This is the time of night I find myself drifting in a vessel to other worlds. Suspended between worn cotton sheets and the thin veil of consciousness. On a hybrid mattress with enough fluff to feel dreamy and enough memory foam to trace my shape without feeling like a bag of sand.

This bed will be paid off in 5 years. I bought it within the same month I bought a house and a car. It was expensive for a bed, but the cheapest of the three and the only one that came with the option for a no-interest loan.

I laid on a dozen beds at the first mattress store, 5 at the next one, and 5 again at the first one. This was the one that came out on top. Not the most expensive. Not the least comfortable.

The Goldilocks bed.

The foundation for the dreamscape I enter every night. The solid grounding that catches me from imaginary falls. Where I collapse after running from monsters that appear as people from my past. The home base, like the Davis' curbside tree in childhood games of tag. The shores onto which I pull myself, tussled from the seas of subliminal exploration. Ravaged and wind-tossed. Cheeks salty with my own rain.

In this moment, I'm aware of my suspension, my consciousness the fulcrum of a squeaking see-saw. The quivering meniscus of a glass not quite overfull. Before the sun touches the tripwire horizon, alerting me to the day about to make its case. Before the moon has inserted itself into the coinslot of tomorrow. While the nightshade remains askance at the top of the window. Stuck in the gray area that lies on the spectrum of time convention: too early to start the day, and too late to go back to sleep.

I have a decision to make: Do I tuck back in and cower behind the sheer folds of night's polka-dotted skirt, hoping? Or do I bravely touch warm feet to cool wood and open eyes fully to the beckoning call of today?

The one I am writing you from now.

Credits

Accompanying music: Klass by Tom Ashbrook

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