2019-08-02 - Is This Real?

"Does it look real to you?"

How did she get into the water, dark and murky, surrounding her on all sides. She doesn't remember. Why doesn't she remember?

"Where you are right now, does it seem real?"

It seems wet, why wouldn't it be real? Memories come back in flashes. Leaving the club, walking through the rain wrapped in scarves, walking over the puddle, falling in.

Her hazel eyes shift up toward a dim glow, the street light seems to ripple as if it's under water. "This is real."

The voices come out of the dark, overlapping with one another.
"Is this real?"
"Is this in my head?"
"This is real, yeah?"

Her scream is sharp and immediate, the sound loud though it should be muted by the water. Something yanks at her arm, and she turns only to see herself. Her mouth opens, bubbles come out along with the words, "This isn't real."

"You know it's not real, it's a Dream.."

".. and it's killing you."

The water is draining, just in time, her chest is on fire, she can breathe but she can't. She tries to swim upward as it drains down, but she's drawn down as well. Just when she wonders where this is going to take her the dark claims her.

There is a flash, a little girl standing in a kitchen, listening as someone talks on a phone. "Well someone has to come get her. I'm not keeping her, I have enough mouths to feed. I don't fucking care who takes her, just send someone." There are cookies on the counter, blood dribbling from inside onto the pristine white counter. It drips to the floor, it's loud.

The scene fades, the darkness swirls, and then..

Another flash, a ten year old girl is crammed into a corner of a closet. She hears someone tearing through the room. "I'm going to find you, and when I do, I'll give you something to cry about." She twitches and tries to shove herself deeper into shadow, but it's only a matter of time until she's found. There is fresh blood pooled on the floor, it's inching toward the closet.

The darkness is more dense now..

Another flash and it's dark, the sound of a belt hitting skin and then screaming. "I'll beat the sin out of you! So help me! You are unclean, and only pain will save you!" The screams come again and again, and then they go quiet. She can taste blood in her mouth. Did she bite too hard on her tongue? It drips out of her lips and down her chin.

"Trust nothing, accept nothing you see, whatever happens, interrogate everything.."

She falls out of the dark, landing heavily, and for a while she lies there, waiting for the quiet to break open into another memory. She doesn't want it, but there isn't any fight left in her.

She stumbles to her feet and sees a reflection ahead of her. Is that her?
She runs, she hits a barrier, and pounds on it with her fists. She pounds until her hands bleed.

"These voices won't leave me alone."

She holds up both hands, giving the dark the middle finger, blood drips to the ground. It's loud.

"Is this real?"

She sinks to the ground, giving up, resigned to being lost here. A fingertip taps against the barrier, leaving a smear of blood, and the cracks start, weaving lines across the mirror until it's all breaking.

She stumbles, soaked to the skin, standing under a street light, her shoes drenched in the puddle.
What the fuck just happened?