Sinistre

From the bright kitchen where I’m chopping vegetables while Mark prepares the saute pan, the rest of the house is a dim twilight of shadowy hobgoblins that I ignore. Hyper-awareness of minuscule movements puts me on edge, yet I brush them off with pragmatic explanations—air from the heating vents causing the curtains to tremble for a flickering effect from the outside lighting. I continue cutting produce even as a presence hits me like an aroma announcing gangrene. The invisible being jerks me off my feet and thrashes me on the kitchen counter, mashing vegetables. Mark continues the monologue of his day, oblivious to my distress. My voice is silent as I separate from my physical form.

I wake with a start. Mark is hugging me in what passes for night in the city, his arms silhouetted by the building lights. The panting, I realize, is coming from me as I calm myself in a feverish sweat, stars still twinkling before my eyes, now open. Mark’s arms are squeezing me tight. Too tight—limiting my breathing. The panting, not me this time, becomes a rough-edged heat in my left ear, almost words, but not in a recognizable language.

Gasping for air, I awaken on the couch, obviously in the midst of a wild catnap. The air shimmers with sunlight. I am heavy-limbed and fuzzy-brained, watching the shimmer solidify ever so slowly into beings passing one another without speaking. The couch holds me like a magnet. So many people—they’re jostling around each other, and then they are forcing past one another, still silent. They are walking through the couch. They are walking through me.

A cry builds in me, but remains inside as I sit up on the couch, wide awake now. Yet the darkness is not what passes for city nights. It’s truly dark. I reach out past the couch—no people, but I’m not entirely sure I would feel them. Not with my fingers anyway, and there are no arm hairs rising to announce any presence. Putting my feet down to stand, I find no resistance, no floor. My feet dangle, so I draw them back onto the couch. I tell myself that I am dreaming. I shake my head, tears flying.

I wake. Still darkness. I shake my head fiercely, crying loud heaving sobs.

I wake. Still darkness. I give in and lie back on the couch, sniffling indelicately.

I wake to a snore that takes me a moment to realize it was mine. I’m in bed. Alone. I hear a noise in the other room. That better be Mark. The real Mark.