Dark Halls, Stone Walls

Chapter Four and a Half

I wished I'd made him stay to argue with him longer.

The candle I grabbed from the library hadn't been renewed and burned out a few hours after I'd come back. Or at least, I figured it was a few hours.

I requested Laura to get a clock as soon as possible for me to hang on the wall, as minutes felt like hours, and hours felt like days in a pitch black room in almost complete isolation.

I snapped my fingers. I jumped up and down. My head bobbed up and down and over again. Stuck my tongue out to make silly sounds and used my bed, bedside table, and desk as a makeshift playground all the while. Anything to steer myself away from the madness I knew awaited me if I allowed my mind to settle for too long.

However, as I allowed myself to grow quiet for even a moment, the darkness that surrounded me seeped further into my pores, into the crevices of my mind, risking all motivations to come to a screeching halt.

Then I would trip on the bed frame. Again. Another time. My body would flip over and my face would hit the floor. Once, twice, three times.

Time did go by ever so slowly, or quickly, or not at all.

Then I hit the ground once more. Something popped in my nose. Liquid streamed down my face.

I kept going. Noisy as ever, bored, annoyed, and in pain.

Someone knocked on the door and me out of my daze.

"Come in!"

The door opened.

A small but strong hand yanked me up from the ground by my arm and pushed me onto the bed. A pause. Then it pulled me to the bathroom, water ran and shut off, and a cold cloth was thrown onto the back of my neck. The hand pinched the bridge of my nose but I swatted it away to do it myself.

"Laura, I've got it," I muttered. "Thank you."

It all seemed less like reality and more like a wistful dream that somebody here cared about me beyond basic needs.

The night went on. I was eventually guided to my bed much more gently than before, but even as I laid down to sleep, I wondered how I got there in the first place.