Bastion of the Blue Moon

1 - Dark (1/2)

I lay awake with my eyes aimed at the ceiling, unable to hear anything besides the sound of raindrops. It was another sleepless night, another dark swell of thoughts without relief. My mind reached out to the sky beyond my roof, hoping to find answers it would never receive. I was looking for a sign, an explanation, something. Was there someone or somewhere out there that had the answers? It seemed as if I would never know. I pleaded with myself, with God, with the universe. It was the same as every night before—silence, except tonight at least I had the rain. Although I had always loved falling asleep to rain, these days it was useless in its task. Thousands of tiny droplets cascading peacefully upon the roof above me, yet I was as awake as ever. Then I turned to my latest remedy, I decided I would talk to my father.

I looked across the hall to my parents' room, long since darkened for the night. I whisked off my sheets and quietly stepped into the shadows towards the doorway. Using whatever moonlight that streamed into the room I viewed the bed of my mother and father. I stepped one stretch further into the doorway and thought to myself how surreal it all felt.

Because only one week ago, if I wished to talk to my father, I would have been able to do it in this room.

Now things were different. They had changed in one night. Three of us went to sleep that night one week ago, but only two of us woke up. My father had left this world without a warning or a goodbye. There was no sign from the universe, no foretelling of the agony that was to come. Thinking of this, still peering into the dark bedroom, my eyes filled with another flow of tears. Through the darkness and the blur, I saw the figure of my mother rustle in her bed, and I quickly returned to my room.

Peering into my room again, a glint of light from outside the window reflected metallically off of something on my desk—a typewriter. It was a gift from my father that he had given me just weeks ago after a day of yard sale shopping. I trudged over to the old thing and clicked a few letters onto the paper.

I'd rather have you than this.

Ding. It felt wrong to use it now. He wasn't here to see it, nor to hear it's slightly annoying but charming clicks and dings. Even though the rain likely shrouded some of the noise, I knew better than to wake my mother from the rare sleep she was getting, so I returned to my bed. Now I lay in the darkness once again, above my sheets which no longer felt the same. I no longer felt safe and protected under them, because sleep was no longer a realm of dreams. It was a world of nightmares, and for some it was a journey to a place from which there was no return.

Sleep was my enemy, but sleep was my friend. It was also an escape—one that I had seen very little of since that night. So I talked to my father in my head until it seemed like there was nothing left to say. This night I finally met this friend named sleep sometime after reading the clock at 3:42.

* * *

Morning brought with it sweet bliss of forgetfulness, soon followed by cruel realization and remembrance. He really was gone. I wondered how many mornings I would forget for a moment that a piece of my heart was lost.

A knock on my door preceded my mother's entrance.

"Good morning, honey."

"Morning Mom," I said, staring at the ceiling.

"Do you think you want to go to school today?"

Through horrible timing of an already terrible event, I hadn't gone to school since the year started. I'd missed the first four days of school during the first week of September. This was a new week, and I decided I would finally get out of bed, and out of the house.

I turned to my mother, "You know, I think I will."

She put on the closest thing to a smile I had seen in a while, saying, "I'm glad. My boy's finally going to be a sophomore!"