For The First Time || A Niall Horan Fanfiction

Preface:
Light

 Time was whirring by.

Leaning on the door, I watched how it played through the window of the van. People, things, places were going unrecognizable as we drove past. It was there, a blur, and then it’s gone. Time gives those moments that happen then gone after. Time was going by all of us. I was aware of it but I didn’t want to know of it. Glancing back to the inside of the van, I faced again the blanket of black laying most of it. It somehow didn’t bring much comfort when the coldness bothered my nerves.

I looked back outside; the cars and people quickly panning by, and watched them fade into the black as my eyes closed. 

The first thing I saw was darkness—but the feeling that came along with it was familiar. I breathed calmly and adjusted my warm clothes as I fully leaned myself to the door. I didn’t move but let myself be aware of the little things around me for a while. The cold. It gradually covered me. The lightheaded feeling recognizable to me took its toll…and I let it be. The cold made me numb. My mind wandered on the thought of not being here. It’s like detaching yourself. You’re just watching. You’re there but at the same time you’re not. You’re just not part of time.

Floating. Lightheaded. Empty.

Years ago, I thought it was impossible. It’s hard to believe that we could ever feel—empty. To feel nothing. It was my ignorant youth that never understood. I was filled with smiles and carefreeness. I was covered with love and wonders progressed by the light beside me. He glowed for me and I bathed on his shining liberation. I always held his hand and entwined that same thought we always have: to reach the stars of the vast night sky.

And right all of a sudden…gone…was the light.

It was then I learned what I thought was impossible…to be possible.

Dark and in depth were those days that I was lost. Reality was ever so bright and clear. The days gloomed. Nights were without stars. Rooms were emptier. I was suffocating. My sight shaken and blurred to the point I lose step and fell.

I realized then that I understood the depressed. I was part of their downcast faces, their fake smiles and their lost gazes. And yet—we don’t carry the feeling the same way exactly. Nobody can ever know how you exactly feel, the exact pain you’re going through. They will never understand it completely, feel it completely even though they say they do.

But then, we don’t feel it forever.

Something, that brushed my fingertips, took off my surreal covers. I was absent-mindedly caressing my fingers to the seats I was sitting on. I looked around, my surroundings then lightly waved through my presence of mind. I sighed and adjusted myself up along with my brown coat.

“Anna” I directly looked up to my driver. After the silence during the drive, Paul finally made a sound. “We’re here”

I turned again to the window and from a distance I can make out figures standing, waiting. My vision was still blurry, hazy from shutting myself out for who knows how long. Colours of yellow, orange and white emanate the scenery. Knowing I’m a bit out of focus, I deem myself that I wasn’t fully present.

As we got nearer, I didn’t have time to properly steel myself when I thought my spacing out was enough to calm down my untamed nerves. I had small shaky breaths as reality gently seeped over. Apparently, I knew the fact that I’m not too tense at all. I was used to this I tell myself but my body is telling a different story.

Lights. Flickering lights.

Like those beginnings of resurfacing. That’s where it starts. When you knew you were to forever dwell in the dark abyss, drowning and will soon be gone, there are those lights; lights that take most of your vision. You squint over its glaring glow but you resist being drawn by its overwhelming shine. It’s the heavy and the dark that tangles and restrains you to embrace the fervent light and it can only flicker like a beating heart. It flickers until your eyes are scarred and feverish.