back into oblivion. One mistake, and I'll slink back into my shell. Honestly, it's a miracle I emerged from it in the first place, and it's an even stranger miracle that I broke free of my isolation mere days before Mom was diagnosed with cancer. It's like my brain forced me to wake up before it was too late. It forced me to mature. And because of that, I wasn't a burden on Mom in the last days of her life, but a helping hand...most of the time.

With a tired yawn, I pinch the bridge of my nose and shut my laptop, then slump forward and rest my head on the desk.

"That's enough for tonight," I grumble.

My body dreads waking up tomorrow. It would like nothing more than to crawl into bed and stay for a whole week. Maybe even two.

"But what am I going on about? Tomorrow I get to start all over again."

******

Sunset Glade is a residential subdivision at least twenty years old, and all the houses are modest and quaint. There's nothing fancy about this place, but nothing shabby either, and with its age, the trees, fields, and bushes have all grown into their positions, giving the neighborhood a more natural appearance than newer areas zoned for housing. Many of the front porches are decorated with an autumn theme, having pumpkins or even jack-o-lanterns set out, and the trees are beginning to change colors. Though not fully, many of the leaves have faded to lighter shades of their natural skin.

But I haven't come here to admire the scenery. No, I'm here to visit Caleb. I haven't talked to him in a while and I'm eager to spend more time with him, and since he wasn't answering my texts, I've decided to come speak in person.

When I pull into the gravel driveway, I half-expect him to open the home's front door and walk out to me, but he doesn't. Nobody does. I sit in my car for a moment, wondering if the intrusion is too much. Maybe I shouldn't have come. Maybe I should just go home and not bother him. But despite my fears, I exit the car and approach the house, expecting to at least make plans with him to hand out at a later date.