In the Waking Hours I Know My Name is Nessa

My name is gone from my mind. I had it before I came here, but now that I need it, it seems to have fallen away -- like a dead leaf from a hibernating tree. 'Tis the season of forgetfulness.

Forgetful-ness. Forgetful Ness. There's something so familiar about that, but I can't recall what it should be.

I'm staring at this stranger who's staring right back at me, expectantly. I mumble something, but even I do not understand what I mean to say. She cocks her head, raises an eyebrow, and leans in as if the inches between us are causing the confusion. 

The cold wind blows. More memories fall away. I can almost see them, just for a few seconds, flitting away, tumbling across my timeline, dissipating into the emptiness. Flames flickering into ash.

Shit.

Well, at least that word is clear in my head. I haven't forgotten language altogether. I try to say it to my curious reflection, but she, too, has evaporated. 

This is worrisome. I lift my hands and stare at my fingers. They seem resolute. I wiggle them. I feel them. I am not fading away like everything else around here. I am solid and strong and loud and bold.

The freezing gusts slice into me like blades of ice. I stand against it. I turn to face it, and even though it takes all my strength to find my voice and bring it into my throat, I howl my name into the mighty darkness. 

The sound brings light and the light brings color and the color ripples through the memories, through the leaves of my life, printing words on every page and singing every song. 

I inhale light. I exhale warmth.

I know who I am now. I am Olivia, Forgetter of Names.

Sonofabitch

Falling.
   It's supposed to be the end of all things. It's the mind-shredding fear of being out of my own control; the sensation of helplessness; the desperation of reaching out to steady myself and finding nothing but the smoky air clouding up my dreams. I usually fall facing upward, staring at the ridge where I once stood. Maybe there is somebody there, reaching out for me, calling for my return. Maybe there's an empty universe swirling in on itself, and I'm falling away from it. Maybe I should turn myself over and see if there's anybody below with arms outstretched, awaiting the soft impact of my arrival.
 
   That's not usually my luck.

   I once dreamed the sonofabitch shoved me so hard that I fell out of the car and off the side of the road. There was no drainage ditch. As it turns out, that ditch is just a mirage. If you care to walk up to it and press your hand firmly against the dirt and the sticks and the rocks, you'll find it ripples for a moment and then dissipates into a mighty nothingness. That's where I fell...into the nothingness.

   It's useless to scream. Nobody can hear me, but that doesn't keep me from doing it. I scream all the sound out and then I'm not falling anymore so much as floating, and now, it's not just me. There are Others. Some are like me, they float and look around in wonderment. Some are plummeting, screaming with abandon as they whoosh past me. There they go, and I stare after them hoping they'll discover the floating thing. The floating is so much more pleasant, but it's not really what I want to be doing. I'd rather be floating up. That's not what we're doing in the nothingness. There seems to be no upward movement.

    Hands grab at me and pull me downward. I'm afraid of this, but I quickly understand that this Other is not pulling me downward, but climbing over me.

   They are me.

   We are all me, and we see this simultaneously, and instantly know that we are the only way out of this. We clasp hands and use one another as purchase to climb back out of the drainage ditch. It is a great effort to climb over my own back and shove myself upward and cheer myself on. I can only think that some other me, somewhere below must have hit the bottom, and now we are all standing on the shoulders of the Me down there.

     We climb out of the nothingness, and he is still there waiting for our return. He grins and fantasizes that he'll be shoving us back into that void again, but we are ready for it this time.

    We have the feeling he'll scream all the way down.