I'm empty of everything that early in the morning. No sleep, no hunger, no profound instinctual compulsions that you'd guess live deep in the bowels of the morning, when only the least complex form of each person exists. When it's that dark and that quiet, the heart is the only thing that matters.
          I breathe, but each breath whooshes like wind through one open window and out the other. There's no substance in there; lungs don't catch and hold on. My chest moves hollowly, mechanically, as if it's some household appliance running incessantly. Like a light bulb glowing in a deserted house.
          My eyes stare anywhere, at anything, at darkness and nothingness and up through space and time into worlds where each speck of dust is an infinite entity. I'm restless, too hot under normally snug covers, my arms wanting to reach out and grab hold of something more substantial than what I have. Have you ever had that feeling? Of just wanting to reach out, out, out into the atmosphere, farther, longer, feel the power reverberating through your arm, and feel the stretch of your muscles and tendons? My cheeks burn--I know they're red.
          I turn onto my side, I stare out the window, I watch the murky orange-pink of the streetlight far away, slightly blurred by the ***** glass.
          My stress is tangible, emanating out of my body, filling the air with a cloud of decay, stifling me in my bed. I reach up and touch the ceiling, less than 2 feet above my head, feeling trapped, my temples are a newly tumble-dried button-down shirt firmly pressed under an iron. I'm aching, and it's all my fault.
          My dreams have been wispy, morning haze, almost indistinguishable from real life. Reminders.