The Corridor

Beams of golden light pierced the window and flooded the room of the loft revealing a cluttered mess of clothing and paperwork spread about. A serene quiet was shattered as sounds from an alarm clock shrieked in repetition. “Ugh…errgh… argh” was the muttering of a hung over 40 year old fed up with the responsibility of life. He reached over to recklessly swat at the alarm sound, eventually slapping a button on the clock that silenced it.

It was early evening and he was just now waking up for the day. He lately found himself caught in this cycle of late night insomnia, early morning crashing, and late afternoon wake ups. This took a toll on him biochemically since it threw off the effect of the serotonin and melatonin hormones in his body. As a result, he had lately been a bit snappy with the people he conversed with. Today, it only took him about 25 minutes to get showered and dressed.

“Another day another dollar.” This seemed to be his mantra lately. “I’m the type to spit the facts man I don’t brag man; I just came to get the bag and leave, I’m a trashman” he muttered in a raspy whisper. For the last couple of months he had taken on more responsibility at work. He volunteered to manage the facility over night during this phase where the company is restructuring and bootstrapping its inventory. With only a hand full of well trained professionals to keep an eye on, it was usually smooth sailing.

On the way to work in the evening, he would often stop by a bar called Tipsy’s which was unique in that it served tea, coffee, and alcohol. There was always a very social environment and sometimes even a public conversation happening when he would come into the bar. He thoroughly enjoyed the buzz of conversation all around and figured it was a great way to get his mind prepared for a long night. Looking around and seeing all the happiness and contentment in the faces of his fellow patrons always helped him to leave with a smile on his face.

Today when he stopped at Tipsy’s, he immediately ordered a hot black coffee and sat at the bar. When it arrived, he glanced about between sips and noticed a few faces but then went back to staring at the coffee in front of him as if it were the blackness to an abyss. When he looked up again there was a woman with a green sweater sitting beside him. He tried not to stare but couldn’t help but notice her radiant beauty. Her hair was dark and curly and kind of hid her face from the side angle. She smelled of a sweet fragrance and nature, like flowers. Something was familiar to him about this moment. Then he noticed the time behind the counter and double checked it on his wrist. It was definitely time to go.

He dropped cash on the counter top and hurried to his car. His frame fit snugly into the leather interior of the sports vehicle. It was about a 20 minute drive to his company’s location from the bar. Each day that he traveled, he would think. Many of his thoughts were replays of moments he regretted; situations where he wished he’d done things a different way. There were usually enough of these thoughts to preoccupy his mind for the duration of his commute. Sometimes he wondered if he would ever overcome this habit and find himself totally content with his life’s decisions.

It was cold and empty inside the corporate high rise. His broad and tall figure could be seen casually crossing the threshold of one of the lobby’s elevators. He was the only occupant. After doing this for several weeks, time seemed to go as quick as it came. It was just an automated process of walking into the office, checking the appropriate numbers and metrics, monitoring the facility, and checking in to the appropriate channels to ensure that everything was working as it should be. Today was no different he thought as he exited on the 34th floor. It was no different or was it? When he walked into his office today, something seemed amiss. His desk was completely empty, yet he remembered leaving a particular stack of papers on it the previous day. His office should have been off limits but apparently someone did not know the company policy.

He continued to investigate his office for immediate signs of who may have cleaned his desk. Upon closer inspection of his desk, he noticed his work laptop was on. When he moved the mouse to awaken the computer from its sleep, he noticed that his desktop background was a picture of a forest or woods. This was confusing to him because he especially made sure that his company’s logo was set as the desktop background of his work computer as a sort of formality.

He also did this to encourage himself to avoid using the laptop for personal matters. Where did this picture come from? What did it mean? The thoughts persisted only a few moments but were then quickly engulfed by the desire to know the person who had been in his office. It was of no immediate consequence though, since he had things to do at the moment. He needed to grab another coffee before he got started on his usual actions, so he walked out of his office to one of the break lounges to make some.

