The First of Many

Watching

-☾-

You plopped down heavily at your desk and took a long sip of your drink. Cool, sweet ribbons of caramel and chilled coffee danced across your tongue, a much-needed caffeine and sugar boost to get you through the morning. As you connected your laptop to the monitor, your calendar popped up, warning you of your incoming meetings and cheerily chiming to remind you of the two dozen unanswered emails sitting in your inbox.

It was going to be a long day.

Last night, you didn't sleep well — but what was new? You tossed and turned for what felt like an eternity. The white noise of the fan didn't help quiet your racing thoughts. Your blankets were too hot when on, too cold when off. You tried throwing one foot over the edge of your mattress, but eventually gave up and lay, staring at the ceiling until exhaustion overtook you, pulling you into darkness. Too soon after, morning had arrived, stealing what little remaining rest you hoped to gain.

You've always had an interesting relationship with sleep. It either came too easily at inopportune times, like in the lecture hall when you were in college, or in meetings when your colleague gave the blandest presentation on client engagement over the last quarter. Your eyelashes would flutter closed and your head would nod. If you were lucky, a sympathetic coworker nudged you awake before your boss saw. Sometimes, you weren't so lucky, but you managed to keep your head above water at work regardless.

It always seemed that when you really wanted sleep, truly needed it, it escaped you. For as long as you could remember, it had been like this.

The sleeping pills the doctor had prescribed did help. On the nights you took them, the medicine forced artificial drowsiness upon you. But with it, they also brought fog over your mind, a hazy mist that clouded your thoughts and dreams. Not that you dreamed that often, anyway. And when you did, it was like a shimmering mirage you couldn't recall in the morning. You could remember incomplete flashes of a scene or moment like viewing them out of your peripheral vision. It was always nameless faces and places, garbled speech. You had to admit to a tiny amount of jealousy when you heard other people talk about their fantastical dreams full of fantasies and adventures. Hell, sometimes even their nightmares sounded more interesting than what you experienced.

An instant message flashed across your screen, pulling you from your thoughts. You'd only just logged on, and already you're getting pinged. You sighed and dismissed the email notifications. Those would just have to wait until later.

-☾-

The train jostled you in your seat as it switched tracks, bringing you towards the outskirts of the city. Your ride home was full of faces glued to screens, scrolling social media feeds with weary expressions. You frowned; you likely looked no different. The worst part was that there wasn't even anything remotely interesting on your phone. At this point it was just a habit, fingers flicking via muscle memory over memes and short videos. This occupied your time until it was time to sleep. You almost laughed out loud. For you, it was more like attempt — and fail — to sleep.

You shoved your phone in your pocket and smoothed out the dark material of your pants as you stood, the train doors opening to your stop. Just another anonymous body among the crowd, you walked out with the others, boots and sneakers and high heels all contacting stained pavement in overlapping staccato patterns.

It wasn't a far walk to your apartment, only a few blocks. The crowd thinned as you traveled further from the station. Usually, you used this time to relax, to let yourself decompress from the stress of the day. But this evening, your mind couldn't shut off from work. Those emails in your inbox still loomed over your head, and you were sure they had multiplied by now. They always did. You mentally ran through your to-do list as you jogged up the two flights of stairs towards your apartment until you stood before your door.