I was rifling through some old stuff recently and found an old little notebook of mine. I have no idea when I had last written in it much less seen it, some time BL(before laptop). Anyway, I skimmed through and re-found this little rambling. I vaguely recall having some sort of story attached to it something about deserted islands and a dream prince (yuck), but I rather like it just like this, inspiring, you know? Maybe I'll add something to it later, but for now it was just something to get me typing and hopefully out of this awful writers rut of mine.

For those of you following my TLC, think of this as an apology for all those missing weeks. X)

I don't remember much of anything. Just kinds of feelings or reminders that lead to what might be memories. The only thing that is clear in my mind is that nothing is clear, and this might pose a problem.

There is darkness, nothingness. At first, I don't even think I am anything, if that makes sense. Then I think I am only there because I know I can open my eyes. It doesn't help, I still see nothing. It is an everlasting darkness, but not an empty darkness. I feel as if maybe there is something with me, something I just can't see and that maybe it is just a single veil of darkness that kept me from my surroundings. I know if I just reach out I might touch something and then I do. I am standing upright on something, well that's an improvement.

Or maybe not.

I suddenly have the sensation of being very high up. I tentatively reach out my hand and feel a cold horizontal bar, sloping up and down into the darkness. I clutch at it with a death grip, just in case this new footing decided I wasn't worth holding up.

Time stretches on endlessly as I wait to see if anything else would appear or disappear. Poor choice of words, I wait to feel, I still can't see.

The floor and bar stay.

Experimentally I reach out a foot, perhaps I might find something new? I jerk my foot back and grip the metal bar even harder, if that is possible. There is no floor any further than an inch or two from my foot. I stand for another forever and a second before I think to test the other side. The same result. I am on a metal rectangle suspended, perhaps magically, in space. I have thoughts of spending the rest of eternity glued to this spot until I either die of hunger or fall into the endless abyss.

I stand there for another long space of time, just standing, barely even thinking, just breathing and blinking, which is about all I dare to do.

Finally, I have the bright idea of feeling if the metal bar goes any farther up. I would have slapped my head at my stupidity for not coming up with this earlier if I wasn't terrified to take my hands from the bar for fear that my only life line might disappear the moment I released it. Slowly, I slide one hand up to feel if the rail leads up.

Nothing.

I am suddenly reluctant to test downward for fear that it might not continue and I would be stranded. I am deathly afraid of the possibility that I might be sitting there for the rest of my life. Inch by inch I force my hand out along the bar. It goes far enough that it becomes difficult to keep my feet firmly planted. That is good enough for me. It goes farther than I can reach and hopefully farther than my little island (Strange that it is already mine), but there is no way to really know. I take a little shuffle forward, again sliding my hand down, then another and another until my toes recognize the place where my island stopped. Yes, the rail went further, but how much was the question. The next question being that, if it was only a rail, how would I navigate it? How long could I hold on without falling off? I don't think I have that much upper body strength.

I spend another eternity deliberating when I finally decide that anything is better than this nothing. I reach both hands past my island as far as I can then lower myself into a sitting position so that I won't jerk the rail when I jump off.

Imagine my excitement at finding there is actually another island beneath mine, only a little farther down from the edge. I'm on stairs! However, this does very little for my confidence in my thinking ability, yet again I curse my stupidity and this time I do slap my head. I sit on the stairs for only moment more, I'm not about to spend a moment more sitting here when there is a staircase to climb!

At first I edge along on my butt, lowering myself carefully onto each stair, but after maybe 50 stairs I am confident enough that it continues and I begin to trot down. It is one of those curving staircases like a giant stretched out spring. I am almost afraid that it might really be a spring and just snap me off into the darkness, enough of this is so dream like, who am I to say what is and is not possible. The stairs continue on a very long time, I think I should have been tired, but I wasn't. The stair case goes on forever, made all the worse that I have no idea how far I have gone, and how much farther I have to go. I could have been climbing for days, for all that I know about the time.

I have the idea to slide down on the railing, but if it suddenly ends I would have no chance and could be flung off forever. Or with my luck the curve would be so tight I would not be able to stay on.

I continue.

I begin to hate that ringing metal sound each stair makes as I climb blindly downward. I start walking as quietly as I can, but that is too slow. I start running down, the stairs ringing like crazy.

You know that feeling you get when you expect something to be there but it's not? Well, of course that's what I feel as I rush down only to suddenly find that, instead of another step, I have finally reached level ground. I get that weird lurching feeling in my stomach and scream as I realized I have left the rail. What would happen, now that I had lost my life line? Would I disappear again?

It takes me a few seconds to accept that I am safe on on this new smooth floor. Carefully I open my eyes that have been shut in fear, not that it matters, I still can't a thing.

