Bright

He beamed at me. The rock was on his desk, waiting there by his hand. I tried to keep my eyes from it, but they kept slipping toward it. It was hard to look him right in the face, like staring right into a lightbulb.

The silence too—neither of us spoke—it was deafening. I know it’s a cliché, but it’s true. The silence seemed to swell, as if suffocating the very ideas that might be formed into sounds—words. You couldn’t think in that silence.

Finally, his voice broke through the clouds. My eyes shot back to him (again, I had been staring at that rock) as he spoke:

“We’re very concerned,” he said. “Your behavior of late has been erratic.” His cadence was like the waves of the ocean, or like the pentameter of Shakespeare. It didn’t seem right, the dips and swells—unnatural. It was unnatural, but it was soothing, in a way, hypnotic. I felt like it didn’t much matter what he was saying.

I stifled a yawn.

He picked up the rock.

“You were clutching this when we found you.” His voice went up and down and up and down. Was he speaking or humming? “Why are you so interested in a rock?” Was that a question? Should I answer? He kept talking. “I’m not sure it’s good for you.”

My eyes shied from his face. It was too bright, piercing. I couldn’t pull my eyes away from that rock. He was juggling it, passing it back and forth before me. Swinging back and forth like a pendulum.

I don’t know when I fell asleep.