The Wanderer

I feel as though I’m below the surface of the waves. So deep the light won’t reach, but not deep enough to feel the ground. I have no sense for up or down. I hold my breath for fear of drowning.

When my lungs give out and I gasp for air, water never floods my lungs. Just the next breath of soothing oxygen. I flail about looking beneath me for the ground, if I’m not drowning then surely I’m falling. It’s been going for minutes, even though there are no stars or moon that illuminate the ground, it will still crush me all the same.

I pray to make it home safe, to have the ground below my feet again. To not be falling in the spotless abyss. I feel stable, flat, unflinching ground below my feet. I thought I was looking down, I thought I was falling. I think I’m alone. Endless void stretching past the horizon, into the sky, even below whatever surface I’m calling ground.

I begin to wander. No sights here, so surely there must be some further, I should eventually find civilization. Light. 

Noise…

color…

something…

I wander for days, nothing changes. Endless void, no noise. Not even my footsteps, breathing, talking. Nothing permeates this world but my thoughts. I yearn for home, Earth… 

Green.

GREEN!!!

I begin to sprint when I see it, on the horizon a green line. A distant plane. I can reach it if I keep moving. There will be people there. Others I can warn about the Void overtaking the wilds. 

My frantic sprinting turns to a jog, a trot, a walk. I can’t reach the green, it’s always on the horizon. No matter how long I go towards it. I fall to my knees, my head in my hands weeping. “Hell, this is hell.” I cry. 

“I can hear myself”.

“I can hear my voice!” Sound has returned to me, I can hear again! I jump up in excitement. If I can hear then I have to be close to the end of this place. My suffering can be over soon. I can go home soon, see my family, see my dog. Forget about this place and leave it far behind. I stand and begin to walk with new found vigor. “I will reach that horizon, I will feel grass below my feet, I will escape this void.”

As I set forward, the green line on the horizon slides across the plane I have called home for days. Green overtaking the void I walked over. Small spikes stab my naked feet, I jump in response. “Needles! Grass is supposed to be soft.” As I land the once freshly grown blades of sharp grass are longer, droopy and soft. Pleasant to feel against my feet. “What’s going on? Where am I?” I don’t know what to do, I thought I would be done with whatever this place is when the void was gone. Now it rests above me like the night sky, the grass grew too fast, the green overtook the area so fast. I want this dream to be over. “I just want to see Jack again.”

I lay in the grass, defeated. My skin tickles from the greenery, a pleasant feeling. I close my eyes. When will this be over?

Something wet licks at my face, and nudges me awake. I open my eyes, blinking away a dream. A snout takes up my vision, a bark getting me to rise. I pet my dog, Jack. I rub my bleary eyes and walk to where his food is, pouring some of it into his bowl. I stretch and yawn, clearing the last vestige of sleep from me. I begin to look around, I should get something for myself to eat. I look around, green, void, and grass still below my feet. “I’m still here? It wasn’t a dream?”

Jack looks up at me from his bowl, tilting his head. I reach down to pet him, “At least you’re here with me boy.” How did he get here? Was he following me, did I wish him here? Can I wish myself home? I close my eyes and speak my wish. 

I open my eyes, the void of the sky still staring down at me. “No home? Could I wish for something simpler? I wish for the sun?” Nothing changes. I just want to see it rise again, I can’t tell when it’s day or night, I want to feel the warm glow of the sun against my skin. As I plea for some light and warmth, I feel a heat against my skin. The Sun begins to rise above the horizon.

Is my dream lucid, I control all that happens here. Not all that happens here, the only time things happen is when I truly desire for them to come true. I crouch down to Jack, petting his head. “What should we make first? We can’t go home, but maybe we can make one here.” I start to walk, Jack at my side. My thoughts running wild, anything I desire, truly with all my heart, can happen. I want a place where Jack can play, a place he can run, a place he can hunt.

Trees start to rise out of the ground, some, small saplings. Some, tall reaching above to the once dark sky. A sky slowly turning blue as we hear the lapping of gentle waves. Jack yips as he runs around the newly formed forest. Eventually returning to jump up my leg, where I pet the ecstatic dog. 

“What do we call this place, Jack? It’s definitely not Earth, I might be dreaming but until then it needs a name.” Unfettered creation at my fingertips, and nothing to guide me. Nothing but Jack..I may never return home, but I shall at least make a place where I can be happy. A world where hopefully others can come to call home eventually. I’ll wander this place until they come, or they rise. I can’t make ideas, I don’t think I can make something abstract, but I can set the blocks for those who come after. A world that they can understand, a world that they can navigate without all the confusion I went through. 

I will wander Cordelia and give it shape so its children will have a place to call home.