Undecided

A Story by CitrtgoW8P

He found himself face down in the street, staring blankly at his own vomit as his vision slowly oscillated from numbing blurs to sickening clarity, like instantaneously shifting between dreams and reality. This only contributed to the nausea.

It was night. He could only tell this because it was the single constant between his two worlds and easily recognized. Otherwise, he was unable to perceive anything outside of his current condition.

The static that filled his brain attacked his ears as well: nothing but indiscriminate white noise, drowning out all the voices inside his head. In a sense it was calming, and had he not been aware of the fact that he was holding himself, kneeling on the edge of a sidewalk, he would have been perfectly content with laying himself down right then and there, and letting it all wash over him.

Earlier on in the evening he had ingested something, something he had not quite been able to handle. It hadn’t been anything tangible, but he couldn’t remember exactly what it was. It could’ve been anything really: an image he’d seen on a television, a phrase or comment he had heard in passing, the headline of a newspaper, or even his own distorted image as he walked passed a store window that advertised the most recent sale or the newest product that would change your life forever, for better or for worse.

Whatever it was, it hadn’t sat quite right in his head. There was no appropriate space in his mind for it, and so it forced itself in and festered. The problem with such things is that once they have forced their way into your consciousness, they cannot be removed. An image cannot be unseen, a voice cannot be unheard, a word cannot be unread, and a thought like this cannot be forgotten.

There are two options when faced with this affliction. The first option is to let yourself succumb to it until it has become so completely unbearable that it knocks you out. Then it must manifest itself in some type of physical form in order for it to be fully released. It makes you so physically ill that in a moment it no longer seems important, as your main concern becomes your own personal welfare.

The second option is to remove yourself. Escape deep into another level of consciousness until the thought slowly fades away to the point where it is hardly even there anymore. This method also forces you to deal with a transition back into reality, which can have the same nauseating aftershock. The deeper your escape however, the more you tear yourself away from whatever it is that makes you human.

He had spent what felt like years in this escape act before. Like a regular Houdini, only, in escaping, he was not miraculously setting himself free from the locks and chains and emerging victorious from the confines of some shark infested tank to the amusement of an audience. It was more as though he were escaping from the audience, into the tank, suffocating himself to the brink of unconsciousness, completely indifferent to the fate of his physical existence, as long as he could be free to exist in the unscathed confines of his own mind.

Just close your eyes, fall back, and forget that the ground is there to stop you. Moments turn to days, weeks, months, years, LIFETIMES. Then, once you do hit the ground, just remind yourself that it was all worth it. Because whatever it was that had brought you to this point in the first place is now lost, somewhere deep inside of your unconscious, never to be unearthed.

The man rose, wiped his mouth, and staggered to his side. At the last moment, he was able to stabilize himself by grabbing onto a nearby pole, and hoisting his frame up against it. He looked up to read the sign that sat atop the pole, but at first he could only make out the blurred shapes of the letters. Slowly, the words came into focus, and he realized that the sign read “One Way”, with an arrow pointing behind him. He had seen thousands of these signs before, each one just like the other, but it wasn’t really the sign itself that interested him. His vision, seemingly constantly adjusted to the darkness, could just barely make out the heaped shape of a person kneeling on the sidewalk down the street, hands clasped together in a manner he had often observed of the people in the worship houses.

He could faintly hear the muffled screams and yells coming from the hunched figure. It was obvious that these cries were not intended to be received by some higher being though. They did not contain words of praise or reverence, but rather of frustration and regret. They were self-afflicting.

This was all speculation of course, as he could not actually make out any recognizable words coming from the stifled voice. He thought of how amazing it was that he himself understood the nature of the man’s cries despite his inability to understand their words. He wondered how this was possible; but suddenly the wonder passed over him, as whatever social instincts he still retained kicked in and he realized the man might require help.

© 2011 CitrtgoW8P

Author's Note

Its just the beginning of something I've been working on, kind of like a jumping off point. I still have a lot of other ideas/themes that I would like to incorporate. Mostly looking for comments regarding the writing style and how engaged you might have felt after reading this section. I appreciate any and all feedback.