Tuesday, August 30, 2016

DRIFT (flash fiction)

I think I’m upside down, but I can’t be sure. Drifting, though. I can see stars and galaxies. Not sure how, because I don’t have eyes. In fact, I don’t have anything. And I’m pretty sure I’m nowhere, though surely I must be somewhere. And, as best as I can tell, I am utterly alone. Oddly, I have no idea how long I have been here, in this state.
I’m not sure how I died, though clearly I did. I had a former existence. Memories are still intact, though. Wouldn’t I need a brain for that? One minute rushing to work, and then . . . blackness. Silence. Stillness. I suppose I should be freezing, but I can’t feel a thing, except some anxiety. And I am not really sure I am actually still, exactly; I sense I am floating, hence the ability to be inverted. I must be in a huge swath of vacuum?
I thought there would be others. Souls clustered like billions of shiny insect eggs or dots of light. If I have mass, it can’t be much. I’m not heading toward any light. There are distant celestial bodies, but nothing I recognize.
Perhaps this is purgatory? Or I am in Hell! It would almost be a relief if some disconsolate diatomite passed by. Then at least I might have a bearing. On the other hand, I don’t feel I am being punished, and there is no pain, physical or otherwise. Just . . . calm and emptiness. I guess my retained memories would mean I am not entirely empty.

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