People Tell Me My Eyes Are Cold

People Tell Me My Eyes Are Cold
“ Did you dream again last night?” He asks in monotone, drumming vocal chords give hints to nothing. Therapists never alter their tedium, because then you might get to know your crazy. The only difference is that I already know I'm crazy.
“Yes,” I say. Pen against paper scratches my brain.
“Was it the same dream as before?” Rolodex images spins across my minds eye. Fire, metal, gears, shift.
“Yes it was.” Another scratch, another pinprick from my brain. It’s not what I say that he writes down. My words mean nothing. My thoughts mean nothing. He reads my movements. He watches the physical things, miniscule and almost imperceptible to a human eye. Almost tranquil.
“Describe this dream one more time for me if you would.”
If only he knew. Ignorance must be bliss. Stupidity is mercy.
“It starts the same every time. I’m surrounded by millions of people. They all greet me and want shake my hand. I’m happy.” Pen to pad again. He doesn’t know what happiness feels like he only knows what it looks like. “Then all of a sudden the people’s faces turn sad. They look heartbroken, betrayed even. They begin to age suddenly until all that’s left is a withered puff of smoke. They all leave until I am all alone in the completely white room. Its blank, a void…” This is the most terrifying part of the dream being utterly and violently alone. I pause as if to take a breath but I don’t. “Then binary code starts to appear, spreading from my feet. They unfold from the whiteness like a plague infecting it until they cover the whole room. Suddenly there are corners and walls. The room is given definition. It’s made real. The numbers shift and pulse fiercely but mechanically in artificial perfection. Their every move is an algorithm, a pattern, forced to be random. It’s a perfectly ordered chaos but somehow I feel at home among them. It feels safe, like I belong there but I don’t know why.” But I do know why. I wonder if he knows yet.
“Then straight out in front of me at the other end of the room a doorway appears. It’s instantaneous. One second its not their the next it is. Then the…”
“Wait can you describe the door to me?” He’s playing games with me. That’s what sanity does to a man.
“ Its white oak with a bronzed handle. Its normal, this is what I find so disturbing. I can see from around the frame a great light emanating from behind it. Then slowly, ever so slowly, the knob begins to turn. The light stabs out in spiky rays as it opens. Smoke and sulfur fill the binary chamber. The door is open and Hell stands before me. Inside there are giant clockwork gears, megalithic and rusted. They look deafening but they don’t make a sound.” He stops his scribbling. The air in his office stands stagnant, like fallen feathers. “Flames lick at the metal. So ravenous are these flames they look alive. Then out from the abyss comes a shadow. At first it’s just a black speck but as it steps over the threshold I see it for what it is.” Fire and brimstone rein down on Sodom and Gomorrah. Outside it begins to rain.
“Walking on that binary plane comes a metal catastrophe. It is humanoid but in the same essence it was not at all human. The body was shapely but too smooth catching glints of light off the wrong parts of its chest. It was metallic and almost gray but vague like burnished lead. It steps were almost graceful but so perfectly timed they looked awkward. As it approaches I see its mouth, a junk heap of gears and jutting metal. Continually it gnashed, scraping metal upon metal, a screeching almost like a harpies call.”
“And the eyes?” He asks baiting me, menacingly. His own eyes dribble. He knows he has me.
“The eyes are just like mine.”
“And how might that be?” He’s playing with his prey. Damn him.
“People tell me my eyes are cold, lifeless, inhuman even. Those eyes look so right in that machine but the same ones are in my own head. It doesn’t make sense Doc.” I can hear the hammer falling.
“Hmm… and then what happens, after you look into his eyes?”
“Nothing. That’s when I wake up.”
“So, what do you think these dreams mean?”
The trap is sprung.
“I don’t think I’m human.” Down the gavel falls, I told you I was crazy. Scribbles like mad ants crawl across the page.
Now comes the hard part. Time to make reality insane. “Now Doc, I’m usually a perfectly rash individual but Jesus…this makes no sense. I’m not normal. I don’t eat. Not just today, it’s been three damn weeks and not a crumb. A-and I know things. Things I shouldn’t. Ask me any math problem. Anything.”
Monotone turns consoling, sympathy for the deranged. “Now there’s no need to…”
“Godammit ask me!” Vesuvius is about to implode.
“Alright, now there’s no reason for that. How about… eighteen thousand five hundred and sixty seven times oh I don’t know…four thousand six hundred and eighty nine?” Doubt protrudes from his tongue… like worms.
“Eighty seven million sixty thousand six hundred and sixty three. See I’m a fucking human calculator.” Time for the grand finale. “Oh and Doc I don’t even have to breathe anymore. I haven’t had a full breath since I've been in this room.” Armageddon. Pompeii is molten. The world burns but he is untouched, motionless. He ignores the rapture. “Well?” I plead. “You have to believe me. Tell me what the hell is happening to me. What am I? You’ve got to believe me. Please.”
Silence prevails. No breathing is heard, not even the quicken of a pulse. Then slowly, mechanically he smiles and removes his eyeglasses. “ Oh I believe you.” All is silence after this and for the first time I truly look him in the eyes. They’re cold.
Fire, metal, gears, shift.