After The Nothing

Rrrrrrrring!

I pick up my phone to see who’s texted me, only to find out it’s one of those stupid ads: ‘Congratulations! You’ve won ten billion million dollars, just gives us your credit card number, passport, birth certificate and the keys to your house and we will send you the money! Hurry, you only have 5 minutes to reply!’. So annoying. Gosh.

I go back to browsing Wattpad for a good read, but so far there’s only “The Hot Boy That is Actually A Werewolf And He’s Also Justin Beiber’s Brother and Did I Mention He’s Hot?” and “rseaons y im soo good at riting #2”. “Authors” these days.

Sighing, I get off my bed and brush my teeth, and after putting on my monkey pyjamas I quickly fall asleep.

I am on and off from sleep so many times and so fast, like when someone flicks the light switch on and off repeatedly to annoy you, and honestly, I really need some sleep. My mind swirls with images of goats and wheat and apples and trees and anything and everything.

Now I’m falling, fast, and spinning rapidly, so fast that it makes me dizzy. I see swirls of colour everywhere, morphing into fire and berries and swords and anything and everything. It reminds me of Alice in Wonderland, when she falls down the rabbit hole, but this is eerie and terrifying unlike Alice’s experience.

There’s a black something, wait, no, a black nothing looming closer, closer and closer until I’m nearly devoured by it. I can’t fight it, I can’t move, it’s coming closer, I can’t stop it…

I hear a voice “Sally, Sally, not so fast. You’ll soon be here, in my hands.”

I wake with a shudder. I’ve been having this dream ever since I could remember, and it never fails to terrify me. It always comes unexpectedly, sometimes after a whole month, sometimes five nights in a row. It always starts with me falling and spinning down rapidly though anything and everything towards a something – no, a nothing – and that’s when I wake up shivering. Every time the dream comes back, I’m a millimetre closer to The Nothing, and I’m scared of the idea of what might happen when I reach it. I was so close this time, but what really terrifies me is that I heard its voice for the first time. The Nothing talked to me as if he knew I would finally reach him in the next dream.

But I turn over and slowly fall back into an uneasy sleep.

The following night I am too scared to sleep. What if The Nothing comes back in my dreams and I finally reach it this time? Who knows what will happen? So I keep myself awake as long as I can but around 2 am I can’t stop the fatigue anymore, and with aching limbs and stinging eyes I drift off to sleep.

Here comes the dream again. Will it ever go away? It’s almost like a dreaded routine I have to go through all the time.

First comes the Blinking Lights. That’s what I call it, because that’s basically how it feels, my consciousness blinking on and off constantly.

Then comes the Rabbit Hole, falling though everything and anything so fast that I can’t keep up.

And finally, The Nothing. The part I dread the most. 

As I spiral closer and closer to The Nothing I hear its eerie voice again “Sally, Sally, you can’t escape me, Sally. Welcome inside, I’ve waited long enough. Sally, Sally, Sally…”

As I move ever so closer to The Nothing I start to panic, what’s going to happen next? What am I going to do? It’s only a dream, right? I’ll wake up soon, right? Right? Right?

Closer and closer I go, faster and faster, nearer and nearer. I let out an unheard shriek as I am swallowed up by The Nothing, slowly being pulled down to its depths...

And then there is… Nothing?