I lay in a heap on the floor, unable to find my willpower among all the tangles of confusion swamping my mind, I am just too over loaded at the moment to devote any of my apparently little brain power to moving.

Then comes the footsteps.

I haven't even considered that anyone else could be here. I am startled up guiltily, straining all of my working senses to catch where the person is approaching from. I carefully crouch into a position so that I can bolt if needed. The footsteps echo insistently but the only thing I can tell is that they are getting closer. I grow frightened, the boots seem to be coming at me from all sides. I turn sightless eyes desperately around. Suddenly, I am sure that they are standing just over me. I do the only thing a person in my position could be expected to do, I jump up and run.

Unfortunately, I only get as far as the "jumped up" part because I quickly find myself restrained by two large hands on my shoulders. I now know two things about my attacker, he is a man, and he is very strong, or at least comparatively.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he says quietly in my ear, a voice like waves on sand.

Right, this coming from the brute who won't let me go?

I relax, slowly turning around to face him.

WHAM!

My arm swings; my fist makes contact with his face. Just as I hope, it is enough to catch my unseen attacker off guard and I am able to wiggle away. I bolt. It's not till I am running that I realize just how stupid I am being. I could run into or off of anything and judging by how quickly that guy had found me, he can see. Too late to go back and apologize. I keep running. Yet another bad idea, he is faster than even my dead sprint. He catches me again in moments.

"Stop it!" he orders, barely breathing hard I note jealously.

"Don't touch me!" I scream, flailing my limbs in his general direction. He holds me off, keeping my arms tightly to the side and me at arms length. On a brighter note, I can talk and shout. I take full advantage of this fact and begin screaming wordless rage at the top of my lungs.

"Quiet! What is wrong with you?" he asks, shaking me firmly. I quiet quickly, realizing that I am getting nowhere. I continue to struggle feebly for a little while longer in the silence until I finally decide to listen to see if he has anything to say. So far he hadn't hurt me, even though I had him.

Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to be in a talkative mood. I wait silently, nervously counting the seconds to keep track of time now that I have a hold on it. In a childish need to break the silence I say the first thing I can think of, "You're hurting me."

"You punched me," he points out, but loosens his grip all the same. "Who are you? How did you get here?" he demands firmly.

I glare in his general direction, or so I hope. I start to form some sort of snappy statement when I realize, I'm not sure of the answer myself. I have no memories of anything, I begin to get scared, but I cover it quickly up under a thick layer of sarcasm. "Well, I do believe I came from the top of the stairs and I came here because I didn't want to stay there." I'm not too sure I managed to keep my slowly waxing fear out of my voice. He releases one of my shoulders and I gasp involuntarily, suddenly terrified of being left alone again.

"Do you know where you are?" he asks not meanly, but something in his tone rubs me wrong all the same.

"How am I supposed to know that when I can't even see? All I know is that I am at the bottom of that bloody staircase!"

"You can't see?" he seems surprised, though I'm not sure why.

"You stupid or something?" I demand, "It's not like I've been hiding it or anything! Who do you think you are anyway?"

He chuckles, "You probably wouldn't want to know," he assures me.

"What, you ugly or something?" I spout without thinking. I'd meat it to be mean, but I am ashamed the second it comes out, what if he was? He says nothing, and I can do nothing to interpret his silence. On impulse, I reach out awkwardly for where I would guess his face should be. I miss and brush his ear instead. He is caught by surprise and releases both my shoulders. I make shrill sound of protest and tumble into his chest, not sure if it would be worse to stay with him or be alone again. I think the emptiness would be twice as bad, now that I know there is something- someone else. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," I mutter thoughtlessly, "I was just trying to see-"

He some how seems to interpret my mutterings and carefully takes my hand, guiding my fingers toward him. He has a very polite and direct manner as he does so; I think must have known a lot of blind people, or perhaps he is eager to prove my ugly remark wrong, as he is anything but. High cheek bones, slim nose, thin face, hair that just brushes his eyes. I am suddenly struck with such a clear picture in my mind's eye that it almost seems I can see his face alone in all the black, I can barely describe it. I don't think I have ever been able to do that before, and don't think I ever will again or in any other situation. Some kind of fluke or- but as soon as I start to "see" his face, everything seems to be slipping away including my consciousness.

I try to stay, to hold on to my new lifeline but I am falling... gone.

This really was based off of a dream of mine, if you were wondering. I'd just seen DareDevil, and if any of you have seen that movie you would understand their totally fake way of "showing" blindness. Anyway, I had some weird dream as a result, and when I woke up that last part was all I remembered of it. I was totally enchanted with the idea. 3

PS. I know, I know, 'get back to writing', *sigh*...