It had been early dawn when James had left, and Sarah fell into a deep sleep almost immediately. It was the kind of sleep where she would wake up when the alarm went off and there would be deep imprints of the sheets all over her legs, and her body would feel too heavy and respond just a half-second too slowly. Sarah had gotten used to this kind of sleep… it didn't happen often, but there was a quality to it that was familiar. When she woke up, it didn't feel like she was waking up, it felt like she was being dragged across the membranes that separate worlds.

Sarah's alarm went off at 9, which gave her about half an hour before she needed to be out the door. Her first class began at 10, giving her just enough time to relax and imbibe a cup of what she called a caffé maté – half a cup of coffee mixed with half a cup of yerba maté and a splash of heavy cream. It tasted horrible in a way that wasn't foul, but she liked it; it shocked her body into wakefulness. Toby, with his suburbanite hauteur, considered her drink blasphemous and offensive. "Isn't the point of maté to have something that isn't caffeinated? Never mind the fact that it tastes terrible." To which Sarah would only smirk and add a pinch of red pepper to his Ethiopian when he wasn't looking. This morning, though, her drink didn't seem to help her sluggishness. She had been staring into her coffee watching the way the liquid folded into miniscule waves at the edges of the cup when she realised it was already 20 after 9 and she needed clothes.

The skirt and stockings Sarah had been wearing last night were slung across the back of her sofa from when James had removed them before they crawled into bed. Sarah picked them up, slipping the skirt over her head and reaching around to zip it closed, brushing the lap with her palms to lessen the wrinkles. Although the skirt smelled like whatever smoky bar she and James had descended upon last night, it was the only semi-clean one left. The stockings, however, were too sweaty and disgusting to reuse. Sarah tossed them towards the clothes basket in the corner of the room and sought a new pair, as well as an appropriate blouse. She found one that would do, as long as she didn't lean over too far while lecturing. She chugged the rest of her cup of...stuff and rushed out the door.

Outside the air was cold and dry, and Sarah realised she had forgotten her coat. She walked briskly across the parking garage to her assigned spot and started the engine of her car, stamping her feet and making herself small until the heat got going hot enough to keep her warm. Only then did she bump the transmission into reverse and pull out of her space. At the first red light she reached into her glove box and pulled out a cigarette, flipped open her lighter and lit the damn thing, feeling ever more anxious until the filtered end was between her lips and she'd gotten the first mouthful of smoke.

During the drive, Sarah considered the way last night had played out. She and James had ended up at some posh new underground bar, where the owners acted like beatniks and the clientele smoked cloves and drank Hemingways. There had been a live pianist, and the air was full of smoke, and Sarah had drunk quite a few gin and tonics. Eventually the air started to look like it was shimmering, and Sarah began to feel light-headed and the smell of the cloves started to get to her and she found James and insisted they go home. That was when she started feeling like she had lost her grip, and on the car ride home she'd started seeing things. There had been a white room, with platforms of varying heights and the walls had been covered in white velvet curtains. There were people in dresses made out of tulle and men wearing glittered masks with long noses, and the vision had felt tangible. She remembered feeling like she could reach out and grab a handful of lace and sequins. And the whole time it was like someone was watching her.

By the time they made it home, Sarah's visions had stopped, but she still had that nagging feeling that there were eyes in the darkness, following her and keeping track of her. James had helped her upstairs and had removed her clothes, and covered her with his own naked body, enveloping her and keeping her focused on him. His blue eyes were hypnotizing, and she stopped paying attention to the phantoms in the room and instead got caught up in the slickness of his skin and the way his muscles bunched and grew taught and relaxed. By the time they'd finished having sex, she'd forgotten about the white room, though her anxiety and detachment were still there. Then James had left and she'd fallen asleep and now here she was, jittery from her caffé maté and fretful about what had happened to her last night.

As Sarah dragged on her cigarette, she realised that it had been almost ten years since her last…episode. She cringed internally at the word; her therapist used it to describe those times like last night, when her sense of reality slipped and she found herself immersed in some fantastical alternate reality, but she really hated the word. It made her feel like her life was a serial drama, like she was a character written for the screen. And it didn't help that her therapist used the word in a scathing manner. I should probably get a new therapist, she thought as she flicked her ashes out the window.

About twelve years ago, Toby forced Sarah to talk to someone. "A professional, Sarah, not some art student you find at the bar." She didn't listen at first, or even after the third or fourth time Toby suggested it, but eventually Toby had stopped recommending and started making phone calls for her. He was tired of the way she was dealing with things, getting strung out, fucking young impressionable men that she found at the university bars. Eventually Toby found Dr. Froud, who had been a good therapist, prescribing anti-anxiety pills for Sarah until he realised she was just using them for the high and wasn't trying to get better. Froud kicked her out after that, and Toby made a few more calls.

Which landed her at the door of a therapist named King. His manner was obtuse; he was rude, condescending, arrogant. She cooperated with him because it meant she could get out of his office and away from him sooner. Her sessions with him helped her learn techniques to deal with her fantastical thoughts. She could recognize when something wasn't real and wrap it up in a box with a pretty bow and store it away. And although some of her coping mechanisms were…less than favorable, they were working; she hadn't had a relapse for almost ten years.

Until last night. Last night, something was different. Sarah couldn't quite place her finger on it, and she knew the thought would trouble her all afternoon until she had the chance to sit down and really think about it. But for now, she pulled into her parking space on the university campus. She threw away her fag in one of those special cylinders scattered about campus, the ones with the hole that was only big enough to slip a cigarette into, and trudged across the green to the building where her class met. She walked into the room, set her things down on the giant table at the front of the auditorium. She scanned the crowd and noticed…James.

His eyes. Those beautiful, blue, deep eyes. They were watching her, and the hairs on the back of her neck prickled. Déjà vu.