Somnambula

A little something about a girl that walks through sleep.

The rain leaves the air clean yet bitter, until breathing in is like chewing raw coffee. It isn’t a night for sleeping; the incessant clink clink clink of something upon the roof sets my teeth on edge, until it may as well have been nails screeching down a blackboard. William Morris is on acid and painting frantically outside my window. The fireworks blink into full bloom and the colours achieve vibrancy in a single snap, which vibrates dully throughout the countryside and rattles at the panes in my window. Even the walls become paper thin and balloon inwards, buckling under the force of sound and light. The rain makes them sag still further and I swear the corners are starting to curl, leaving thumbprints of black sky to peep into the room. Millions upon millions of silver owl eyes stare back at me and the covers are thrown up over my head, presumably by my own shaking hands.

I suddenly realise that I’m asleep.

Her skin is molten glass, frozen as it slides around her shape, consuming her like an insect in amber. That inner heat, a jewel of cut flame for a heart, it throws shadows onto the walls and light, beautiful, sinful, fragmented light. It pulses and flickers, her ribcage curves jealously around her centre. Those eyes open, lashes, lid and iris curling back like the singed petals of a rose. Those pupils are black. A heavy, velvet black, lugubrious as poured treacle.

She moves quicker than a hummingbird, the light inside of her as indecisive as lightening. Sometimes I lose sight of her, until a pulsing hand grabs me from underneath the bed and pulls me closer to drown in those eyes. They glisten like wet pebbles, but with all the loneliness of a small stone swallowed up by a whole ocean.

Ice slides down my spine as delicate finger tap at the back of my neck. She is no longer there, but behind me, moving swiftly through that state which is neither quite awake nor fully asleep. You must look through your lashes if you want to see her.

Her fingers clink together as she reaches for the curtains which slide from her grasp, so her hands form instead into childlike fists and her bottom lip protrudes into the very picture of petulance.

Did I only dream it? For in the morning there is nothing left of my elusive guest, except the odd calling card upon my pillow. I assume it is a hair, but the fine gold strand sparks whenever touched, bruising my fingertips. So I simply blow it away and the memory of my glass hummingbird dissolves with it.   

Author's Note

Angela Carter inspired :)