Domenic

I’m running through the woods, the wind is making it hard to breathe. Every part of me is screaming to stop, but I can’t, there’s something behind me, something I can’t see but can feel, getting closer with every step. My heart is racing fast, it feels like I can feel every beat of it. My vision is a mess, everything is dark. I blink, trying to make sense of it, but it’s useless. My glasses are gone. I remember the moment they fell, the panic I felt, and then the terrible crunch of glasses under my foot. I stepped on my glasses and that took away the only way I could see.

Now, I’m half-blind, and I can’t avoid the time I am at. I trip. The wind roars, it feels like wolves, or maybe it’s just my fear.

I reach out, desperate to catch myself, to find something to hold on to, but there’s nothing. Just the cold and the darkness pushing me in from all sides. My breath catches in my throat, and for a moment, I think about stopping, just letting it all go and lay here, where maybe whatever’s chasing me will finally catch up and end this. But I can’t. Something inside me, some human instinct, keeps pushing me forward. I don’t know where I’m going, I can’t see the path ahead, but I have to keep moving. I have to.

I wake up, my heart still racing the same. My body is sweating, the sheets feel watery to me, making this even more uncomfortable. It takes a moment to realize where I am.

It was just a nightmare, Domenic. I tell myself this. The darkness, the wind, the trees, none of it was real. I let out a breath, trying to calm myself, and wipe the sweat from my forehead. The relief washes over me slowly, like a cold glass of water, as I remind myself that I’m safe, here in my own bed. I sat up still feeling the tiredness of running, the pressure of all of that wind, the pain of the shattered glasses of mine underfoot. But it’s over now, just a bad dream that will fade.

I realized today that I should not take naps in the afternoons, because the dreams of the afternoons are always tougher on me.