Everything is becoming. Nothing is. –Plato
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Just before sleep overtook him, he felt something.
Not a big deal. Feeling something was the prime feature of this experience, this voluntary commitment. Mostly nausea. A churning, a longing, a darkness. And more—too much. He'd turn a corner and run into an emotion, like he'd motorcycled into a cement wall. Undirected guilt, unnamed loss, cutting anxiety. Things he'd pronounced dead and buried a decade ago, if he had ever felt them. There was no logic to it; he did not have the energy to construct one. He couldn't even find enough motivation to resist. On the good days, the beast dragged him. On the bad ones, it ate him.
This was different.
Steady pressure on his chest, thickness in the back of his throat, bitter slime lining his mouth. C'mon, c'mon. I know this one.
But the solution slid out of his grasp.
Pressure. Lungs. C'mon…
Prodded by the feeling of drowning, his heart revved up. He wrenched his eyes open. Saw anemic amber light, gray smears. Felt heat and satisfaction, the deep pleasure of fighting back. Then his heart collapsed into a sleep rhythm. His limbs were too heavy to lift.
He plunged into the dream with his teeth bared.