Day 262 - The Morning

 The Morning

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

The bells rang out.

Trent was already awake. Staring at the ceiling. He could remember 3:13 and 4:42 and then 5:59. He had looked the clock, rolled over and hoped he could get another couple hours in, forgetting all about the season, nature and the fact that he had set the alarm the night before.

 The plantation blinds were closed tight, but the sunlight had begun invading the cracks in between an hour or so ago. Once upon a time, he had needed an alarm to wake. Then for about a year, he woke at 5:00 am every day. Every damn day. His father had collapsed and died at 5:15. Somewhere deep in the back of his mind, something had nudged him awake, as if being awake at the same time would have made any difference at all. 

Trent didn’t need an alarm. He used this one. Set it every night. And it rang every single morning. 

Why? It was insufferable. The routine was pointless. He was already awake. He was always awake. He had beaten the clock for weeks if not months. Basically, ever since he began setting it. He could have shut it off. If he had wanted to. 

Trent had his smart phone. He had used that as an alarm years ago. He certainly didn’t need a mechanical clock. But he would wind it and set in and fall asleep to the ticking pendulum. He could have written a tune to that pattern. He could have counted down to when the chimes would sound. Routine. That’s what it was. Set in stone. Immutable repetition. 

His mother had bought him a morning sun alarm because it was more “natural”. But for some reason it took the annoying repetition of his father’s father’s father’s old alarm clock to give him what he needed. 

Usually. 

Not today. 

Trent, already awake, stared at the ceiling. He had woken in a state of uncomfortable mixed anxiety. His sleep had not been relaxed. His dreams had been all too real and all too full of heightened emotions. His heart beat too hard. For a minute he wasn’t quite sure whether it had been real or not. 

It was getting annoying. Very very annoying. 

He vaguely remembered his dreams. He had certain commonly repeated dreams. Last night he had had two of them. But last night was so far away and it was already beginning to fade. 

One dream was about choice. Something where he had a choice to make. It was something about freedom. Or that was what he could remember anyway. Some dream analysis website told him that this must mean he was confused about a situation in real life. He felt stuck. He didn’t see a way out. What was he confused about? What wasn’t he confused about? Every single day was chaos. He had no control over his life, his choices meant nothing. His life was repetition with no end in sight. It was no wonder that his subconscious was a struggle and his dreams were chaos. 

The other dream was worrisome. He never remembered the beginning, but he always remembered the end. He could see clear as day, the machete, as it swung down. And he knew, just knew his was going to lose his hands. Sometimes he saw the dismemberment, sometimes he didn’t. It jarred him awake. Cold. Scared. Confused and freaked out. Different websites said it meant different things. He feared loss. Of himself. Of someone close to him. Of a special personal skill or ability. An absence of a hand might mean that he felt like he didn’t have enough freedom. 

Freedom. Again. Apparently, all roads didn’t lead to Rome, all of his led him right back to trappings. 

It didn’t matter how much he thought about it. How much he told himself to relax. To not worry about it. His sleeping mind was beyond his control. 

What was he losing? What had he already lost? Trent didn’t know. He could just tell that something, something deep inside was different and wrong. Something had happened. He just had no idea what.

Trent kept all this to himself. He didn’t tell his friends. He didn’t tell his mom. He hadn’t seen his dad in what seemed like an eternity. Some people had told him to try and talk to his father, either at his grave or in some other way, through meditation or shared activities. That felt a little too much like prayer and no one ever answered his prayers. He wondered what he would do if he father did answer. 

Trent’s dreams were his own. 

But he had his father’s clock. He could have that. Everyday.

Couldn’t he just roll over? Couldn’t he just close his eyes and go back to sleep? Couldn’t he just take one day off? One day of rest. A break from the routine that was his life. But that bells weren’t going to let him.

So then why didn’t he get out of bed? 

He was waiting on something. A moment. A sign. A thought. Some spark. Something special that would make him. 

The bells kept going. And Trent kept waiting. Unsure which of them would give up first.