[Short] Nightmares and Defenseless Sleep: A Diary Called Bible

I wake up.
It is still deep in the night.
Outside the window and inside the hotel, the desires have finally dried up and are fast asleep. There is nothing as quiet as sleep. Perhaps it is because desires and egos are paused during sleep.

I don't know how many hours I slept, but I call it morning when I wake up. Sometimes I have only slept for a dozen minutes or so. But I consider it having overcome one night.
I have gotten used to the city. I have gotten used to walking all day long. If you walk that much, you at least get to know some faces. But I cannot get used to sleep.

That is because sleep is far too defenseless.
You cannot escape from dreams.
It is not that I am afraid of nightmares. Being plagued by nightmares must mean I am happy.
What I am afraid of are soft, gentle dreams. Or perhaps, recollections of memories.
They force me to face what I have lost in vivid detail. Losing something doesn't happen just once. Every single day, I continue to lose. It is pathetic, but sometimes I wake up crying.

However, I cannot afford not to sleep.
To escape from dreams, I must exhaust my body to the limit and reduce the room for dreams to the absolute minimum.

But even then, dreams are something you end up seeing.
That is why I do not sleep alone.
I don't mean I sleep with someone else. I have never tried it, but having someone sleeping next to me when I wake up might make my chest tighten even more. That would mean I have moved my life forward on my own.

Therefore, I sleep in environments where there are strangers around me when I wake up.
For example, a park bench in the early afternoon.
When I wake up, if there is a 'reality' there like a stranger, I can use that reality to deceive my dreams. No, I can keep the past that took the form of a dream on hold just as it is. In any case, it seems I still have some sense of judgment.
I quietly leave the silent hotel. day5

©2026 Text by Kanon Arishiro, Paper Cutting by Mio Arishiro