Into The Darkness - Part 1

It's too early. They always wake us too early. The light burns my eyes. How long has it been since I last slept? I can't tell. The doctor is coming to see me again today. He always has "nice" things to say, to try and motivate me to get up, socialize, sleep proper...they even give me pills to help. But it doesn't happen, I'm wide awake all the time. It's why I'm here, I imagine. They put me here. To help me. But it's not helping. The doctor will help me. He'll show me that everything I'm seeing is fake. That the fire and the pain and the blood...oh God, the blood...he'll show me all that is in my head, a stupid dream that I see even when I'm awake, the insomnia a side-effect of my fear of those dreams, or so they've told me.

10 AM...I can hear them in the hallway, I'm all the way at the end, in the last room. The doctor and the orderlies are visiting each patient, saying hello, asking how their mornings are. I sit up, brush my hand through my hair to make it somewhat proper. I sit on the edge of my bed, ignoring the shadows that bounce around through the room.

'They're not real...' I keep repeating over and over in my head, 'Remember what the doctor told you...'

I wait in silence, hearing the footsteps get closer and closer until they stop just outside the door. I hear a soft series of knocks, one...two...three...then the lock unhinge and the door open.

"Ah, you're awake! Good morning, how have you slept?"

"Good morning, doctor, you already know, the insomnia?"

"Yes, of course, I just hoped the new series of medications would have helped. Is it still the nightmares?"

The doctor talks calmly, entering the room, the orderlies stay outside. He takes a seat in a chair next to my bed. His eyes scan mine, they stare right through me. Those blue, piercing eyes. There's light around him in the room. I can't explain it. Why is there always light around him? Why do his eyes pierce through me? Why does he frighten me, even though he says he's here to help?

"Jeremy? Jeremy are you alright?"

"Oh, yes, sorry, doctor. Yeah, it's the nightmares again. I just...I can't see those things again."

"It's quite alright. You have been taking your medication?"

"Yes. They don't seem to help. I keep taking them, eating, going outside, but nothing's making the nightmares go away and I can't sleep. I feel weaker every day, too. And I'm still seeing those...things in the dark..."

"Well, of course you feel weak, you haven't slept in...what is it now, 4 days? You know your parents brought you here for help because you were seeing 'demons' and monsters everywhere. Together, we'll figure this out, Jeremy. If only you'd let me in..."

"I'm trying doc...I just have a hard time..."

"Let me in, Jeremy, tell me the details of these nightmares, these horrors you see."

He stared at me...those intense, piercing eyes. He kept repeating over and over "Let me in, Jeremy..."