There's nothing worse than having been involuntarily pressured into a corner by an invisible force that embodies every pain, anxiety, and depression you've ever known. I knew something funny was up on my fourth day of self-induced isolation. Before you try to attribute my zaniness to deprivation of food, water, medication, I've kept up with all three. Every pill was absorbed. My calendar can prove it. Curled under several blankets, I was reading Joe Hill's "Heart Shaped Box". A cookie-scented candle's flames danced across the pages, creating a calm haven I knew well, and one I knew how to enjoy. A shrill voice with a consistency of nails against chalkboard projected from under the front door: "! Where have you been? We MISS you!" I glanced straight across at the empty wall above my TV and unconfidently believed it best not to confront the whatever-it-was. Seconds later, the voice shrieked with laughter. A hard pecking faster than any hand could accomplish clattered against the door. A red laser pointer's beam shone from under the door crack and casually made its way to my foot. I got up, unlocked the door and cracked it open just a little bit, eyes distrustful. The hallway is unusually filled with dark grey smoke, which begins to spill into my apartment unit. Something was not right with the thick smog. A few coughs later, hazy flashbacks along with a throbbing headache make themselves imminent. While still holding on to the door handle, a strong tickling sense under my right foot came out of nowhere and then morphed into prickling hot needle pain. *** 12 September 2002 "How can a Neopet be in a dying state if they never actually die?" I thought to myself, clicking and scrolling through my favorite website, Neopets.com. I feed my red Kacheek a few bites of omelette. I hear footsteps coming down the stairs -- my heart filled with grief (really nothing new). As they grow closer in sound, I become tense. Then a loud scratchy voice pierces its way across the living room: "Why the fuck are you always on the computer? I hate that you're always in this trance state." I retort, "Would you rather I were on a beach drinking alcohol and having sex as a teenager with a person far beyond my age? It's what the cool kids do, anyway." The voice tells me to shut up and not talk back. I tried to ignore it. "You're fucking stupid you know that? You're going NOWHERE in life. That wise mouth of yours will always hold you back." I insisted on not providing a response because it would only be met with continued, needless harping. She left the house, slammed the door as hard as she could. Orchestra practice was in two hours which was more than enough time to see if I could snag a good deal on a white Kiki Kitty on the Gaia Online marketplace. The hours melt by and I grab my flute bag and folder of music, then head upstairs to grab my keys. Except, my car keys were missing from my lanyard. My face goes numb. I look outside to see my car is not in the driveway. Maybe it was moved? I run out onto the driveway gravel and, much to my chagrin, I slip and fall hard on my knees and parts of my elbows. I'm sent into panicked breathing, feeling like I got punched in the chest. *** When I got myself together and pushed toward the ground to get up, the smoke began clearing. The sounds of screaming, crying children rang from all directions, bouncing off the walls and reverberating into an overwhelming experience. My limbs were throbbing with acute stinging. I looked down to see if there was visual evidence of wounds. There were none. The blood-curdling shrieks of suffering children decrescendoed to a deafening silence and normalcy took reign. I desire to pretend like nothing happened, except I hear my cat meowing, but not from inside my place. She sits at the end of the hall to the left, displaying a big merry red gift ribbon wrapped around her tail. Her back is facing my vision. "!" I call out in hopes of her making her way back. "Meow!" she replied, unmoving. I walk toward her. She licks her paw. Before I can pet her calico-patterned fur, she faces me. This isn't my cat. This cat's green eyes were were baking and steaming into ashy crisps. This cat's mouth was filled with writhing maggots, pecking off dead oral flesh. The forlorn, defeated look in its eyes comforted my gut. The extent of my understanding for such comfort was deeply nested in my subconscious. Before I could think much about what I was feeling, the cat's appearance started to glitch, like a VHS tape coming to the end of its recorded content, transitioning into white noise. The strange being traipsed its way past me toward the other end of the hall. Past the stainless steel-covered wall lights, the unit numbers, and the storage room. Audible white noise crescendoed as the cat moved farther and farther away. The upturned volume was unbearable. I walked toward the absurd animation which turned the volume down. When the cat moved forward, the volume increased. The cat ran up the spiral staircase which extends upwards ten more stories. If I didn't keep up, my ears would have hell to pay, so I chased after it. The sound of white noise danced in volume depending on the distance between us. Metal clangs from my shoes against steps bounced off the walls. My thighs burned by the time I reached the top. At that point, uncertainty presented itself with whether or not the cat was still around. I couldn't hear the white noise any longer. I walked up to the bubbler to have a sip of water. While drinking I found a moment of tranquility, contrary to the events leading up to this. I wiped off a few drops of water from my lips with my sleeve and headed to the window equipped with a ladder that provides entry to the roof. I'm hanging off the side of a twelve-story building in pursuit of a phantom cat. I pull myself over the wall and clumsily land on the fake grass. The sky is a marvelous blue-black tonight. The stars asynchronously glimmer like Christmas tree lights and it is clear the city is in a state opposite of active. The little ball of white noise is nowhere to be found. I slump into one of the roof's lounge chairs to catch my breath and relax for a second, taking in my surroundings. The moon's back-shadow is such a vibrant teal, starting from the moon's edges and blending out to white. Or, wait -- is that? The white noise cat appears to be parading around the moon! The teal color becomes intense as time passes by, transitioning from a cloudy texture to a full consistency you'd expect of lasers in movies. I blink once, and then I'm suddenly in the midst of tall grass in a bona fide pitch dark forest. *** The whispers and whistles of the wind weave and dance through the night sky, in and out of the empty space above the tall grass, and within it. The grass leaves brushing against each other create a calm in me that is so easily lost when involved in city living. The sky's shade resembles the moon's backdrop teal, but it is darker. Having regained some of my footing, I feel empowered to explore. Why was I brought here? Am I actually here? What felt like hours had passed, and nothing notably stood out from my wandering, at least nothing aside from the increasing chill running through my body. I finally enter an area not enshrouded in tall grass. Up ahead was what seemed like a light orb. It resembled the way the moon looked when I was on the roof. It moved toward me in an elegant style. I wish I had my sunglasses. The orb exited the tall grass, exposing a girl with round prescription glasses. Immediately I felt an innate connection stronger than anything I'd experienced before with this person. She stopped. She appeared to be in shock at least equal to what I was feeling. No words were exchanged between us because none had to be said. I knew this was someone I had once known, maybe not in this life. I couldn't place my finger on it. We both started to cry. An hourglass appeared above and between us. It levitated in a menacing manner, threatening that time was running short. To add to this, my right-side-up perception began to rotate counterclockwise. The girl and I's locked stare was yet to be interrupted. The crying became much heavier. It felt like I missed her, that I knew her, and that I'd never ever see her again. My insides dropped. I held a hand out to her and she did the same as though her shape was a reflection. The tears flowed uncontrollably. Our hands touched, and the environment dissipated, like the effect of a TV being turned off. *** I awoke in bed with an intense headache, feeling dehydrated. My pillow was drenched in tears; memories of hiccuping my way through unruly fits of crying were unavoidable. I turned to my left to get onto a dry pillow, and then slunk into a lowsy fetal position.