It’s getting colder out. Every time the cold arrives, so do the worst of my panic attacks. I don’t fully understand why.
Maybe it’s these clothes… do I always wear these? No one seems to understand. Even she, my love. She, who has been through it all. She looks at me with worry, confusion… with pity. How long has it been? Two? Three decades? Yes, I think… about 36 years.
Time is meaningless now.
I haven’t aged a single day since the nightmares started. My mind is filled with holes and images of those strange eyes. Eyes so real, but also alien. Eyes bigger than life itself. I close mine and I see them.
I remember when it started. Nice weather. A good day for going out on an aimless walk around town… a day so otherwise unremarkable.
I received a package. Unmarked. No postage. Strange, sure, but I didn’t think much of it and curiosity won over caution.
After all, what kind of world would we live in if packages were dangerous? Never before has anyone heard of mail being used as a weapon here. Not in our world; our “perfect world.” That’s what she would say. And she’s right, you know. I don’t know where these ideas come from. Strange truths from strange realities that worm and burrow their way into my unconscious, just like the god damn eyes.
Our lives are dreams. But… my dreams are nightmares.
If I think about it too hard, it hurts so much I swear my head will pop.
The package contained two sets of knitted winter hats and matching sweaters. They fit us perfectly. I laughed when I saw them. We had moved in together that year, and she brought her dog along. I love that dog. We got him a matching set. Only one in the store.
The nightmares started a couple days after wearing the stupid things. We went out as we always do. The day itself had been its usual flavor of blissful blandness. Just walking through throngs of people, all of us seemingly with a purpose yet none having a real one at all.
Are we ever going anywhere? Or are we just…
That night was the first night I saw them. Eyes, huge, searching in the vast sky. I had never seen eyes such as these. I knew they were eyes, somehow, but they looked nothing like our eyes.
I wanted to rip off my glasses—rip out MY eyes in hopes I’d stop seeing what I was seeing, but it didn’t matter. The sky was full of them. Constantly moving, constantly searching.
And then, suddenly, they all gazed directly at me… in eerie unison. My body suddenly not mine, waving at them with a forced smile. When did I start using a cane? Did I always wear glasses?
Why can’t she see what I mean?
None of us have aged at all. She and her sister look at me askance when I mention it. One time I tried telling them about my nightmares. They immediately stopped talking, stared at me with empty eyes… then started having a conversation between themselves, as if I wasn’t there at all. It wasn’t their usual “creepy twin sisters” games. It was no prank. I had broken some law of existence by opening my mouth, and these were the consequences.
They had no memory of shunning me for hours. It all got so ridiculously surreal, that I began doubting myself. I couldn’t remember if my memories were real… maybe I had imagined it all?
That’s when I realized I was starting to lose grasp in reality—whatever reality even was. I wasn’t upset… I was terrified. They weren’t lying… they genuinely didn’t (couldn’t?) know what I…
Hopeless, I figured all I had for help was myself. I decided the best (if only) course of action I had was staying awake. Perhaps if I fought unconsciousness, I’d remain in whatever plane of existence I lived in originally: the one that seemed less liminal.
I missed what I could remember of my life; what it had been before the bloody sweaters. Before those damned eyes.
I tried it all. Coffee. Freezing showers. Pills. Pills that keep you awake aren’t easy to find in this world, but it’s not impossible if you know where to look. I know where to look. I’ve been everywhere after thirty-something years of constant traveling.
Where am I even trying to go? None of it worked. I would even lay in the tub covered in ice, full of pills, practically vibrating… not caring if I died from hypothermia or frostbite or from my heart giving out. Whatever it took—whatever harebrained insanity I could think of, I tried.
It didn’t matter. Eventually, I’d fall asleep and succumb to my repetitive, endless nightmares. I’ve tried burning them, you know? The hat, the shirt, the god forsaken cane… these glasses… it doesn’t matter. They all come back. Just like me.
I can’t remember the first time I tried ending it. I figured if there is no me, there is no eyes to watch me.
Every time I think I’ve met my blissful end, I’m suddenly back in the crowds. Walking whether I like it or not, waiting until the eyeballs frantically searching for me finally find me. Waiting until my body forcibly turns me to smile and wave at them, acting as if I didn’t wish I was dead. Then I wake up, back in my bed, as if nothing happened. I only write this now because I worry I will become like the others. I can’t be sure if this will even survive once I finish writing it… but hope is the last thing to go, right?
Am I losing my mind? God I hate this stupid hat. I feel my mind slipping. Soon I’ll be just like them. Just like Wenda and Wilma, knowing something is wrong but refusing (forced to refuse?) to see it. Perhaps that’s for the best. At least I will always have Woof.