That Friday I felt like an extra in someone else's movie. I woke up to some mock-up universe that looked and moved like my own but turned out to be composed of some cheaper material. It was a rude awakening, the entirety of my sleeping consciousness imploding in an instant, borne by the force of six sharp raps on the door. The last time I had heard a knock on the door was four months ago, announcing the arrival of a friend who I had little contact with but still enjoyed a mutual affection that made looking forward to our next meeting enjoyable. At that time, I had weeks to anticipate my friend's arrival and the shining evening stretching before us.
In this case, however, the knock was completely unexpected and I shot upright, blearily addressing the door with a hoarse "Be right there!" The last remnants of some aborted dream melted into the limpid grey light that illuminated the length of the bed. My mind briefly examined images of great, grey desert dunes stitched from the worn fabric of my comforter. In the meantime, my legs had flung themselves from the bed, and I was stumbling down the hallway, mistaking a lightswitch for a small painting. After a brief moment of consideration, I stumped across to the small kitchen, little more than a tiled counter and sink next to a stove, and flipped on the stove light. Dim yellow light overwhelmed the morning's infantile rays and slowly filled the room, as if my small apartment was as unwilling to confront the day's illumination as I was. The light bulb's yellow stain did nothing to remove the winter chill from the dark floorboards, and I did a little hopping dance to the door, like a small shorebird that dislikes getting its feet wet even as it lives its whole life in the aftermath of waves.