The man quickly returned to his office with a focus on the objectives for the day. The discovery of someone breaching his office was barely in his mind anymore as he returned to his desk to take a seat. He so swiftly clicked his mouse to awaken his computer that he didn’t notice that the desktop background was different. It was 15 minutes into his work when he returned to the desktop to open a new file and it was then it dawned on him. The desktop background was now his company’s logo, but he did not remember changing it earlier. This really bothered him because he took pride in having a strong memory but did not remember doing this. Yet the background was his company’s logo and not the picture of the forest.

This intensely bothered and intrigued him so much so that he began to search through the files on his computer for the forest picture. This was beginning to take up a considerable amount of time and he could not afford to misappropriate his time further. After an agonizing 30 or so minutes of searching, he reluctantly gave up to return to his usual tasks. As he continued working, he could not help but to think of that picture every now and again.

The familiar sound of that alarm clock shrieked through the air and it was time to start the day again. Within moments, the man was out of bed and arranging his clothes. The sound of a running shower could be heard in the background as he hustled in his underwear back into the bathroom. Within 30 minutes, he was dressed and on the familiar route to the company as the last bits of daylight faded. Soon he was starting to near Tipsy’s, and it was time to determine whether he was going to stop there this evening or not. He checked his time and he was running a bit early so he decided to take that stop. Within moments he parked up and swiftly walked into the bar. There was an open stool at the bar directly in front of him as he entered, so he decided to take a seat.

When the coffee came he would stay the bar for a few extra moments. His thoughts became preoccupied with that picture that he was sure he had seen on his computer. What he found most strange was the fact that he could practically smell the nature of the image. It was as if he was in the actual photo. What he didn’t know was that every time he came into Tipsy’s, someone was watching him. After a few sips, he took the remainder to go and hurried back to his car. It would seem that this day was starting out quite smooth for him.

The sleek form of his vehicle could be seen gliding into a parking space as usual. The man’s large and slender frame soon emerged and it’s movement was swift like a ninja. He moved into the building with the haste to dodge raindrops and vanished into the void of it’s corporate interior. It was the 11th of November and inside the building the brisk air of winter was not spared. “Everything is everything” was the sentiment as he rounded off his daily routine of checks. There was a previously reported issue on the other side of the building being worked on by overnight maintenance tonight. It was his company’s policy to check in with their team to ensure they had what they needed.

He would normally send one of the assistants, but they were currently short of staff at night. It was time for him to make his walk to the other side of the building, which was separated by a corridor. As he turned the corner into the corridor, he suddenly felt his feet shooting up from under him. Panic ensued as he lost his footing and found himself in mid air about to crash down. Normally he was like a cat in that he would always find a way to land on his feet, but this time was an exception. His body hit the ground with a solid thud which caused his head to snap hard against the ground with a loud crack.

Suddenly, he opened his eyes and he was in a forest. The trees were very tall and spread apart enough to provide good vision of the surroundings. Shock and confusion displayed on his face as he squinted repeatedly and rubbed his eyes. There was a familiar smell in the air of the forest as he began to walk in a random direction. “HELLO?!?” He yelled out over and over as he walked about the forest, hoping that someone would hear him and come to his aid. It felt like he had been walking for hours when suddenly he saw a figure in the distance. His pace hastened as he desperately sought to make contact with the mystery person.

“HEY!!! HEY!!!” he yelled as he frantically flailed his arms. As he got closer to this person he could see that it was a woman. “EXCUSE ME MISS!!!” At this point he was practically out of breath. When he was about 10 feet away she turned around and faced him. She stood tall for a woman and had large curly hair. Her eyes were a brown fire that pierced into his soul immediately. Who is she? The question rung in his heart like a bell. It was at this moment he found he was unable to speak. Then suddenly everything went black.

When he woke up he was back at home in bed. The last thing he remembered before the forest dream was slipping and falling in the corridor. How did he get home? What happened at work? These questions bounced through his head as he rubbed it to inspect for any sign of damage or trauma. His head was not sore or hurting in any way. Messages in his phone told the tale of what happened. He was able to piece together that he fell in the corridor and one of the cleaners had to wake him up. When he did this the paramedics were called because he was out cold when the cleaner came upon him. After the cleaner woke him, he had apparently been just fine and even checked out as ok with the paramedics. Apparently he drove himself home and put himself into bed. For some reason, he did not consciously remember any of that.

