Dark. The ceiling fan is rotating at its top speed. Four windows are not adequate to eradicate the darkness in this room. There are various objects on the study table. The first column of objects is arranged in an orderly way. The rest reek of hopelessness. The lay-back office chair, which doesn’t suit the demeanor of this room, isn’t facing the study table. Rather it seems to have found its optimum position through years of neglect. There’s a bedside table on the left side of the bed. A couple of books are in the lower drawer. Dust all around. A hopeful alarm clock on the top. It is next to the filled water bottle. A slightly opened cupboard next to a mirrorless dressing table. The bed is made of steel. A simple design. Comfortable space underneath for possible monster invasions. Decorating rice lights are wrapped around the head of the bed like a snake who has given up.
At the absolute center of the bed, he is coiled up like a fetus. 97% covered up in a thin blanket. One leg above the side pillow. His head is curled up in a fashion that enables him to have maximum entertainment with a minimum neck strain. At the base of the cylindrical side pillow, there’s a conveniently placed, landscape-oriented mobile phone. He is very still. Not a single sign of movement. It’s as if he has become a part of the room. He has morphed into an object in his own atypically symmetrical room. Something familiar is playing on his smartphone. Something he has already seen a million times. It’s a comedy sketch. But he doesn’t laugh now. Maybe he did the first 1000 times. Does he like this clip so much? Or is he just afraid of watching something new? He is using headphones. He likes the atmospheric applause every time the protagonist delivers the punchline of the joke. It clears out all other unwanted sounds. Sounds, not noises.
After a while, those applauses and those punchlines, all become a kind of white noise. One note, constant loudness. The mind can wander on its own when a part of it is occupied by something. During his voluntary vegetative state, he heard strange background noise. Familiar, but strange at this moment. It was like a loud calling from a distance, slowly creeping in, harmonizing with the white noise and gradually becoming louder with every iteration. He knew that his mom is calling. He was reluctant to get up. Part of the bed, part of the room. He eventually gets up; in a spring-like fashion, mustering all his remaining strength at once. Looks at the various objects that surround him. His crew so to speak. It both assures him and injects him with despair when he sees that none of the objects: the table, the chair, the cupboard, the dirty piece of rag on the floor, the empty amazon box torn destructively, none of them have moved even half a centimeter in 6 months. He stands up. Legs asleep. No surprise there. The mind is not functioning properly. The room that is so rigid in its appearance is suddenly revolving in a crazy psychedelic fashion. He slaps himself to wake up. It works. Opens the door of his room. The hallway is dark too. Or maybe his eyes are adjusting to the light. And at the end of the hallway, there’s light. His mother is standing there with an empty bag in one hand and some cash in the other. He goes up to her and she hands him the cash and the bag. She is saying something, but it’s inaudible to him. He nods. Goes down the flight of stairs, opens a door, in the garage now, open the main gate and he’s outside the house. The moment he steps outside, he gains a certain consciousness. Maybe the dancing leaves of treetops, the children playing on the road, a kite bouncing around in the sky, a dog bathing in the sun, and the warm asphalt beneath him triggered this immense, almost adrenaline kind of rush of joy within him. He is now outside. Free from the room. He longed for this moment, but he lacked the will to go outside on his own. The room was kind of a self-sustenance chamber that he built for him for the bare minimum of keeping himself alive and entertained. The world outside has too much joy and wonder in it. He is somewhat scared of that. His job now: buy groceries.