I couldn't find him. We planed to come back the same way we got there. But I couldn't find the way. All the little signs we had left were gone. No trace of him. And darkness was crawling in. So I walked back into the direction of the flickering neon light.

I opened the door and I walked into the room. It was tiny. With the door open there was no space to walk around the bed. The only way to reach the bathroom door was to step over the bed and close the door. It smelled like the air in here was ancient. I coughed. The window let in only a glimpse of the light outside. I could hardly see through it. The floor was covered with a thick carpet that once had a colour but must have lost it sometime between Kennedy's death and Chernobyl. The faded wallpaper had a heavy dark pattern that looked like an endlessly repeated royal emblem.

I lay down on the bed and had the feeling of being sucked inside of the porous mattress that kept every  hollow my body pressed into it like a large block of clay.
I kept my limbs as close to me as I could and lay very still. I could hear sounds through the walls as clear as if they were coming through paper. I think I saw them shaking whenever a stronger sound wave hit them.

I heard a couple fighting in a room to my left. They spoke in a tongue I couldn't understand. But they seemed to hate each other. And they threw things at each other. I winced when something hit the wall near me. I heard sirens from the streets and dogs barking in the backyards. I heard someone moaning in the building somewhere to my right. Maybe somebody made love. At least that's what I hoped.

I looked at the fan on the ceiling. It was way to big for this room. It looked like it's wings would almost touch the walls. It didn't rotate smoothly. At one point in it's spin it kept making a little jerk and a  cracking noise. I wanted to turn it off, but I couldn't see any switch. As I searched the room for a sign of one my eyes fell on the old dusty radio on the bedside locker.

I realised I would never be able to go to sleep even though I felt like I hadn't slept in weeks. So I reached for the radio. With my finger tips I turned it on while trying not to move my body in the mattress' clutch. It lit up into a spooky glow. And it began to rustle.

I moved the wheel on it's side to find a station. But no matter in which direction or how far I turned it nothing else but a kind of white noise poured from the speakers.

It was in that moment that I heard a song in my head. A song I had never heard before. I was sure of that. No one except for me had ever listened to these words before. And though it had no melody I was sure it was a song. It was loud and clear. It told a little story that I remembered from the second it crawled into my mind. And this is what it said: 

I met a young girl
she gave me a rainbow
she had a pale face
but her cheeks did glow

I met her in the woods
where we'd both lost our ways
between trees dark and forbidden
moon light dancing on her face

And I was the one who was frightful
though she was younger than me
she waltzed gently along my side
as if she knew every tree

And as we walked in silence
I told her from the depth of my heart
that though I'm so much older now
I'm still afraid alone in the dark

She gave me a smile
or at least I think so
she spoke: only fear is to be feared
even when lights are low

but there's a cure for your anxiousness
you've got to sing out loud and clear
to fight the fear of darkness
loud enough for your heart to hear

and when the words fill the air
around you far and near
the sound will belong only to you
and will push aside darkness and fear

And so she left me all alone
with my heart pounding like mad in my chest
but as I was told I started singing
to fearful to take a rest

and I kept singing and singing
and singing and I sang
till my lung collapsed and crumbled
and I hit the ground with a bang

I untangled from my blanket
and heard my mother's call
I think she called me Nemo
and I realised I had dreamt it all


Before I fell asleep I noticed breadcrumbs on the sheet beside my head. But I didn't care.