Sandman's Insomnia

I flipped the covers off of me. "Maybe I am over thinking things", I thought. I rolled over on my back and watched the ceiling fan spin ploddingly in rhythm with the light breeze blowing around me from the window I opened earlier. Yet, I was still burning up. It felt like a sauna had me in a tight bear hug and fear was gripping my heart. I tried to focus my mind on the breeze, imaging that I was somewhere hiking along the trails of Jiefen in early fall. I closed my eyes in attempt to fall back to sleep. Instead, I only felt the beads of sweat run down the side of my forehead and drip into my ears. That only irritated more.

"Bowie, Bowie," I whispered to my sleeping husband of fifteen years snoring peacefully next to me.

He didn't budge. He was deep in slumber.

"Bowie, can we talk?," I whispered again while shaking him. He rolled over and smiled almost mockingly at me, never opening his eyes while trying to snuggle up.

"Uggh!" I sighed. I hopped out of bed aggressively in hopes to disturb him just a little.

I walked into the bathroom, flicked on the light, and stared at my reflection in the mirror. I started to hyperventilate. I tried Bowie and I's methods of using face muscles to say our names, Bowie and Mallory and mediate to calm down. Nothing. Just me looking goofy at myself breathing heavily and soaked in my own sweat. Sandman, our pet cat, was up as usual. I looked at the clock and it was 4:15am. Sandman, blinked his big green eyes and kept looking out the open window. In fact, I never saw this cat sleep. He was always up, watching. Bowie had given him to me to ease my nightmares after my boyfriend, Harim Lowell went missing while on an international trip in China.

So I guess I should elaborate. During graduate school, I took a trip to Beijing for a new experience with my bestfriend Yara and her brother Harim, who was also my long time boyfriend. While on a hike through Jiefen National Forest Park, we wandered off the trails to get some photos and got lost. We spent two nights in that forest and let me tell you it was alive. It was like the trees moved around to get us more confused, and we saw silhouettes of beings from the corner of our eyes. We were also extremely hot at times despite the temperature being pleasantly mild.

The first night the three of us huddled together and slept out in the open. We took turns keeping watch and hoping someone from our travel group would notice us missing and send for help. On my watch while Yara and Harim were asleep, I kept seeing sparks of flame flickering all around me. It was so quick that you could easily miss it with the slightest distraction. I woke the other two up and they said it was some type of firefly. I knew that wasn't the case, but I accepted it being that I was terrified and that seemed to calm my nerves. The second night is where things really got weird. We were all on the verge of thirst and hunger and were wide awake when Yara and Harim saw the first flicker. I watched the forest and I saw several more. We looked at each other and Harim jumped up saying that it was search and rescue.

He started screaming, " Over here, we're over here!"

Yara and I followed suit. We saw a light approaching us and a Chinese man in a search and rescue uniform said in English, "I am officer Bowie Gin. I'm here to get you all out of here. Bowie looked into my eyes with such intense, I felt my heart flutter. Eleven other officers lights came together illuminating the forest in an mythical ambiance. I turned to look at Harim and he was gone. Yara was looking around for him too. He was not with the group of officers. It was as if wandered off. I started shouting for him as well as Yara when she noticed him being missing. Officer Bowie got seven of his guides and went back to look for him while remaining officers grabbed our hands and guided us to the main trail. Something was just off. We got there in less than five minutes.

Yara and I arrived at the hospital waiting for Harim. He never showed up. The next morning Officer Bowie told us that they couldn't locate him. They went back several more times with no results. Yara had to call her parents and break the news that Harim was declared missing. A few days turned to weeks, then months, and eventually we all had to return to the U.S. Officer Bowie Gin always kept contact with me about the case. I couldn't help but fell connected to him. We ended up becoming great friends and fell in love which Yara said she was ok with it and expected me to move on from the grief. Yet, she distanced herself and we grew apart.

I went back to Beijing after graduation and ended up moving in with Bowie. The nightmares started shortly after. They were always about being in that forest and Harim is reaching for me at the edge of the trail screaming that he isn't lost and then fades away. The dreams get worse and worse and Bowie always ends up pulling me away from Harim in the dream while he is screaming and being consumed by the forest. He told me it was stress.

One day Bowie came home and with a beautiful black cat that he said he found in the forest while searching for two small kids that wandered away from their parents during a hike. He found the cat sitting next to the kids like a protector watching him intently so he grabbed him up and gave it to me as a gift to help me sleep. It worked for a while. So I named the cat Sandman. I slept like a new born baby, until the dreams started again three weeks ago.

This time they were about me wandering the forest trails with Sandman. I am stumbling around behind him extremely fatigued and begging him to stop walking but he keeps going and the trail dead ends at this little stone house. I see my husband Bowie walk with Harim into the house as Sandman jumps on the window ledge and starts watching them through the window. He looks at me with those big green eyes as if to beckon me to come watch with him. I go to peer in the window and I see my husband Bowie, turn into a flame and engulf Harim in a flame. The room brightens and out of the burning light comes Bowie with a vile of ashes and Harim is gone. A small ember floats down and lands on Sandman's nose and I wake up screaming for Harim.

For some reason, this particular night, I began to think that my my dear Bowie is not who he seems. I can truly say that I have been feeling emotionally drained majority of our marriage. I feel drunk in love yet my heart is empty. This forest calls to me and Sandman seems very connected to the forest. We live on private property near the trail, and this cat is always up moving around, following me, watching me, watching Bowie, and watching the forest as if he is waiting. I now realize that Sandman never sleeps. I am starting to believe I have been tricked by some mythical forest being, maybe a Jin, and Harim is out there in spirit trying to break this spell to find his way home. Sandman's insomnia is not just odd. Its a foreboding action of what is to come if I don't get out of this. Should I confront my love with this theory that could be complete nonsense and only a result of my fatigue and stress? Or, should I accept these nightmares and ignore Sandman's insomnia. I walked over to the window and sat down on the small bench next to Sandman who was staring at me. "Sandman, I can't sleep." I whispered in his ear while stroking his sleek black fur. Sandman, let out a low growl and slowly turns to look at my husband Bowie, who is now sitting up in bed, glaring at us with a smile.