Chapter Nine
Sleeping...Sort Of
A friend calls it "combat sleep". I call it hell. I never quite get there, suspended one blink away from awake at all times. Little creaks in the house, a car door, a sudden wind are all it takes to rip me out of sleep, heart pounding and all sweaty, left in the deep night to try desperately to succumb to sleep once again while my mind races wildly about nothing...over anything.
I am afraid to sleep. I'm afraid shadows will come while I am unable to wake, and I will be awakened, trapped, raped. Sleep is not safe for me.
And the dreams...suffocating, choking nightmares of death and pain and loneliness and longing and abandonment. Females who are predators. Men who are deadly, overpowering giants. Dreams of longing that wake me crying. Dreams of desire that leave me ashamed.
There is no escape, even in sleep.. And so I remain the Vigilant Soldier over my tattered innocence.
