There is a brick wall.
It is the only thing I can see in any direction I turn.
The bricks look sturdy; electric blue jay stones with neat lines separating to conjoin them all together. The grout glows. Each separation made clear and distinct with light.
Sometimes the light coming through the cracks is so bright, the bricks look less corporeal. They aren’t really there. The light comes from nowhere and everywhere all at once. The wall vibrates.
Trembling, I place my hand on a brick at the very center and feel the hum of the light. I dig my nails into the grout and wedge one brick out. I’m bathed in golden technicolour. The brick wall remains. I smile, but there are tears in my eyes.
My heart feels fear and bangs a warning against my chest: it-must go-back. It-must go-back. It-must go-back.
My smile widens, then falters. I lean against the wall, speaking sweet nothings into what could have been a painting. A masterpiece. I listen for the echoes. I can hear children’s laughter and screams and lullabies. There’s too much.
Then, I hear music—the heartbeat made into the rhythm—and lights flash all around. It is hard not to dance. Yet, my limbs feel too heavy to move from my spot against the wall. The screams echo, fading as I finally rise from the wall. I place the brick back, and everything stops. All is still except the outline on the brick replaced, which buzzes discontentedly.
I sigh deeply, my body tense from over-stimulation suddenly relaxing into the almost-silence. I feel drained, and now the loose brick won’t stop rattling.
“It’s all still here. It’s all still happening.” It rattles like teeth in the bitter cold.
I bang against the hard surface like I might be trying to get in, if only it would stop making that sound.
“You don’t know your own strength.” A voice reminds me.
I don’t.
And it doesn’t stop so I keep banging until the brick I had taken out, falls again. Again, I’m bathed in light, but now the anger won’t stop. And then another falls. And another. The anger is fueled by the light because just as there is the beauty of it all, there is also the hatred and the unfettered rage. I let it all wash over me as the brick wall dismantles beneath my fists. I am heaving and crying and laughing, until there is nothing there but me and the light.
I feel raw and naked in its pure radiance. I might crumble under its gaze. The world made extraneous and grey in comparison to the electricity. It hurts to stand there in the discomfort of everything. I want to look away—run away—but my curiosity gets the best of me. Is this the best of me?
I’m still too afraid to move. Barely breathing now the wall is gone.
Everything is silence.
Everything hurts.
But what now?
Is that enough for now?
The bricks fall into nothing, echoing and speaking what I cannot: it hurts too much. It hurts too much. It hurts too much. Over and over and over again. It reverberates through my bones and into my marrow. The sound touches something and then I can hear music. A few notes enough to bring me melodies she used to sing. The music brings me warmth. It brings me memory. The fallen blue bricks bruise purple. I breathe. I am sobbing still. Everything hurts still… Why? I can hear my heart asking.
I breathe.
The bruise melts to blood which pools at my feet until there is a path before me. The red deepens turning everything beneath my toes slowly from liquid to something else. It squelches between them like mud. Suddenly, I’m not so teary eyed, too focused on the feeling of wet earth on my skin. The red turns to brown which roils like tilled earth. I take a step forward, green grass and moss and clover spreading like a sea now that the wall is gone. The light intensifies and fills the space to reveal a gate. The gate doesn’t feel as heavy as the brick wall did and my feet carry me that way before I can object with more tears.
A mother’s song still plays.
I look through the gate: what lies beyond is just outside my field of vision. When I go to open it, I feel another surge: desire. The desperation to open the gate overwhelms me and I try to open it. I shake the bars tentatively at first. Then I put all my force into it, remembering my own strength at last.
Nothing.
Even the song has stopped, leaving me in silence.
“Not so fast”, it seems to taunt. “Where is your key?”
I lean down to look through the keyhole as if the answer might just be waiting for me to merely turn it in its place. Instead the question becomes… what is the key? How do I open the gate?
And if I don’t, will the blue bricks return?
