Cloud 9 [Part 10]: (8)

I wake up.

The elevator doors open to the eighth floor, finally, to a hallway similar to the building’s lobby. To the left, windows expose the body of the building to the rest of the world. Everything is bright as if the place was an overexposed photograph. The sun is shining bright through the windows and reflecting upon the naked white walls. I have to blink a few times and rub my eyes before my I fully adjust to the scene. I never would have thought the transition from a dimly lit elevator into the world in front of me would be such a drastic one. I once again look out onto a soundless world, my face pressed near the glass, catching the refracting rays emitting from that big burning star. As much as one would love to look at it, it’s impossible, but trying again and again is practically involuntary—a quick glance and look away, a second quick glance and look away, etc. I am taunting blindness.

Mama always told me not to look into the sights of the sun…

Good ol’ Bruce Springsteen runs through my head, flopping between the difference of his original Blinded by the Light and the Manfred Mann’s Earth Band version of considerable changeable tone and lyrics.

But mama, that’s where the fun is…

Across the black and white marble floor, my legs glide and my feet clomp softly with a faint echo. Everything is quiet. I feel the least bit insecure of retrieving my brother, but I’ve come this far and I should keep going.

The doors are white against the white walls with the only difference of having silver door handles to distinguish what parts of the hallway can be opened and what cannot, what can be entered and what will stop you in your place. The numbers give the optical illusion of their floating above the doors and not fastened to them. I don’t remember which door would lead to my brother, but my gut feeling lets me know when I arrive. Rather than being rude and intruding, I knock and wait for my brother’s response.
He opens the door, and I immediately understand that something is not right. It’s as if something will go wrong if it hasn’t already. The way he’s looking at me doesn’t sit right. I ask him what the matter is, if he is feeling alright. Before anything is discussed, he throws up on me.