Soon by Renee
featuring unknown
I’ve always loved night time.
Night used to mean wonderful darkness. It used to mean sleep and rest and . . . and comfort. I’d pull the covers up to my chin and settle down on this pillowy, soft bed and let the dreams come. Some nights, his arms would be around me under the comforter, letting me find that safe place against his chest before I fell asleep. We always did fit together perfectly that way.
He used to tell me I had the most perfect bed for sleeping. And no matter how kinky that sounds, I agreed with him whole-heartedly. I still do. This bed is the most expensive thing in my house . . . and it was worth every penny I spent on it.
But it’s not the same anymore.
Now he’s gone, out of my life completely, and the night doesn’t feel anything like it used to.
Darkness has lost that wonderful blanket it brought, leaving behind this forbidding cave of a bedroom. Never in my life have I ever been afraid of the dark . . . but now I am. It scares me to lay here for hours on end, every sound echoing off the walls and every movement in the shadows making me cringe. I’m terrified of being alone through the night.
I hate turning out the lights now. I dread getting in bed, despise putting on the comfy pajamas I’ve always slept in.
Maybe it’s because it all reminds me of him.
Well, that’s just something I’ll have to get over.
Soon.
Sleep? Yeah, you can pretty much forget about that. Every time I close my eyes, I see his smile, hear his voice and feel him all around me. The first few weeks, I knew that was natural. But now I think I’m just losing my mind. I think I’d actually like that. Going crazy has to be better than reliving every little thing about him night after night.
It’s been months since I’ve gotten up in the morning and actually felt rested. The long, hot showers I’ve been taking don’t do a thing to erase the black circles around my bloodshot eyes and all the make-up in the world couldn’t hide the exhaustion showing on my face.
And my family and friends have started commenting, voicing their worry over my seeming lack of health and worn down appearance.
“Nessa . . . are you sure you should be working today? Why don’t you go home and rest?”
“Are you feeling okay, Ness? You look . . . rough.”
“You need help, Vanessa. Have you seen a doctor?”
I know I look like the walking dead most days, but it’s not like I’m doing it on purpose.
In fact, I’ve tried everything I know of, short of making an appointment with a psychologist: Sleeping pills. Running on the treadmill every afternoon. Warm herbal tea. Meditation and trance music. Counting sheep. Leaving the ceiling fan on. Soaking in a long bubble bath right before bed. A glass of wine. Aromatherapy candles and those scented plug-in things. Relaxation exercises. Reading a magazine.
After a while, I thought that maybe I was just missing the feeling of a body beside me, so I went out and bought a few of those long, body length pillows. You know, to take up that extra space in the bed. At first, I thought it was going to work. The bed felt full and I could feel that tension back off just the slightest bit. Only problem was . . . I could hug the pillowed fabric as tightly as possible, but - no matter how much you wish for it - body pillows don’t hug back.
My God. That makes me sound totally pathetic, doesn’t it?
Anyway, I even tried drinking warm milk. My advice to everyone who’s ever thought of that: never, ever, under any circumstances should anyone try that. It was absolutely disgusting. I took that first sip and thought I was seriously going to lose my dinner. Not a good thing, considering the weight I’ve lost from all the running I’ve been doing.
That’s another problem, I suppose. I wasn’t heavy to begin with, didn’t need to lose an ounce. But even eating regularly doesn’t keep the pounds from coming off. I can still hear the shock in my mother’s voice when I told her I’d dropped from a size eight to a size four since this whole mess started. Thirty pounds in eight weeks . . . even I know how dangerous that is. It took me a week to convince her that no, I’m not trying to kill myself, just trying to wear myself out so that I can make it through one night.
One night. That’s all I really need. Just one night of peaceful, dreamless, uninterrupted sleep.
It’s inevitable. It has to happen.
Soon.
I’ll get so worn out that my mind can’t help but shut down and I’ll finally get the rest I’ve needed.
My life will go back to the way it was, when I had no problems whatsoever. There was nothing to miss, nothing to lose, nothing to regret.
Nothing? Make that nobody.
A few more days and it’ll be like it was before I met him.
Soon.
That one night will come soon. The night where I won’t dream about him, only to wake up crying, whispering his name as the tears soak my pillow. The memories won’t float around in the dark, taunting me with the fact that I wasn’t enough for him. I won’t miss him, won’t wish he was still here with me, won’t imagine that he’s holding me.
One night, he won’t haunt me anymore.
I’ve accepted that it’s over. I really have. I know that he’s gone and he’s not coming back. Nothing I do or say is ever going to change that.
He’s moved on, gotten over me, gotten over us and everything we had.
Now I just have to do the same.
As my sister says, I need to get myself into that ‘good riddance’ mindset and try to put myself back on track.
