He looked at his phone, knowing the screen would show the usual wallpaper of the world map he set a long time ago. It wasnt as though he expected anything–nobody had messaged or called him for a few years–but the empty home screen always managed to make him stall for a second. He flopped down the bed letting the device, now a useless rectangular piece of metal, slip through his hand. Everything was served as momentary purpose. Whatever he didnt need, didnt matter and was categorized into the void of pointless forgotten realm, materializing again only upon his imminent desire.
He never looked beside– at the walls– making sure to stare only at the ever familiar blank white ceiling. He was always limited that way. He had to be fixated, confined. The walls and everything else were the reality he did not want to admit. The ceiling provided the escape where he could drift, wander, pluck the memories and draw them in his mind.
The ceiling was the essential medium which he could forget and imagine.
Then as if on cue, random images related to both nonfiction and fantasy rushed forward as though they had been waiting for ambush.
He flipped through them like pages in a book, and waited for the most prominent one to emerge.
Among others, he thought of the friend who had at one point crossed his life but left as insignificantly. The one who had a weird way of wobbling while walking. Why he had come to mind, he did not know. He did not question.
Then he wondered what happened to the girl who he stopped being in touch with. He was juggling with the two options fate had always used; was she one who would also leave till death do us part? Or were we ever to cross paths again? He did not pursue like always, and left it to time’s task.
Then after sifting through a bunch of arbitrary memories, the dreaded one which always came last, finally emerged: his future. As always, there was only black. He conjured up the images of what he could be, then was forced to face what he was now.
Then he crouched, hugging his knees to his chest, neither closing nor further probing on the thought that emerged. He just left it bare open and vulnerable, always available for construction.
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