The next evening he got ready and went to work as normal but did not bother to stop at Tipsy’s. Everyone he talked to that knew about the incident was acting as if it was nothing major and that everything was fine. It was obvious they didn’t want to bruise his ego. He became suspicious that the incident may have been embarrassing. He didn’t feel that everything was fine. The day continued as normal with no further incident. When he made it home the following morning, he was so tired that he immediately collapsed. When he awoke up that afternoon, he remembered in his dreams he was running through the forest. These thoughts about the forest were really starting to disturb him.

Several weeks had passed since the incident and everything in life seemed to be going as scheduled. The arrangement he was in with the company was working well on both ends. The company was doing well, his savings were getting larger, and his goals were coming closer. When he initially started this night routine, he couldn’t be asked if it was what he truly preferred. Now that some time had gone by and he had a chance to settle into the role, it had become like clockwork.

It is known that melatonin is released in the body at midnight and serotonin is released around noon. These are natural body processes that govern the sleep and wake cycles and when out of balance can lead to the feelings of bad moods or depression. As a result of the incident, he has started paying special attention to his health. This meant he was now exercising on a daily basis before work which helped his mood out quite a bit. He was noticing the improvements in his physical shape which were a direct result of his improved diet and regular exercise. Now when he looked at himself in that full body mirror which stood in his bedroom, he couldn’t help but smile.

The beginning of his day came again. The alarm rang with a song by Nina Simone called ”Feeling Good” which was one of his favorites. Then he was off to the office. He listened to the politics of the day as the sleek vehicle cut through chilled air. It was surprising that it weighed in tons when you saw how it sailed over the asphalt roads like a swift boat at sea. On this day the man would stop at Tipsy’s for a coffee on the way in. At this time of year, the Sun had been setting earlier in the day. The evening air was cool as the last bit of light in the day faded, providing a shaded scene as he entered the familiar building.

The slender and muscular frame of the man wasn’t hard to notice. He sat at the bar as usual, eagerly awaiting a hot black coffee. After a few moments passed, a man came and sat a stool away from him on his left side at the bar. This wasn’t unusual; he just happened to notice because the bar was mostly empty. The man who had just sat looked at him and nodded in acknowledgement as if to say hello without speaking. He was an older man with long greying hair which hung down from under a paperboy cap. He nodded back to this man to return the gesture and then turned his gaze straight forward as he began to escape in thought.

Not too long after that, a slim woman with curly hair sat a few stools away to his right. As she walked to the bar and sat, it created a small draft of wind that moved from her to the surrounding area at the bar. She was quite tall and seemed to radiate a natural elegance and beauty, although her body language was modest and reserved. She was definitely not hard to notice either, although he could not quite see her face. He felt she had a very distinct smell. Like a sweet natural odor mixed with parfum. It was very pleasant and reminiscent of some kind of nature. It smelled like flowers deep in a forest.

An uncomfortable thought of falling in the corridor of his company’s corporate high rise caused him to quickly shake his head in order to shatter the thought. “Hmmph!!” Just then, the tender placed a coffee down in front of him. “The usual.” She said with a smile and a bit of cheer. The man slid several paper bills onto the bar before standing and walking away. Something was familiar about that person who had just sat down. He sensed she had been watching him while he was at the bar and she was watching him as he was leaving. There was a bit of mysterious tension in the brief moments where he walked out of the establishment.

He took a sip of the hot black coffee as he walked outside to his car. While he pulled out and proceeded on his way, he couldn’t help but to revisit the thoughts of the corridor. Due to the way his offices were structured, he had very rarely needed to cross that corridor to access the other side of the building. Come to think of it, he hadn’t been on that side of the building since the incident. His preference had been the comfort zone of his side of the office. When he walked into the building and pushed the elevator, it was already on the lobby floor. In the few moments it took him to get into his office from there, he considered what it would be like to confront the corridor again.

