I was very imaginative as a child; a gift I am glad I have not kept as an adult. When my mother had tucked me in and the lights had gone off, I would stare at the ceiling before going to sleep. In the darkness of the room, and the bits of light left in my eyes, I would see thousands of different shapes dancing across the ceiling. I saw dogs padding across a field, baskets floating down rivers filled with ducks, people talking to one another, or looking off into the distance, and even a marching band parade. I could change the shapes to fit whatever vision I wanted, a game that I played nearly every night. It was mostly enjoyable.
The problem came when I began to see things that I didn't want to. Visions of people staring back at me, crouched in the corner of the bedroom. My mind began to wander outside the confounds of 2d characters on a simple ceiling background and found itself creating 3d ones in the room around me. From a shadow created from a bookshelf, I would see a small girl, watching me. I ended up spending many nights in my mothers bed, peering fearfully around me.
Not many of the visions lasted more than once. By the time I turned seven years old, I simply stopped engaging my mind in that direction. I no longer saw the scenes that plagued my mind at night. Except for one.
A tall, dark figure standing near the doorway. Never moving, just watching, with absolutely no distinguishable features of any kind. Even when my family moved houses, the figure followed me; showing up near the entrance to whatever room I slept in. I was absolutely terrified of this figure. The only way I was able to sleep at night was to not look at it and pretend it didn't exist. I didn't have a name for the figure at first, but at some point I decided that it was death, my personal death, waiting to take me to the other side. I never knew when it would inch from the corner of the room to my bedside to take me away. But it never did move.
During my early adolescence, I forgot this figure existed. After some tumultuous experiences and relationships within my circle of people, I didn't have time to pay attention to a childhood nightmarish fantasy. It wasn't until I was nineteen that I recognized it again, stoic in the middle of the room. But, strangely, I wasn't terrified this time. It was always there, an absolute truth in the midst of life's ephemeral lies. Something I could hang onto as things fell apart, an anchor to keep me guided. I knew that even if I was entirely alone in the world, stuck in a dumpster in some degenerate alleyway, that death would be there, waiting to take me away from it all. The medicine for the ills of living.
I watch for it every night before I fall asleep. As it statically creeps closer and closer every time the sun goes down. I am comforted by it, just as much as I am repulsed. It is what it is. And there's nothing more than that.