There’s a part of me that’s beating myself up, hammering it into my head that I should’ve listened to my mother from the very beginning. If I had, none of this would’ve happened. She’d warned me, told me that musicians were bad news, that they changed girlfriends like they were changing clothes and didn’t give a rat’s behind who they hurt, as long as they remained fashionable. He’d break my heart, she’d claimed, and leave me in the dust to pick up the pieces all by myself.
So maybe I didn’t follow her advice completely, but I was definitely more cautious than I could’ve been. I made it a point to test the waters for a while before I jumped in to anything serious with him. The plan was to hightail it out of there at the first sign that it was all a game to him.
But I never got that vibe. He was so sweet, funny, attentive and surprisingly honest, it didn’t take me too long to see that the stereotypes didn’t apply at all where he was concerned.
Even at the beginning, whenever we were together, I had his undivided attention. He kept his phone on vibrate and didn’t allow the slightest interruption, never missed a beat in any conversation, proving to me that he felt I was worth his time, worth the effort.
As good as it felt, as much as I enjoyed being around him, I never expected it to last more than a few weeks at the most. I guess part of me was still cautious, anticipating the day that he would decide I wasn’t anything he needed and traded me in for the next pretty girl who came along.
Not that I’ve ever considered myself to be pretty, or even all that attractive. It was just . . . being with him made me feel beautiful, whether I was or not.
That’s probably why it surprised me when we were still together months later. Not only was I with him, I knew without a doubt that I’d fallen for him. And I was more than comfortable with it. When I finally got up the courage to tell him, he gave me that smile that made me want to melt, hugged me, kissed me . . . and told me he felt the same.
Talk about cloud nine. I think I floated for days after that. Or maybe I floated for months. I was too busy letting myself be in love with him that I lost track of some of the time.
But I’m fairly sure I just barely survived the crash landing when it ended.
I’m not sure what exactly made it die, I don’t even remember if he gave me a reason. All I know is that I wasn’t anywhere near finished loving him when he walked away.
It was unexpected, to say the very least. After a year and a half, I certainly wasn’t getting myself ready to let him go. In fact, I’d been hoping that he was about to propose, or, at the very least, ask me to move in with him. Anything that would take us to the next level. I wanted permanent. I wanted forever. With him. A family, growing old together . . . the whole shebang.
All that silly stuff that I’d warned myself against when I met him.
Out of everything that could’ve been a factor, I’m almost positive that it wasn’t because he didn’t really love me in return. I know he did. It was obvious every time he smiled at me, or held me, or kissed me. I could feel it when he hugged me close at night.
And I could feel it when he looked at me. Even when I wasn’t expecting him to be anywhere nearby, I could always tell that he was there. I could feel his eyes on me, knew that he was watching me. That warm feeling would start in my stomach and spread through me, the smile would automatically come to my face and I’d try to keep him from seeing that I knew, patience endless as I waited for him to decide that it was the right moment to come closer.
If that wasn’t enough, the pain I could see in his eyes when he pulled out of my arms that last night, moving away from that final, goodbye kiss . . . that broken look was plenty evidence that he hated having to hurt me.
But that didn’t keep him from turning his back and leaving me there at my door.
Maybe he thought I’d argue, scream, cry, beg for him to stay . . . but I just couldn’t bring myself to do that. It was obvious that I’d let myself reach a level in our relationship that he hadn’t quite gotten to. I wanted to keep him and he wanted to let me go. And I loved him enough to set him free without making a scene of it.
For the most part, my emotions were kept locked away. I know a few tears escaped as he kissed me, but other than that, I gave absolutely no indication to him or anyone else that my entire world was falling apart.
I watched as he pulled away from the curb and drove off into the night, then pushed my way through the front door and locked myself inside. It was like I was in a daze . . . I don’t think I even took off my dress before I laid down in the darkness, my mind flying, trying to figure out how I’d let us get into a rut, or whatever had happened that had caused him to lose interest.
That’s when the night changed, became something to dread. Sleep evaded me for the first time.
That’s how I came to the place I’m in now, laying on a soft bed in a dark room, plagued by insomnia that doesn’t seem to be nearing an end, staring at the ceiling, surrounded by pillows and still wondering what went wrong.
The daze never ended. I try to focus, really, I do . . . but I just can’t. Focusing means feeling. Feeling means pain and emptiness. The emptiness scares me out of my wits. How do I fill it? Is this void permanent?
I hope not. I want it to go away, so that I can feel whole again.
Soon.
To feel whole. That would be such a major step. If I could feel whole . . . but it’s not that easy.
No matter how hard I try to move on . . . I still love him. I still want him. I’m still missing him.
Missing. Miss. Misery.
Funny how those words all seem connected.
Misery kills people, I guess.
I can’t let that happen to me. I let him walk away, I let him go, he wanted to go . . . now I have to get over it. Get over him.
Soon.
It can’t be too much longer. Can it?
