There it is, looking back at me. I challenge it with all the courage I can conjure, but I fail. I can’t help to notice the single color that swallows up the room—black. Not to be confused with the cheerful blacks we place on commonplace objects, this is black at its purest. At its finest. The unyielding black that only nature can create, every single night. With this ancient black barring my senses, I jerk my eyes to full capability. I feel my eyeballs frantically moving, identifying, searching, and they start to ache. I curse the evolution of man and pray for some type of celestial device to magically be placed upon my bed. Nothing happens—I was falsely encouraged. Oh, the extremities of nature! How can it be possible that so beautiful a thing can create such a powerful, forbidding monster? The frantic pace of my eyes is replaced with conserved, occasional sights, afraid to pick anything up which I do not want to see. My eyes feel heavily anchored, but I do not succumb to it. Sleep is for the vulnerable; those who get eaten by flesh eating beasts first, those who die in the classic, enigmatic horror movies first. Dying never felt so real to me before.

So here I am, thinly veiled from the blackness, shielded by a sheet of glass. No— “shielded” isn’t really quite the right term. The black has penetrated my transparent barrier, and is ominously present. So this is what blindness must feel like; it allows me to heighten the remaining senses I have. My body sensitizes tenfold to any form of contact or interference. There is a fault to this process, as my heart falters at every infinitesimal sound, every screech, every creak. As every car goes rattling past, I fear for my life. There isn’t really a word to describe my fear. A sort of nakedness that puts one on edge. There is no control over one’s surroundings—where one’s fate can be easily manipulated.
The rumbling of my dad’s nasal cavity has an insidious pattern to it. Every so often it softens, and softens; a possessed whispering. As I follow the sound and frantically try to locate the haunted breaths, it hits me with a loud, forceful snort, and halts, stopping my progress. Every time I fall for the unforgiving inhalation, and every time I desperately try to cling on to the eerie murmurs, bracing for certain impact. This starts to trouble me, and a clammy hand reaches out to the fan for assistance. The resonance of my powerful rotating ally comforts me, and gives me a pleasing draft that curls me up under my covers. The strong wind makes my dry, fearful eyes fill with warm water, and I finally close them to coat the delicate layer. The streams tickle my face and slowly travel down to my nose and mouth. My tongue eagerly searches for a drop and finds it. The surge of salt and liquid fills my mouth, but I don’t mind. I realize I can’t hear anything else. The looming darkness seems a frustrated foe, a defeated and forgotten adversary. I identify with the phrase “ignorance is bliss”, and ease my mind and body, now filled with contentment.