Caffeine

Have you ever noticed that when you lay on your stomach, with your head facing the ceiling, the visions that dance around your head all night become more vivid? You might wake up in the middle of night with an uneasy feeling from the hallucinations you were just experiencing. You stuff your face into the pillow, only to find, in the middle of night your subconscious movements turned you right back to the same position as before.

On one of these nights in particular, you recall, waking up without the slightest idea where you were. Usually when you slumber in this position, you enter a world of splendor and mirth. When you rise in the morning, you chose to fall right back to sleep, extending the trance you have discovered simply by shifting position. This was not one of those nights. Although you fell asleep face-up, you awaken with less orientation than dream induced euphoria. It was a little frightening, but quickly your thoughts and memory rush back to you, and soon enough you return to rest.

That was yesterday, though, nothing in this world is certain for very long. Who's to say that tomorrow you don't wake up with even more confusion. Slowly losing yourself everyday, waking up less aware of who you are. Suddenly, it all makes sense, and you feel a dash of pride for exposing the truth. The problem is not sleeping a certain way, waking up with this newfound senselessness, or even going to sleep right after waking. The issue is sleep itself.

You've always been a problem solver, and the solution here is self-evident. After all, you've exercised insomnia before. For days on end, eventually losing track if it had been three days or a week that you not been dormant. The trick, you've learned is to eat more food. Its not as maniacal as it sounds. Just when you feel your eyelids pulling themselves down, or you start colliding with the bump strips on the side of the road, all you need is calories. Its a kind of balance. Sort of like how if you eat enough oxygen-rich food, you don't need to breathe.

Most people in non-third world countries have become lazy. Honest, their bodies have acclimatized to a high level of calories and sleep every day. In time, with enough practice, if you double the amount of food intake, you will notice how easy it becomes to stay up. Back to my earlier point, you've figured out this is how you'll avoid the demons in your dreams, it was a logical decision at the time.

What you didn't account for was the actions of other people, see, it was on that exact day your roommates held a conference in which they did not invite you. Had you been present, obviously you would have had the right to speak, and your opinion would've been heard. Possibly, even considered, but I'm getting off-track here. In this delegation, without your approval or privy, they had decided a sort-of ranking system for the household. In which, you occupied the bottom-rung. Whenever and wherever conceivable, your accommodation was not to be accounted for.

The days and weeks that ensued were nothing short of total madness. It started with little things, like moving your toothbrush since there was one bathroom in the house. Before long, your every movement discerned whether you would be stepping in shit or bathed in it. Its still nothing like battling those hallucinations of your respite period. On that front, you've done extremely well. It has now been four days, and only thirty-two thousand calories down. You don't feel tired at all. Its almost uplifting and energetic, and even without the use of caffeine pills until very soon in the future.

When you got back from the bank a few days later, your roomie had literally booby-trapped your door. As you walk pull the handle to your chambers, a bucket of oozing fluid piled all over every square inch of your body. That's where the caffeine pills come in, because, of course the scale must be tipped in other direction. Its only the parameters of our destiny, to fulfill justice under all circumstances. You knew that the only way to do that was to enhance your concentration. Caffeine is just the tool for the job. So, while peddling as little gratification on your bedmate's behalf as possible, you wash up and proceed to the store.

Reading the box on the way home it reads, "Do not take more than directed. Consult your physician if you experience any of these symptoms..." blah buh blah buh blah... so on and so forth... Here we go, "Do not take more than 8 pills in 24 hours." The case holds twenty-four pills, so you throw a few in the hatch, just upon arriving at the front door, knowing full well these suckers start up instantly. Its odd, though, the bouncy feeling you've had lately is still around. Being completely objective with yourself—as you're walking by your roommate pretending not to notice his barely subtle, arrogant stance—and still remaining entirely objective, you observe something is amiss with the pills. There's no jolt or punch. Just the same wakefulness you've been accustomed to.

Startlingly, you begin to feel a heaviness in your chest. Now remembering the cause, a feeling of dread covers over you. You had not eaten at the store. First thing is first, a couple more pills for the alertness required to advance through the kitchen safely, and prepare for the necessary action about to be taken in total vengeance against the man occupying the other room. You down the pills, eat a burrito, some chips, a pizza, and grab a drink.

That was all it took. The resulting level of focus felt just about right. Pacing the area in front of the entryway to the enemy room for a minute, you examine the shadow of a prick. Swinging the door open wildly, to catch your opponent off-guard, just then you realize you didn't make a plan for revenge. Fuming in the hallway briefly was enough to instigate the blaze. You swarm your attacker within eight-hundred milliseconds. "Ok, where did this knife come from?" you thought. Next thing you know, you've arisen victorious over the foe. Shreds of torn skin and random glands or membranes or tissues and whatever else lay strewn around the room. "That was probably premature." was the last thing that ran through your mind(s).