Fragment #30 - Ghosts

Tuesday 14th July 2009
Glasgow

It's late, I'm stalking through my flat. My eyes wide open seeing nothing through the inky black held in place with my curtains. I can't sleep, well I could sleep but that's not something I want to do right now. Nightmares of the sweetest kind, horrors of love and perfection punctuated with the occasional “what if..”
Better to wander the halls like a caged animal than to wake wanting nothing but to cry and to beg for something better than this. So I stay awake.
I've been awake now for three days, every time I look at my bed I'm punched in the face with dread and outright fear.

The light in the kitchen sears the back of my eyes when I switch it on, a cold harsh light drapes across the worktops and walls revealing my sins of sloth over the past week. I find a mug that looks clean enough and make yet another coffee, not bothering with the luxuries of milk and sugar.

I sit on my couch and look at the outline of the street lighting behind the material and the glass. This is the hour when ghosts come back to haunt you, personal hell's invading your mind with doubts and fears. This is the time when introspection comes and tries to convince you that you should regret life.

The front door closes quietly behind me and I descend the stairs out into the glistening rain-soaked streets. The splashing slap sound of my feet hitting the black pavement echo in my ears, an occasional taxi shoots past, but I pay little notice. My eyes are on the shuttered shop fronts and the dark windows of the homes above.

A walk always clears my head, especially at night. I stop at Kelvin Bridge and look down on the river churning away, I can't help but remember all the times I've had on this spot; drunken nights of crazyness with John, petty arguments with Lynne and that sweet embrace I had with Bénédicte. Memories and ghosts, all long gone and some long dead. But I remember. I remember all of them.