Under the Bed

Is anything real

The ceiling in my bedroom was an intimate image. I knew every pit and blob of the grimy textured paint by heart. Every pareidoliac hallucination was mapped in rogue neural pathways tucked away in a corner of my brain. The dog with a mohawk, the circus clown holding a teapot, the little girl with the hollow eyes, the cat, the demons.. all of them. They were always there. Always lurking and ready for a macabre parade across my dashboard, across my desk, stomping on my twitchy psyche.

Every night watching the demon procession, every night looking for new bumps and divots, new demons, new freaks for the phantom parade brought to you by insomnia.

Every day they haunted me. With open eyes they traipsed like specters across my vision, their images washed out and bleeding into reality. Was the clown with the teapot sitting at the reception desk? Did he wink at me?

It was like this for awhile. For a long while. A silent task. A silent torture. The never-ending exhaustion.

Then one day, the demons told me to look under the bed.

I didn’t look that day.

I didn’t look for awhile.

As I lay in bed one night, tracing their familiar geography, I heard breathing. Deep and centered, like those yoga people I wish I could be. Those people who haven’t mapped their ceilings. Who haven’t faced despair with a bottle of gin and a sharp knife. Deep, people. Deep, breathing.

“Are you a demon?”

Creaking.

Breathing.

Deep.

“Yessss.”

“Do you want me?”

“Yessss.”

“No one’s ever wanted me.”

“I want you.”

“Why?”

“You’re beautiful. You’re deep.”

“No.”

A hand, jet black and furry with claws curved like those pretty vases in museums, reached out for me. Claws like scythes, glowing against my black sheets. I reached out for it. The hand held mine. Tight and warm. I slept that way.

I slept.

The next night I looked under the bed.

I was there. I’d been there for awhile by the looks of it. A little swollen, a little purple.

Lost.

I embraced me.

And we slept.