Earworms

[intro]

One morning, I woke up and realised that something was off. Nothing came to my mind immediately at that moment but something was just irreparably odd that morning. It was as if in the darkness of the night an unknown beast had entered the room and stripped it of its comforting familiarity, and left behind only the strangest of sensations.

I got off the bed and headed towards the bathroom, a bit wearily perhaps, and struggled a bit to squeeze the toothpaste onto the brush. The sensation seems to have spread into my fingers, deep into the marrow. I wash my face, trying to regain my senses. The numbing chill of cold water running down your face is comfortably alerting. A gentle wake up call for every pore and every nerve. Shaking off my weariness, I look into the mirror. Looking normal, a little pale perhaps, but maybe that's because I haven't been seeing a lot of sun recently. Eyes are bloodshot, probably from the late nights, and ears a little too large, or have they always been like that, I'm not quite sure anymore. The longer I look at my reflection the more faults I find in it, which means that everything is normal.

I go for a shower, a shower seems like a wonderful idea. Hot, almost scalding water running down my skin, yes, it is a great idea. I turn on the heater, take off my clothes, stand under the running water, reach for the soap bar.

A large hole, gaping and dry opened up in my chest, and I've only noticed now. The blood around it is dry and brown. I take two steps back from the discovery. What in the name of all that is holy is that doing on my chest? Tentatively, I touch it. I feel nothing, not even my own fingers travelling on that wound. It is as if a large black hole has opened up on my chest. And I've stuck my fingers into it. Numbness everywhere.

Bewildered, I cleaned myself to get better look at the wound without the blood around it. I soon realised that my back also has a hole to correspond to the one in my chest. It's like someone decided to stick a spear through me while I was asleep last night, but instead of waking up I continued sleeping through the bleeding. How is it possible that I can survive that? Worry burdens my heart. I struggle for a while to find my pulse, and then slapped myself several times to make sure I'm not dreaming. And just to be sure, I grabbed a thermometer from the kitchen and tested myself for a temperature.

All tests are negative.

I am no longer in the realm of the living.

I peek out the window, expecting infernal wastelands to welcome me into oblivion, but instead I find the usual sights, a few cars on the road, wilting trees, a single green garbage can, a few lampposts along the road and a very unpleasant view of factories in the background. I took a deep deep breath, and screamed my lungs out. And then I dressed myself and waited.

A knock on my door informs me I'm still on Earth. I walked over and opened it. Ms Rogers, my ever so friendly neighbour had decided to drop by to see if I'm alright after she had heard me. I told her that I've stubbed my toe and I'm fine. As I close the door, dread settles onto my heart and I swallow another scream.

I'm dead, definitively dead, but I'm in the real world, for some reason. How did I die anyways? And why am I still here and not in some paradisiacal landscape with wings and shit?

Should I go to work? I mean I am dead so I shouldn't need to eat or drink and I have enough savings to last me for a few more months before the money runs out.

I sit down, perhaps I can just call the office and tell them that I'm taking the day off, they won't ask questions, and I still have a week left of my break days to use. Maybe I'll go to work tomorrow, or the day after, or when I want to, I really can't tell for the moment being. I'll cross that bridge when it comes to it. For now, I want some music, a nice place to sit and a few moments of peace.

I sit down, and start making a playlist for myself. I have a variety of strangely specific playlists saved in my account. From the likes of "for a random rainy day" to the "for punching bitches in the face". I treat naming them as a sort of inside joke to myself, perhaps slightly silly but certainly very amusing.

As I build it song by song, I think of my life before my death and what might become of my life after my death. Suddenly, visions that are just too startlingly clear enter my head, and I realised that if I don't document this now, I might never be able to do it again. I scramble for a notebook after I'm done with the playlist and with music playing in the background I scribble frantically but legibly the stories that had made me.

They are not and will never be my stories, but they have made my story possible.

So I present to you a recollection, a redemption, a memoir, a diary, a record, a journal, a note, an echo, a stain.