The memories refuse to go away, so maybe I should just let them come. Let myself have the dreams. But first, I have to fall asleep. You have to be asleep to dream, right? Right. If I imagine he’s here, holding me like he used to, then maybe the sleep will finally come.
Stop fighting it, Vanessa. Use it.
But that’s kind of defeating the purpose. The whole idea is to forget him, not lose myself in the ghost of him.
Ghosts. They’re everywhere. Here in the house. On the street. In the park. At the beach.
Sometimes, I get that same feeling I would get when he watched me. Mostly, it’s when I’m walking up the path to my front door. It’s eerie and creepy, but at the same time, I relish in it, because it’s almost like he’s right there with me.
It’s times like these, when my mind is whirling, going from wanting him to wanting to let go of him and around again in a matter of seconds . . . this is when I really feel like I’m just inches away from going over the edge.
Why not? I’ve already lost my heart and body to him. The only thing left is my mind.
No. He can’t have that, too. I won’t let him take it. I’ll keep my mind, thank you very much.
I want to get up, to pace the floor, anything that’ll bring an end to the panic I can feel building in my chest, tightening my muscles. But I’m too tired to sit up, let alone walk around the room.
Sleep will come soon.
Soon.
When exactly is soon, anyway? Is it tonight? Tomorrow? Next month, year, decade? Maybe soon isn’t even in this lifetime.
If soon waits much longer . . . I might just die waiting for it to get here.
The tears are coming again. I can feel them on my cheeks.
What was that noise? Is the phone ringing? No, that’s just the bells in my head. Good, because there’s no way I could make it to the phone. Not right now.
That panic is pressing down harder, making it impossible to breathe. My throat feels tight, my mouth dry and I can hear the gasping sounds echoing through the room, proof that I’m really fighting to take in just one ounce of precious air.
This has happened before. It’ll pass. I know it will. But it still scares me out of my wits.
Whatever wits I have left, that is.
My fingers fist in the sheets, the tears streaming faster as the band around my lungs suddenly snaps, finally allowing me to breathe properly again. I’ve never appreciated oxygen or proper lung function as much as I have these past few weeks. The attacks haven’t always happened. They just kind of . . . started.
Maybe someday, I’ll get past them, make it through a night without having to fight that invisible ghost who tries to strangle the life out of me.
Soon.
It’ll be over soon. It has to be. I can’t live like this anymore.
There he is again. No, not he. It. That weird sensation that makes it feel like he’s here, lying with me and holding me.
“Go away. Please. Just go away.”
Even if I wanted to scream the words, I couldn’t. Not that they do any good. Those invisible arms just hold me tighter.
Finally, the sobs come, ripping painfully from my chest, those awful keening cries that I can’t control flying out into the darkness before I can muffle them. They don’t sound human, more like a wounded animal or some kind of howling dog. But there’s nothing I can do but let them go.
The night is closing in, icy black fingers combing through my hair, touching my cheek, leaving a trail of shivers across my skin.
It takes some effort, but I’m able to roll over on my side, hugging one of the body pillows and hiding my face from whatever it is that’s hovering just above the bed. I wish the demons would go away, but they refuse, whispering voices gliding through my mind.
I’m here, Van. It’s going to be all right.
Van. He’s the only one who’s ever called me that.
And now the ghosts are saying it.
It’s not right. It’s . . . it’s just not right.
They can’t do this to me. I can’t let them do this.
But all I can do is cling to the pillow and cry.
I can’t fight anymore. And I think they know it.
There’s a weightless feeling around me. I don’t know if it’s all in my head or if someone is really lifting me up off the bed. Someone could have broken in, could be kidnapping me. They could have something awful planned for me. Or maybe it’s just the darkness wrapping around me, closing off everything else that surrounds me.
Things are so jumbled in my head, I just can’t focus on it right now.
To tell you the truth . . . I’m beyond caring.
Why should I care? I’m going to die anyway. Whether it be in twenty minutes or twenty years . . . I’m going to die. What difference does it make if it’s now or later? I just . . . I’d like to be asleep when I go. Less awareness that way. Peaceful.
Maybe my last dream will be of him.
I think I’d like that. I want that.
Soon sleep will come.
Soon the ghosts and demons will leave.
Soon I’ll stop wanting him, calling for him, crying for him.
Soon it’ll all be over and I can move on.
At last, I can feel my eyelids growing heavy, worn and weak. They slide closed, blocking out the blackness of the room and putting myself in that inner darkness, where I know things might be peaceful.
But the awareness is still there, relaxation evading me even now.
Soon isn’t going to happen tonight . . .
All I can do is pray that I’ll make it through the night and see tomorrow.
That’s wrong. I can’t do this anymore.
Please, God. One way or another, let all this end. I don’t care how, but it has to end.
Soon.
Inspired by LeAnn Rimes’ Soon