Chapter I: Suddenly Everything Went Dark
This is a tale of the most odd…wait, no, the most extremely bizarre thing that has ever happened to me… or haven't, for I still have doubts if that really happened, me being always concerned about my mental health since that fateful day. Oh sorry, let me stop my babbling and get on with this story…
It all started on a Tuesday morning, a grey and absolutely ordinary Tuesday morning, and that I consider that the first odd fact…Why of all days would something choose to happen on a TUESDAY? An absolutely boring mid-day of a week? Well, it's going get stranger anyway…So, I was brushing my teeth after lunch, very lazily, watching the foam drip from my mouth into the sink, I wasn't thinking my life was boring or having any kind of existential crisis nor was I thinking of the meaning of life in a general sense or having any sort of philosophical deep and grand thought, I was just thinking about nothing really, slowly floating through my mind were random and detached strings of thought that I cant even recall. Suddenly, everything went dark…
"Damn, light switch! I fixed you only two days ago!" I said turning to press the switch located directly on the wall to my left…and the light went on again…for two seconds…and off again. It's incredible how some minor problems can turn out to be so annoying!
"Daaaaaammmnnnnnn!" Once more I turned to press the malfunctioning switch, now applying quite some violence. The light keep going on and off and I kept spanking the switch harder and harder. By the 76089 time I was going to punch the dammed thing…I missed it! How? How could I miss it if the switch was directly at my side (and until a second ago I was fiercely hitting it)? Odd…. In the dark I extended my hand to feel for the wall…where was the wall? I stepped forward, hands still ahead of me looking for it…one more step…one more…and yet another one…and another…How could I be strolling around like that in a bathroom that is hardly the size of a matchbox! Without thinking I started to walk again, faster this time, in hope to bump into something. But I didn't! I didn't bump into the cabinet, nor the sink, nor the toilet… nor into a single solid, tiled, cold bathroom wall! I felt my insides grow cold with that sinking feeling that something was really, really wrong. I stood there petrified with my eyes wide open to the darkness around me, mouth slightly hanging and dripping dental cream foam, tooth brush forgotten but still in hand and also dripping… And then, without thinking (obviously, because that's what people tend to do when their brain reaches a state of total confusion and switch to automatic panic mode), I bolted…. After what seemed like an eternity (but surely it was more like one minute) I saw a slightly lighter dark (if that is possible) ahead of me, and it became increasingly lighter, going from total blackness in what seemed like an indigo.
"Oh my… is that a light in the end of the tunnel! Oh my! What is happening to me! I'm too young to be seeing a light in the end of a tunnel!" Pushing aside my panicked thoughts of that being the entrance to the afterlife, maybe after reasoning that it would be a highly improbable thing for someone to make the spiritual passage holding a tooth bush... I absently continued to go in the direction of the lighter path.
After a while I found myself in an area where I was surrounded by huge dark blotches, towering shadows. My vision adjusted a little to the lighter ambient and looking up I could see an opening through the shadows…I was seeing…the sky? Yes, it was indeed a piece of a very starry night sky! And although starry, the sky was dark with a thin crescent moon emanating a dim glow. Gulping down the rest of the dental cream that still was in my mouth, I took another look around. The shadowy forms around me became more clear when realization hit me…How could I be so slow! They were trees, now I could see their tops moving a little…Leafs lightly shaking in the breeze. My ears, that seemed to have woke up just now, began to catch sounds of the rustling leafs and other unidentified forestlike noises. The gears inside my head began to turn and I came to the brilliant conclusion that I was in fact standing in the middle of what seemed to be a forest. I had already had my share of "hows": "how can that be?", "how is this possible?", how, how? No, I wasn't going down that road again. "Let's not further question this surreal situation." I wisely told myself, but I could not help thinking that at that precise moment I certainly was laying at my cold bathroom floor, unconscious, after some kind of insanity attack struck me. I hoped I would eventually wake up….
Concentrating on my surroundings I started looking for a path or a hint of anything to follow. I heard water flowing noise in the distance and decided that was a good thing to take as orientation…after all, if you are lost, follow the river! Despite the fact that I didn't know if lost was exactly the term for my current situation, to the river I went.
The path was muddy and slippery; it looked like it had been raining earlier! How peachy! My lovely fluffy slippers were sinking more and more in the mud at very step, but in a Pollyanna way of thinking, always seeing the merry side of situations I thought that it could always be worst, it could be raining right now. And as Murphy never sleeps, his laws always present in our daily misadventures, I heard the distinct crack of thunder roam in the sky, but thanks heavens it sounded distant and the night was still looking reassuringly clear. Alerted by Murphy's warning that he wouldn't spare me, I put my Pollyanna side away and began walking quickly, ignoring the fact that I hadn't a clue where I was going (yes, I was heading for the river, but where was that river going to lead me to? To a warm and cozy cabana away from the rain? I highly doubted that! ). Every sort of nature disposal was getting tangled in my hair, going through the woods was proving to be a very hard task, I was fighting branches, bushes, rocks and all seemed damp and sticky even the air. Besides that all the while I was trying not to think of what kind of disgusting, poisonous bugs, nasty insects or other kind of creatures could be crawling around. I was never much of an outside person, no, definitely not, too much tension for me!
By the sound of the water I knew I was getting near my target and soon I could see the sparkling river flow ahead. A few more steps struggling trough the wilderness and I had reached the river, it was wide and had many rocks scattered around, among the flowing water, but it didn't seem it would be possible for me to cross it….but then again, why would I want to cross the damn thing? And as I stood there pondering on what to do next and also noting that it was taking me quite some time to wake up…
"Halt there, beast! And drop your weapon!"
TBC.