Stepping into what should have been a steamy shower stall, she suddenly shrieked a silent scream of surprise. The water felt like it had just run off a glacier. How the prevailing outside temperature could soar in the mercury bursting range and still leave the water in the pipes colder than a squirrel’s nut sack in Siberia was incomprehensible. Clearly, the condominium superintendent had not fixed the faulty water heater today like he had sworn on his life to do. You just can’t trust anyone anymore.
Gillian lathered up her loofa lavishly with the liquid body wash, furiously frothing every square inch of skin and hair until the soap stung her eyes and slid down the drain in soapy streaks of suds. Her skin tingled and glowed and her hair would have squeaked it was so clean when she turned off the shower moments later and stood shivering in the aftermath.
Grabbing a fluffy cotton towel, she quickly dried her hair just enough to keep the ice-cold water from dripping down her spine before wrapping the towel around her body. Once the uncontrollable spasms died down enough that she wasn’t in danger of breaking a tooth from chatter jaw, she changed into her cream colored pjs and crawled beneath the comforter on her bed to shiver herself to sleep.
6:06. Gillian rolled over and glanced at the alarm clock. It took a second for the synapses in her brain to fire off an alert that something wasn’t right. Gillian blinked a few times, staring at the glowing red numbers. Six seconds later she bolted upright in bed and flung off the blankets. Scuffing her feet into her slippers, she grabbed her lighter and cigarettes off the nightstand. Halfway between her bed and the balcony door, she stopped. She didn’t have time for a cigarette. She’d lost five minutes.
As she turned ‘round to deposit the smokes on the bedside table and head into the bathroom, she had a multi-sensory vision of stepping out on the balcony and being sideswiped by a bicycle messenger. Everything about the vision seemed so real, from the ripple of her silk pajamas billowing in the breeze to the call of the young man, “Watch it!”
Gillian’s knees went wobbly and she almost fell. She crossed to the unmade bed and sat on the edge, taking stock of the thoughts running rampant in her mind. Running her hand across the bedspread beside her, she felt the soft texture of the duvet under her fingertips. It felt real. Was it real? That vision had felt real too.
She glanced at the clock again. 6:09. She didn’t have time to ponder the mysteries of the universe right now. She needed to get ready for work.
Precisely forty-two minutes after rising from her own inner musings to get primed and painted, Gillian walked out of her front door. Her long, dark hair was pulled back in a sleek knot, pinstripe dress suit properly dignified and classic, complete with nude leather heels. The very image of careful professionalism. A wine-colored shoulder bag provided a perfect pop of color. Perfect as any other day except that she was now eight minutes late.
Every day of Gillian’s life felt exactly the same as the one before. She would wake up at the same time. Smoke a cigarette on her balcony. Get dressed in her best work clothes and apply her makeup, finishing up with 100 strokes of the hairbrush before pulling her hair back so severely that her eyes gained a faint slant and any wrinkle that might dare to appear was pulled fiercely up into her scalp. Then she would walk briskly to work, via the local coffee shop.
Java Joe’s Coffee Haus had mediocre coffee at best, gutter sludge at worst. The barista, Joe Jr, didn’t really care much for his job and would leave the pot on the warmer pad all day long. The brew produced was invariably hot and viscous and black. Reminiscent of fresh tar on a summer day. Not what anyone would call appetizing, but he had the good fortune of being the only game in town so, hey, beggars can’t be choosers.
Gillian paused in front of the smoked glass door to the coffee shop to read the red letters written on the white board hanging at head height. Java Joe liked to write little messages for his customers that he found funny, and that everyone else found frightening. Things like, ‘Happiness is fleeting, but death is forever,” or “Not all clowns are killers.” Today he had covered the board in letters so large that they took up almost every inch of available space:
‘You’re whole life is just a nightmare.’
Gillian lifted her hand and used the edge of her thumb to erase the ‘ and e. Every other person who read this sign would thank her, she knew. She stared for a moment at the red letters on the white board against the black glass. The words resonated in her mind. Hadn’t she just been questioning her own reality? Was this message meant for her?
Paranoia descended like a two-ton butterfly, drifting lazily down, flapping its wings to perch lightly on her head and drive her into the ground. Afraid to open the door for some reason which she couldn’t quite define, Gillian stood frozen just outside the coffee shop with one hand on the glass, locked in an inner battle of wills. To enter or not to enter.
As she stood still as a statue, someone pushed against the door from the inside and without thinking about the consequences of her actions, Gillian shoved back, knocking whoever was trying to exit with the door. From inside, the sound of a startled shout