The next day he skipped Tipsy’s and went straight to work. When he got up to his office floor, he noticed that it was darker than normal. It appeared that the power was off and nothing electrical was functioning. He stepped over to his office and walked in to see the same. The light switch flicked up under the force of the man’s hand. CLICK. Nothing. He flicked it back and forth several times to be sure. “What in the fuck is this?!” he muttered in a deep growl. As he turned to exit his office, he nearly walked into one of his colleagues coming up to him. “What the??” He was a bit caught off guard as he stepped back and adjusted his jacket. The colleague was a shorter female who worked under his management in certain capacities. She simply stood there with an unimpressed look on her face, eyes unflinching behind the thin gold frames she wore.

“What can I do for you?” His question kind of barked out; it was clear that he was annoyed. “We’re having a power issue on this side of the building.” She said as if it burdened her to provide this information. “I see” he said. “The other side of the office is still good though in case you need to use the restroom or make coffee.” The woman turned around and began walking away as she said this as if to express that her mission was completed. The bits of lights that were on around that area of the larger office floor seemed to be generated by battery powered objects and extension cords running all the way to the other side of the building. “Oh great…” he sighed sarcastically to himself.

After taking a few moments to get connected to the various extension cords that were feeding power to his side of the building, he was ready to do some work. Minutes into working in front of the bluish glow of his computer screen, the awareness of the blinding darkness around him began to set it. It was both peaceful and eerie at the same time. All that could be heard was the clicking of the keyboard keys and mouse as he burrowed through his work load. Once a few hours had passed he needed to use the restroom. This meant going through the corridor that led to the other side of the building. His eyes squinted a bit at the thought of his current scenario. Now his bladder was really starting to feel full and for a moment he considered using the blacked out restrooms on his side of the floor.

It would only be a few moments of this line of thinking before he snapped himself out of it. Why should he be so afraid of moving around this place he had worked in for so long. It didn’t take much rationalizing before he popped up out of his seat and begin to swiftly walk towards the other side of the building. He started to near the corridor when suddenly he stopped. The truth is he couldn’t help but to remember what happened the last time he was in that area of the building. The hesitation was brief and then he was back in motion. He walked right into the corridor, which at the moment had been cascaded in shadows because of the power outage. A few steps into the dark hall and he began to hasten his stride.

When he got close to midway through the corridor, he noticed he still could not see the other end. Now everything all round him just seemed black. This feeling of being lost in darkness caused him to panic and suddenly he struck off running. The more he ran, the closer he felt he should be to the other end. Yet as he continued to run it seemed he was not getting there fast enough. His hands stretched in front of him to feel for the exit of the corridor in case he was near it and could not see. He ran harder. Moments passed as he dashed down the corridor, yet he could not seem to make it to the end. Soon he would close his eyes and breathe in deeply in order to catch his breath. When he opened his eyes again, he was in a forest.

The utter shock of this sudden change in environment cause him to immediately slow his run to a stop. He could see that he was on a path of some sort going through a forest. “Where am I?” His voice trembled as he writhed in disbelief. “Hurry!” A woman’s voiced shrieked from up ahead. Although he was completely confused, something about the scene was so familiar that it triggered him emotionally. His eyes became misty for some reason as he intuitively began to jog up to the woman’s voice. By the time he arrived to the woman, tears were streaming down his face uncontrollably. What he saw was the same woman from when he had slipped in the corridor and found himself in the forest before.

The woman had been pacing up ahead of him as if to be moving slow enough to allow him to catch up to her. As he stepped up to her, the familiar face had stricken him again. He wiped the streams of tears from his face as the two of them stopped moving and looked at each other. In this moment he was satisfied somehow. There was a subtle contentment emerging from deep within his heart. Regardless of the familiarity he was experiencing, he could not understand the true source of these feelings at the moment.

An eternity of time seemed to pass as they stood there on the path in the forest. A warm wind sweet with the fragrance of natural forestry swept passed their still forms. Then she hurled into him and hugged him with the squeeze of a boa constrictor. She seemed to be just as emotional as he was for some reason. It took him a split second to return her embrace since it caught him so off guard. It felt good to hold her as she held him. He didn’t even know what was happening. During their embraced they found themselves nose to nose. They exchanged a deep and passionate kiss worthy of the romance from fairy tales. Their lips connected like two magnets and seemed to generate an invisible electricity at their touch.

