Circling the drain
The last vestiges of a sense of control float before the mouth of a dark passage. They’re surrounded and hemmed in with the bright, white, and endless. The passage itself seems endless, too, a featureless, flat expanse of nothing – and yet its walls are a mystery to eyes that cannot see anything.
There’s another, smaller passage off the main one, much smaller than the passage leading into it. If you step into the main one, you see a small, dark room, and then a blank, white, endless wall. If you step into the small one, the walls are visible, and you can’t see their color in the blackness. There’s one more small room after that. There’s no way to get there, and if you turn around, the passage has closed up behind you. There’s no way to find another way out either, for the only way out is the one you came in by. It’s too far. It’s too far.
A little voice inside you thinks “I can’t get in there, I can’t get in there, I can’t get in there…” The voice goes silent when the passage closes on you, and you see white, featureless walls as if looking through the eye of a camera. The camera’s lens is filled with the brightest thing you have ever seen, bright, bright enough that its very light fills your eyes – and you can’t look at it. There is just that one, blinding light. It’s not in your eyes.
It’s in your hands.
“I can’t get in there, I can’t get in there, I can’t get in there…” goes the small voice now, and it doesn’t shut up. It’s a quiet voice, quiet enough so that nobody else can hear it.
Your heart thuds loudly in your chest. Your throat is closed shut, your nose is blocked by cold sweat. You’re trying to breathe, to move, but you can’t move a hand. You can’t move any part of your body – you don’t know how you did it, how you managed to make it all the way in there. The passage closes as if there’s a weight at the end of it. Your arms fall limp, and then you know you’re trapped in there, locked in, and something about the knowledge makes you not want to scream anymore.
You don’t scream. You don’t try to move, not yet. You don’t break the silence of the tiny, empty room, or take a look at yourself, because – why? You already know what’s there. What is there can’t do anything to you, what is there can’t touch you, can’t hurt you, can’t even do anything. You know that. You know that.
There’s nothing there, you know that. There’s not even a single person there, though the room is large enough for at least one. There’s nothing to be afraid of. Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing. You don’t see anything, no light no sound no movement. You can’t see your arms or your legs, you can’t breathe, you can’t run, there’s no danger.
There’s nothing at all, really, nothing that could hurt you, nothing that could touch you. You’re not hurt, though. Your body is at ease, your mind is relaxed, your emotions are at peace. You breathe in time with your heartbeats, you feel all your muscles go slack, you’re perfectly at ease and – oh. Oh, that’s not right, oh no. You’ve done this before. You did it before.
“Oh,” you say.
The light from outside, shining through the passage, catches something in your hand. It’s a tiny, white circle. It’s only there for a second, and the passage closes when it disappears, but it’s still there, and it still looks like this, with that same white light and that same blinding, impossible light.
“I can’t get out,” you say.
You’re sure it wasn’t real, you’re certain of it, so why do you feel the fear?
“Oh,” you say. “Oh, oh, oh. Oh.”
When the light vanishes again, your skin feels very, very cold.
“Oh,” you say. “Oh, please, please, why?”
And for the first time since this whole thing began, you are afraid again. You don’t know why. The panic is different this time, it feels different than it did when you were at your lowest, when you were alone and afraid and desperate. It’s an unfamiliar, unfamiliar feeling. You want to say no, no, I can’t go in there, I can’t, I can’t be there, I can’t –
You’re breathing rapidly now. Your heart is pounding in your chest. You don’t know how you’ve gotten in there, why the lights hurt so much, or what the point was of this at all. Maybe you’ve killed your friends somehow. Maybe this is what happens after. But you’re still here. The door is still there. You’re still here, you say to yourself, over and over. You’re still here, you’re still here, you’re still here, you’re still –
“I’m here,” you say, out loud this time. “I’m still here. I’m still – alive.” It hurts to say. You don’t remember saying it aloud before. There’s a white circle on your palm. It’s still there.
But you know, deep down, that you aren’t. Your breath catches in your throat, and you’re breathing harder now. You’re breathing so hard you hurt. You’re breathing so hard your eyes are burning. You’re breathing so hard you’re not sure you can go on for another second.
“I’m here,” you say, over and over again. “I’m here. I’m alive.”
It’s not enough. You want to scream – and not as in “I’m going to scream,” and not as in “I’m afraid of the things outside and what they might do to me,” and not as in “I’m afraid of my enemies,” but a scream as in “I wish I was anywhere else,” as in “I’m so, so far away from any of this” – but you can’t move a single muscle. You can’t breathe. You’re not going to scream, because you already know this is it. No, there is no point in screaming because you already know that you’re dead.
“Oh,” you say. “Oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh.”
A voice says “what is this.” You can’t see that far into the room. You can’t see anything.
“Oh,” you say. “Oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh.”
“Stop saying that,” the voice says. “Don’t say oh. You shouldn’t say oh anymore. There’s nothing there. Just stop saying it.”
There’s something heavy on top of you now. “Don’t say oh,” the voice says again, even louder, even angrier. “You can stop saying
another banger! what was your inspo for this? and also is it supposed to cut off at the end or is it unfinished?








