1.13

Trying to shield my eyes from the neon light outside my window, I toss and turn in an effort to escape the thoughts cascading in every crevice of my exhausted brain. Wishing I had the freedom to respond to the frantic messages from my family, which escalated from a carefully worded e-mail to pleas for some response. And yet, knowing that it might be the only way they could navigate directly to my tenuous freedom; I had to fight with myself to ignore those I love and treasure. A cold sweat comes to a bead on my forehead as I recall how close to being discovered, I have now twice encountered. All of my sacrifice for the discoveries I made back in Krakow would be wasted efforts.

Drifting into an uneasy sleep, I dream wild things and they are jumbled up pieces of this new life and the familiar one I have abandoned for the safety of all involved. Trudging wearily through the bog of what was, I am shocked by the images developing before my eyes. They flash in random sequence jumbling together with the feelings they evoke and all my questions explode into memories. I feel more lost here than the new place that I have unwillingly transported myself to. As I move through the territory of this dreamscape, I awaken to a sound outside my door.

Standing, it comes to me, out of my fog that I was supposed to be invisible – here and yet not here…unknown. So why am I being called by name? Or was that a figment of my weary imagination?