Another moment in eternity. Soon their seemingly timeless embrace began to loosen until they were no longer kissing. When they were no longer hugging, both of their heads hung low facing the ground. Then she turned back up the trail and began to run again. She gained a bit of distance on him as he paused in place, still trying to figure it all out. Moments later he had started running, too. Then his paced slowed as he saw her up ahead standing on what appeared to be the end of the path which had now become the edge of a cliff. She was facing him with her back to the cliff. At this point he was walking toward her slowly, still wondering what this was all about. When he was just a few feet away, he could see her smiling.

Then suddenly her smile turned to concern. He could see she was looking passed him at this point. When he turned to see what she was looking at, he immediately understood her concern. There were what appeared to be four soldiers from the distant past running towards them complete in uniform with rifles and a couple of dogs. Within moments the two dogs were released and they dashed ahead of the soldiers toward the man and the woman who stood with the cliff to their backs.

One of the dogs leaped at them and the man caught it and used its momentum to swiftly toss it over the cliff. The other dog stood back and growled a bit before charging towards the woman. The man sent a crushing boot into the nose of the dog which caused it to yelp loudly and effectively put it out of commission. He moved in front of the woman to protect her. “Geh jetzt auf den Boden!!!” One of the would be soldiers shouted in a very hostile manner. They were confused at the soldier’s words and did not comply but the soldiers didn’t shoot.

At this point he was sweating profusely; his adrenaline was now pumping hard. “Fuck you!” He shouted at the four men who had now formed a semi-circle around the two of them, leaving them surrounded with only the open air of the cliff directly behind them. Somehow he was now a part of this fight he had known nothing about. When the tension had reached its maximum threshold, one of the soldiers leaped for the man. The man quickly sidestepped and forced up his knee into the soldier’s gut, adding the conjunction of a double fisted hammer blow to the back of his head while he was dropping from the knee. That soldier dropped face down to the ground with a thud. The man frantically pushed the lying soldier over the edge of the cliff before he had a chance to recover. Then there were three.

The other three all rushed the man and woman at once. Multiple fists connected to the man’s head and body as multiple hands gripped his shirt. He exchanged blows and caught one of the soldiers square on the chin with a solid hook. That soldier immediately fell limp and went to sleep, dropping to the ground like a heavy weight. Then there were two. The women clawed at the face of one of the soldiers, blinding him as he gripped tightly to the man’s shirt. The fighting was so wild and vicious that both of the soldiers had dropped their rifles at this point.

The man’s mouth was bleeding and his eye was beginning to swell from the blows. The next moment went by lightning fast. He managed to kick one of the soldiers in the knee and stumble him, which gave him enough leverage to heave him over the cliff. The soldier gripped the man’s shirt and almost dragged him off the cliff with him, but the shirt ripped and the soldier dropped to his fate. Almost simultaneously, the final remaining assailant pulled a hand gun and shot at the man from close range. The bullet grazed the man’s cheek and struck the woman in the shoulder which sent her backwards off of the cliff.

As she fell, she was able to catch on to the edge, where the man immediately grabbed her hand. She hung there in his grasp and looked up at him. “NO!” She screamed as she saw the horror of what was coming. The soldier aimed his gun down at the man who was now lying on the ground holding the woman over the side of the cliff in his grip. Just as he was pulling her up a loud clapping noise rang out. POW POW POW! The soldier unloaded 3 rounds into the head of the man, executing him and leaving no other option for the woman but to fall to her end. The rounds had ripped through the man’s skull but he remained conscious just long enough to see the woman slip from his grip. Then it all went black.

He emerged to consciousness like a diver resurfacing from beneath the water. All he could see was blackness. He didn’t know where he was now. The darkness engulfed him and when he held his hand up in front of his face he could not see it. Then he sat up and he could tell he was on a bed. When he slid his feet off of the bed onto the floor beneath, he felt a familiar feeling of soft carpet. He was in his bedroom. From there, he walked over to where the light should be and attempted to flick it on. It was there and the room illuminated when it flicked on. Everything looked normal. There was even a neatly folded pile of clothing nearby which appeared to be what he had been wearing when he got home. It greatly relieved him that the action of the forest had not been his direct reality. After all of this, he was left only thinking of where he had been. Where was it? Who was she?