NEW FICTION:

He lay on the bed - on his side. One eye hidden in the pillow, one eye lazily open. He blinked, then blinked again. The wall he was staring at was nicotine cream and remote. His mind drifted in and out - like those small ocean waves on a hot summer's day, just flowing over your feet - with no bother. His hand trailed the floor, his fingertips gently tapping on the worn carpet - tapping kept him focused, kept him rooted to the storyline - this storyline. He closed his eye, breathed slowly and deeply. He shut everything down, just kept the gentle tapping of his fingertips with him. He waited for the rhythm loop. When he had it, he started a quiet hum -  wrapping himself around the rhythm. He began to feel light, began to feel like he was nothing, like he was a breeze across a thin cloud - nothing. His eyelid fluttered, then opened. His sight was blurred - then cleared. He stared at the wall - now an open searing red sky above a landscape of drifting bones, ash and cinder - home. He smiled lazily to himself, his fingertips gently tapping on the worn carpet, his quiet hum wrapping itself around the rhythm.