Quest
No phone call. No text message. The phone refused to blink any notification to life. Double taps broke its vow of silence, it was forced to illuminate the pitch black room. The crinkling sound of the bed springs accommodated the halfhearted stirs of body weight, however slight the movement.
Squinting eyes bowed to the glare of the sharp contrast boring into them. No missed phone call. No text message. One tap, and the message icon popped up. A vertical push of the right thumb slid its content up to a full view. Already, baneful thoughts were forming; like thick dark clouds, they gathered and were sure to upend their contents, as self was losing control.
Forgotten. Unwanted.. Rejected…
The list was growing endlessly.
If the beams of the roof let loose and crushed everything under its weight, the pain would still pale in comparison to the constricting twinge in the chest. Alas! All was well with the world, but not this world.
Another tap of the screen took the journey further south into the land of Instagram. Internet connectivity did not dither. Images of perfection; everything nice and spice popped up on the screen. Acquaintances, friends who grudgingly wore the badge with little honour, and celebrities openly admired vied for a spot to sink the already sunk ship. Deep groans escaped lips, but fingers pressed on to the mark of self-annihilation.
A friend started a live update. Unwittingly, a click broke the ice for the isolated guest. Sadly, the game was about to begin. The field was resplendent in the milky moonlight; bathing the spectators and players in a sea of lights. It was hard to miss the substitute whose raised hand patted down the helmet to secure its place on the head. Everyone clearly was having the time of their lives, it mattered not that number 6 was alone and battling impostor syndrome. Nobody was irreplaceable; such a hard knock of life.
Now the chaos that was the mind grew louder by the second. The phone dropped from shaky hands, landing gracelessly on rumpled sheets. They left off to grasp throbbing temples whose rhythms were by now off-kilter.
“Help me….” the whisper strayed from quivering lips. “Please…” he called out but the still air looked on in apathy. The silence bore into his soul.
Slight movements at the door jerked his head in its direction. He quickly picked up the phone, turned on the flashlight only to pause by a wall décor his recently deceased mother had bought for him.
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.”
The tears came then; in torrents. The loneliness and thoughts were still his miserable companions but somehow, he reached out to the Uncreated Creator who held him to curb the impending abysmal fall.
