Hazeshift

By Anoushka Poddar

There is blood on my shirt.

I stare at the brown spots on the front of my button-down.

Nosebleeds again.

I sigh as I sit up and hold my head back. I can feel the blood trickling into my mouth and I cringe; it can’t drip on my books, especially not my notes. Immediately, I run to the washroom.

As I bend over the sink and look at the red water running into the drain, I grope for the bottle of pills in the corner. I quickly pop a few of the red-white pills and swallow them dry.

Everything is fuzzy.

My mind is in a haze.

How long has it been since I’ve slept?

How long since I have been doing nothing but going through textbooks?

How long since I’ve started skipping meals for study sessions?

A week, a month?

My one wish in life had been to never regret any decisions, to live my life without regrets.

How could I not regret making the biggest mistake of my life?

I had read somewhere, on some site, or some blog that humans sleep 1/3rd of their lives away, wasting years of productivity.

Can you imagine how the world would be if we could get those years instead? If we could use those hundreds of hours and actually make something of them?

Well, this was what Mortimer Harry had achieved. Having spent the best years of his life working away in a lab somewhere in San Francisco, he had figured out a way to change the chemical configuration of some chemicals, and after testing, it turned out that these pills could take away the need for sleep.

With NO side effects.

The science world called it a miracle; others called it the work of the devil.

I had started taking them not too long ago, to cope with exam stress.

These days, I don’t know left from right, day from night.

All that exist are my books, me, and the exams just around the corner.

I will stop taking them the moment my exams are over.

I’ll just have them for a week or so, and then I’m done.

At least, that’s what I hope.

Nosebleeds, body ache, general tiredness, all this stemmed from overworking myself.

I swallow those pills once a day, sometimes, twice, when it gets too hard.

I flop down on the tiny sofa and switch on the tv.

The news of the day, in big, bold red letters reads-

‘BREAKING NEWS

MORTIMER HARRY ADMITS TO ADDING METH TO THE FAMOUS NO-SLEEP PILLS, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR USERS?’

My heart stops in my throat.

My hands sweat and my eyes fill.

A haze decorates my vision.

Everything is nothing and nothing is everything.

A year back, I remember.

It was exam week, just like today.

A big fat F scrawled on my papers.

I remember swallowing that white powder, handful by handful and floating away from it all.

Tiny handfuls, every day.

Stress overtook my life, and sleepless nights dragged me down.

A year back I couldn’t sleep even though I wanted to.

History repeats itself, I guess.

The doctor had prescribed anti-depressants, and told me to reduce my stress.

I had severe insomnia.

One day, under the harsh white light of my apartment, on a day when everything was blurred at the edges, I had taken handfuls of that powder and swallowed it.

Just like I had swallowed the no-sleep pills just a few minutes back.

I had been rushed to the hospital.

Doctors and nurses had pumped my stomach and worked around the clock, to make sure I lived when I didn’t even want to.

I can’t do it.

I grab those pills and throw them into the bin with newfound fury.

I can feel the blood in my ears as I switch off the lights and collapse into bed.

I shut my eyes and feel the wold around me, the buzzing in my brain, finally calm down.

Slowly, everything fades out and all that remains is me, and the darkness surrounding me.

By Anoushka Poddar