The Man Without A Name
The walls must be closing in, for with each heartbeat
the room seems to become more enclosed. Perhaps in a few minutes from now the
man, who for the purpose of this passage possesses no name, will be able to
reach across the breadth of this dungeon and feel the cool plaster press him
into nonexistence. At this moment, the entire world, outside of these confines,
is a figment of his imagination. Staying here is safe, if he does not wish to
be sad, he does not have to be sad. If he does not wish to be happy, he does
not need to be happy. There is nobody to satisfy, besides himself. There is
nobody who will be able to witness his flaws and his blunders.
He tears at his hair with grim expression, as he begins
to pace nervously. He is not somebody who is normally bothered by
claustrophobia, but even he starts to become anxious as he begins to wonder if
the ceiling truly may have been several inches higher when he first entered.
His current state of mind is so intense and horrific that he feels both
euphoric and intensely elevated. Still, he is plagued by a cyclic hopelessness
and lack of purpose. He cannot recall the last time he has lain his head to
rest; his eyes are burning simply from his current state of wakefulness. He
wishes to sleep, but he is afraid of what may occur if he misses a moment of
this life, which currently only exists within the confines of his room.
I can only imagine what he would say to me if he knew
I am sitting at the dining room table, behind the barrier of his door, in the
world he, at this moment, is not a part of. I am lightly engrossed in a
riveting tale that I am currently amidst the process of writing. I sit, with a
tea cup near enough to my right hand that I can sip it at my leisure, but not
so near that I may risk spilling it across the laptop I am typing at. I can
perfectly picture the anger that would arise if the man (who still remains without
a name) knew that I am feebly engaging my greatest effort into attempting to
portray the sentiment I know that he is currently feeling. I wish to tell him
that I have expressed the same sadness and terror in my life—and yes—I have
given in to the same darkness. I yearn to tell him that there have been points
in my life too I was sure that I would not survive. I have felt the same
emptiness as him.
I have attempted to knock on his door several times
prior to this moment, but each time I was met with silence. I know that he is
still alive only by the sound of his feet pacing the floor, and the occasional
misstep which causes the floor boards to creak. No, I will not be bothering
this man anymore, moreover he will meet me on his own terms. Eventually his
door will crack open, and I will witness him sluggishly stepping towards the
kitchen. I will meet his gaze and portray to him my utter understanding. I feel
as though our thought processes are eerily similar, even if our behaviour
manifests in different manners. He is feeling the darkness, and letting it
consume him, while I am using his darkness to rid myself of my own. I am
documenting his darkness so the devil may relieve me of my own. If I was
capable of remorse or guilt perhaps I would cease my efforts to capture his
sentiment and instead turn my attention to being a close friend, a companion, a
confidant, a comrade, or crony.
Back in the room, the nighttide is consuming, the man
has never felt more alone in the entirety of his existence. He is captive
within the limits of his own imagination; he cannot leave this room for he is
afraid to see what may be waiting for him. His thought pattern is abstract and
sporadic, as if he is moments away from finding ultimate meaning but does not
process the thought processes to let it out. His mind is being held back, by
his own inferior intelligence. The room is collapsing, his mind is collapsing. Breathing
is a chore. This is death, this is the feeling of giving up—to not have the
energy to lift a finger, let alone his entire figure. He collapses into a
crumple on the floor of his room, letting out a lone whimper. The combination
of lack of nutrition and sleep has left him feeling weak and afraid. He fears
he may never be able to amble back to his feet.
The four walls continue their shift towards each other
and suddenly the room is the size of a small closet. He is left alone in the
darkness while his thoughts—the depressive cognitions, which plague him still,
become all consuming. His brain pulsates, while thoughts radiate, he is
overwhelmed by a momentary wave of grief so profound that he can feel his
entire body shudder. Alone… Alone, what is the definition of being alone? At
all moments our minds are simply our own, no matter who we stand next to, in
essence we are always lost in a single mind. No matter how close we may be to
another individual we are still our own person. Alone! We are so alone at every
moment of our existence, from the day we are born to the day we pass away. But
for whatever reason, at this instant, the man feels particularly deserted in
his isolation. He feels passionately hopeless.
The human mind is such a beautiful entity, the brain’s
involution is so intense, that when it is damaged—when it is bruised—it can
turn life into a nightmare, akin to our most surreal dreams. Can we all relate,
to the pains and tribulation this world has to offer? In the darkness the man starts
to wonder if every mind is hardwired to think with the same methodology as his.
And I, still sitting quietly at the table, find myself with thoughts that I
assume are truly alike to his own. Are we all searching for ultimate meaning,
the purpose of why we have been put on the face of this earth? Are we all
destined for something greater than ourselves, or is it possible that we can
die with our questions unanswered? What if we are living a dream from which
death is the only awakening?
