The door creaked slightly, and then swung open. There he was, but something was horribly wrong. Legs that weren’t hers clung desperately to his body. Arms that weren’t hers wrapped lovingly around his neck. Lips that weren’t hers greedily lapped at his gaping mouth. Her lungs tightened and she stood there, her silhouette darkened by the light coming from down the hallway. All the maddening clutter of thoughts in her head came to halt.
He looked up, gave her an empty apologetic smile, and began say something, but she was already gone.
She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see. The world around her was rapidly filling up with water and she had to get out. Had to find air. Had to get out. Her view was going out of focus, and her lungs began to squeeze even tighter than she thought possible.
After scrambling away from her apartment building, she finally burst from the bubble of her nightmare. Her lungs ballooned back to their normal size, and she looked around, seeing the world come into a harsh focus. She became acutely aware of the unbearable exhaustion creeping into her body, but she had already run past her car by about a block, and so she looked towards the twinkling of the city in distance. She wasn’t too far from downtown. She could walk. Maybe that’d help clear her mind.
It was already well past eight, and a numbing slumber was beginning to take hold of the town. Shop owners could be seen through clean, shiny display windows making the final rounds before calling it a night and heading back to their homes to see their wives. Their wives. She shook her head. Don’t think about it, she slowly chanted to herself. The buildings were slowly becoming taller, and oddly sleepier as she made her way to the bridge leading into the shimmering lights beyond the river. Just before she crossed it, she glanced at the small park overlooking the water. Somewhere nearby a man with a guitar was singing a sad tune, its melancholy notes echoing softly around her.
There, there was her bench. The bench she spent her lunch breaks on, pondering over her uncertain future, merrily giggling over her present, and trying ever so hard to forget her past. But now it was just a bench, a piece of dead tree carved, laminated and placed for her general convenience. Not feeling like braving the expanse between her and the lights just yet, she sauntered over and sat down.
She was already starting to miss the suffocating numbing she had initially experienced as the beginnings of winter licked hungrily at her bare toes. Why hadn’t she at least put her shoes back on? The brightness of the world beyond reached out to her, trying to envelop her in her warmth, but it felt more like an insult to her. She just wasn’t in the mood for happy things right now. She closed her eyes.
And there he was. His baggy shirt swayed as he walked around the kitchen preparing breakfast. Grinning at her. Telling her he actually couldn’t go out with her and her friends tonight. Had plans. He always had plans these days. Must be busy, working for a big advertising firm. He hugged her, planted a soft kiss on her forehead and was out the door. Out to take the trash out. And yet, it was as though he had gone light years away. After bringing the pancakes to the table, he plopped down, and pulled his phone out. An invisible wall shot up between them, and all she could do was helplessly watch from the other side as he scrolled down some page on his phone in a detached trance.
And there he was again, pulling at the ends of his messy hair, nervously fidgeting when she asked about how one of her friends had seen him at the pub down in Greens Brooke. He told her he had been scouting it out as a possible place to take her for their anniversary. To take her. Memories of vaguely odd behavior, seemingly innocent excuses flooded into her view, clouding her vision again.
She wiped her eyes and took a quick breath. Everything. It all made sense. She wrung her hands in frustration. Why hadn’t she noticed? Why had she been so gullible? It wasn’t difficult to tell.
The world started filling up with water again— a gloss of wet obscured the lights, but it was different this time.  Try as she might to wipe away the wet it kept pouring out, eventually sweeping over her head, reaching towards the darkness above. The nightmare was back in full force and had no intention of leaving her as easily again. It was different this time, though. She was drowning.
She looked at the sky, past the flowing waves of her nightmare, to the dim stars above. Her throat constricted, trying to suppress what dignity she still had left from escaping out of her chattering teeth. The pain of his betrayal ebbed and flowed in and out of her mind, slowly creeping higher and higher into the depths of her being. She felt herself sinking into the darkness of her misery. The glow from the lights gradually faded until it was just her surrounded by an oppressive black.
The tune plummeted into a series of minor chords, mirroring her mood. Then it began to rise ever so slightly. She could feel the music pushing her towards the surface. With each rise in pitch, she inched closer, until she finally broke the surface. Air. Gulp of air. Sweet wind on the face. She was out. She glanced over at the source of the music.
The figure was leaning against a lamppost, facing the street behind her. She couldn’t make out his face, but she could see his fingers gliding hypnotically back and forth across the strings of his worn out guitar. He turned his head toward her, nodded and resumed playing.
The song wasn’t exactly happy, but it was… reassuring. A single ray of light penetrating though a dense fog. She reached out to the globe hanging from the lamppost, opening and closing her palm, picturing herself grabbing it. Shaking off the weariness that clung to her body, she stood up, nodded back at the guitarist and turned to the other side of the river.
She didn’t know what she’d do from now on. She didn’t know how she’d face him. She didn’t know anything, really. But at least she knew that she couldn’t sit on that bench and let herself waste away. The glow of the lights splashed against her face playfully. She grinned weakly, then took off to greet them.