28
I wake to a shadow at my bedside, a humanoid figure that’s a concentration of darkness. The pixilation typical to my vision is richer, but whereas in some cases I’m able to contemplate a whole progression of waking thoughts in that millisecond it takes me to start waking, this time there’s nothing but abrupt alarm. I shout, although I don’t know if it’s in panic or in warning. The shadow disappears. Then it’s me being awake. Fully. I check the time: just after 1.34am. And it feels like that, like it’s not too deep into the early morning. Most of these encounters occur around this time. There’d be a medical…
23
I wake to the sight of five shadowy black pulses wafting through the doorway into my bedroom and approaching my bed. And that’s it. I sit up, fully roused. The shadowy pulses are gone. They didn’t just disappear. They might’ve never been. I’m alone in my bedroom. Nothing but me and what happened. I think of this in-between world between waking and sleep, this realm where the conscious mind is shutting down, and dreaming and reality blurs. There’s an alarm here, but I’m not overly worried. I haven’t kicked into fight or flight mode. My anxiety is not cycling up to catastrophising what’s going on. Of course, I’m older now.…