The man’s
consciousness becomes a contrast between being awake and faintly asleep. He
lays on the floor, in a heap, desperately searching for the reason… The reason
he was cursed with a mind that never ceases to rest. He asks himself why he
cannot find happiness like many of his peers, and instead, he is on an endless
quest for perfect understanding. I too, have had similar thoughts and have
dived into a similar frustration.
Time is an illusion,
an entity that does not currently exist. To me, my perception of a minute is as
it has always been. The clock ticks at the same rate it always has. But on the
other side of the door, the man’s conceptualization of a minute is akin to my
perception of a year. Although both our watches may depict the same set of
numbers, a moment to me is not a moment to the man. In the time it has taken me
to write this page, the man has lived a decade or more—he has wept a lifetime
of tears and smiled a lifetime worth of happiness. I can’t help but wonder
where the true psychosis may lie. Is he the one who has lost contact with
reality or have I? I shiver as begin to question the philosophic boundaries of
what is real and what is not.
The room the man
resides in has transformed again from the size of closet to the size of a
kitchen cabinet. He lies with his knees tucked into his chest and can
concurrently feel the ceiling, floor, and walls pushing against him. In his
reality he resides in a box in the middle of the universe. If he was able to
leave the confines of his prison he would step into space, a million miles away
from earth. He whimpers, unknowing that in my reality he is only a door away.
In my reality I can clearly depict the sound of his whining, and I must admit,
with each utterance my heart feels as though it is skipping a beat. I am
oversorrowed so much so, that I hesitate in my chronicling. And for the time it
takes for me to inhale one breath I even feel what may be described as guilt.
The whining continues,
as the man continues to be pushed from existence. The walls are pushing again
him in such an intense manner that he can feel his bones start to break. His
eyes, which are void of tears, from a lack of fluids, blink uncontrollably. The
man, who I would now like to give a name, may have otherwise given up at that
moment if it had not been for our two worlds suddenly becoming intertwined.
My typing become more
furious as I attempting to capture the scene that was about to unfurl with
perfect sentiment.
“Fight it!” I yell as I bang the keys at a near random
fashion.
“Fight it!” I shout again, surprised that I am still
able to forms words with my fingers. The table sways so acutely that the teacup
tips off the table and shatters into two nearly equal halves next to my feet.
“Fight it!” I shout with an odd combination of
fascination, agitation, and excitement.
I’m not sure if my voice carried all the way to the
man but something within his head clicked at that instant. As much as I would
like to take credit for his revolution, deep within my heart I knew my words
were only meant for me. The man begins to push on the walls which are enclosing
him, and he even comes across the fortitude to stand up. He pushes the ceiling
back to its rightful place far above him and stretches his unmalleable joints
which had been folded to nearly the point of compression. In a matter of
seconds the room returns to its original girth and he is left alone to once
again to walk about. He languishes the door with an innocent visage. His greatest
desire at this moment is to do nothing other than to feel the brass of the door
handle beneath his fingertips. He steps towards the edge of his imprisonment,
and stares at his impending freedom, which is the doorway. He places his hand
on the handle—it feels exactly as he imagined it would. He desperately wants to
let his tears flow, but given his dehydration, his tears would likely come out
as grains of sand.
The door opens, and I stop typing momentarily until I
am certain that the man has truly conquered his demons and floundered back to my
reality. When I meet his gaze I am startled by the salient expression he wears
on his face. I expected him to look defeated and in a psychotic state of
terror. But his eyes, the green-grey evanescent orbs in his possession gleam
with a victorious sheen, and odd contrast to the racoon like circles on his
face which signal his fatigue. He smiles, perpetuating his delirium—a hapless
grin that both terrifies me and make me jealous that I do not possess it.
“To the man with no name, I ask, are you okay? Are you
alive? Are your footsteps treading reality? Have you defeated the darkness?”
He says nothing, but I am still assured that his
demons have passed him, due to the sparkle in the corner of his eye that long
ago disappeared. He collapses into the seat across the table from me and rests
his forehead against both of his hands. I examine him momentarily, with my head
slightly cocked to the left, before being lifted from my seat. Gingerly, I step
towards the kitchen to pour a glass of water. After placing two ice cubes
within the glass I walk back to the dining room and place the glass back in
front of the man.
“Welcome back,” I say to him. He nearly smiles.
The only sound that exists between us thereafter is
the sound of my keyboard being bludgeoned by my hands as I tried to capture the
precarious interaction between me and the man who still has not been named.
DannYetman
www.DanielYetman.com
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