We're Not Going Anywhere – Psychedelic Short Story

This post is my contribution to the 'TrippyContest4: You moved me.' in which you could win a lot of SMOKE. All you need to do is sign up on smoke.io and participate in the contest:

Share in a post a turning point experience of your own life of something that has led you to be who you are today - reflect and most importantly, be inspired.

Yanis is walking around the room, placing lasers here and there, adjusting them. Cyan, Yellow, Magenta, my eyes follow his hands and my thoughts at the same … time? What's time supposed to be?

Color Your Mind

at the same time… everything.

Caroline says she loves what Yanis does. I love that she loves. I can't tell if Anna is still with us. I am facing Yanis who wants some feedback. That's Caroline's kind of thing, judgment, answering pointless questions. I feel no need to say anything, no need at all. Why change the lighting? All this action. I can't help but laugh and realize laughter is a judgment, too.

Everything happens at the same time.

Time isn't real and since it's not, that doesn't only apply right now. Every action seems ridiculous. Why bother about the lighting? Don't they see the fractals? Yanis looks at the ceiling, bursting out in laughter. "I am impressed!" he splutters. "I don't think Anton made this elaborate ceiling." Caroline joins in, her whole body explodes in billions of bubbly shivers, she forgot about the joint she was rolling, my eyes follow tobacco and marijuana floating through the air which reminds me, I was rolling a joint, too. I rub my pawns on my pants, hoping to eliminate the sweat somehow. I don't like the sense of tobacco on my sticky fingertips. Anna reaches out to me from behind my back. She robs closer and takes my hands. So, she is still with us. She was just busy reading my mind. She takes a layer of her overhanging cotton skirt and softly dries my pawns. I close my eyes to fully take it in. Her touch is delightful, my mind bathes in her intention.

None of us remembers the floor above. Does she hear us laughing down here? Caroline and Yanis are still off the wall about the ceiling. It’s funny how they would be staring at the dragon if this wall wouldn’t exist. They are facing her right now. I guess. “You’ll leave as soon as possible” is what she said. “Move out! I hate to see your faces!” Nobody answered her shrieking. The four of us only opened our mouth for a drop of acid each and stared at her. One paradox about time: Even though it doesn’t exist, it’s sometimes the only thing that helps. But this, of course, applies only for this dimension. One or two floors down, it is still happening and never happened …

… at the same time …

Anna is with Caroline now who started crylaughing. She’s shaking, sobbing, roaring, her face changes from desperate – mouth and eyes wide open – to eyes closed, corners of her mouth twitching, her body floats in waves, she’s lying down, rearing up, like a canoe on a troubled ocean. At the peak of her latest wave, she glares at me. Streaming tears as if her face would be a hologram from another world and the tears are just the difference in frequency between those worlds.

“May! I feel so good! But I am so saaaad.” I smile at her and understand that she’s not real.

It is simply energy. The pain, the laughter, the tears in her face and the sweat on my fingers. Truth is: I am the universe. I burst out in laughter, I explode. Big bang, I just woke up. This is it. I am the universe and I just woke up to myself. I am consciousness. I just got aware of it.

A new wave of laughter rushes through me and crushes onto my lids. I know who I am. I invented all of this. Just to be entertained. And I wasn’t even aware of it for I was sleeping, I was dreaming. Maybe this is one of those dreams where you think you just got up and started your day, but then you wake up again. I can’t help. This would make it even better. I am shaking.

If I would still be sleeping, I should have woken up by now, I feel every muscle contracting. I never felt that clear. All the time I was just entertaining myself using electricity – 1100101 – I feel so sorry for everyone who thought they would be real. From afar I hear Anna say that I am fine. Fine? Every cell in my body just ignited, I am sending out a golden glimmer, I shine, there’s not an inch on my body that wouldn’t be giggling. I try to explain myself but it’s hard to speak between the sniggle. “Guys, I am – ha ha ha – the universe – uhu uhu hu hu – It’s all just a ga-ham-ham-ham … I can’t explain right now … it is too funny! Sorry!”

I hold my stomach, feel the muscles pounding in my pawns, try massaging the burning belly while I notice all the muscles in my face. My jaw hurts from laughing, the sides of my throat, everything burns and the pain is such a pleasure. I think about the dragon upstairs. Not real. Just a reflection of my fear of rejection.

It’s so obvious! The last time I tried solving a problem with her she said: “You don’t know me, May. So, I’ll tell you, I am not emphatic like you are. I am cold.” She left me speechless that day. Today I understand. Of course, that doesn’t make sense. It was a glitch. I was waking up, I was in-between, where logic and narrative are melting together like those molecules in the ceiling above us. I wonder why it’s still there. Actually, it could all end right here. I have to laugh again. Then what? Falling asleep again? There’s no end to it. Nothing else but this role play. I try speaking again:

“You know, how they say, that world is but a stage?” I can’t go on. Yanis is roaring with laughter, Anna and Caroline are happily swaying, I have to join in. It feels too good and if they are me, they already know. We’re sharing senses, they know it.

Everybody is just playing a role in my play and I am playing different roles in theirs. In my play, Lisa, the dragon who lives above is an antagonist. It’s her job to act as if she’s cold and heartless. Every play needs a villain. Every protagonist needs a burden to overcome, a conflict to grow from. She’s my special task, I am hers. I should be grateful for the negativity she causes in my life. No energy without polarity, at least – again – in this dimension. Because, of course, me again, being the universe, not knowing anything else but polarity. I apologize.

In her play, she’s the loving one and I am evil. She hated me from the day I moved into the house next door. She could never make friends with her housemates and jealously watched me growing into their hearts from the beginning. She hates finding me dancing in the garden, all by myself. Whatever I do to please myself provokes her. We’re provoking each other by simply being ourselves. Not my fault, not hers, … well, mine! I have to learn to take responsibility. I am freaking all of us! If world is but a stage, I need to take on my role and play for my life.

Caroline, Yanis, May!

“Where is Anna?”
Yanis shrugs his shoulders. I stand up to look for her. I step over Caroline and hear her softly sighing. I haven’t walked in a while. It kind of makes me feel sober but the minute my feet touch the steps I notice how they move. It doesn’t make it harder to walk, it seems just natural. I smirk about the pretty work I did creating this universe. Solid from the outside, but just like me … it never stops moving on the inside. It is – I am constant electricity. Before I open the door at the end of the stairway I can feel her presence. I know she will be standing in the kitchen. Not Anna, Lisa. A little tremble wriggles up her body for the millisecond she endures looking into my stoned eyes. I smile at her. It comes from my heart. “Hello.” Simple as that. I can’t tell if she answered me, I am already walking towards the garden, searching for Anna. I check my shoulders, my guts, my neck, my thighs, all those places where I feel emotions like anger and fear. No reaction.