Birdcage of Monotony

Marnie’s eyes fluttered open only to find emerald green walls and dim lights. He was back in The Badlands, slumped over in plush pillows of the lounge chair.

“Mm… What just happened..?” He muttered as he slowly sat up. His head felt heavy, and foggy, as if it was invaded in thick styrofoam.

“Welcome back,” Kaede's cheery voice drifted over to Marnie as he entered the room. He greeted the daydreamer with a happy smile and what appeared to be a tray of fresh tea. “Don't worry, that feeling in your head will lift soon. A warm drink and some sugar tend to help.”

Marnie nodded and took the tea without question as Kaede set it down on the coffee table. His brain wasn't exactly in a position to do much more than oblige. Surprisingly, the taste of warm apples and cinnamon seemed to reignite his senses with a kick.

“So? How was it?” Kaede inquired after sitting on the sofa and giving Marnie a few moments to readjust with his tea. Marnie should have expected this sort of question, yet it still somehow caught him off guard. Or, perhaps…it was merely the need to answer the question that threw him off.

“Ah. It…” he struggled to put his thoughts into words. It felt like an indescribable experience, one which brought some profound amalgamation of satisfaction and regret.

“It was nice,” was what he decided to say instead. Luckily, where many would have been disappointed or offended by Marnie's seemingly lack of enthusiasm, Kaede merely grinned in a proud, knowing way.

“Good! I'm glad you enjoyed it,” he said cheerfully. “RabbitHole really is a wonder, isn't it? If you start taking it regularly—”

“Yeah, but I don't think I'll take any more,” Marnie interjected instinctively. Something about the shocked expression on Kaede's face stung, but it was too late. Better to gulp down his tea in an attempt to think of a gentler follow-up than it was to backpedal. At least then Kaede's shock morphed into bemuse.

“I mean, uh, it was good and all,” Marnie continued. “But I just don't really think it's my thing, you know, to make a habit of.”

“Ah… Right, I completely understand,” Kaede responded politely, rather than becoming dejected. “No medicine is for everyone. I'm just happy you were willing to give it a try.”

Marnie nodded a little awkwardly as he took another sip of tea. He couldn't hear the rain beating outside anymore, so he curiously slipped his phone from his pocket to check the time. Then his eyes widened.

“Whoa, how long have I been here?!” The daydreamer exclaimed. He immediately drained the last of his tea and began collecting himself. “Oh god, I have to get home before it gets dark— and before it starts pouring again. Uhm, thanks again, Kaede. It was— well, it was really nice meeting you.”

“Any time, Marnie. Please, come and see me again sometime.”

Despite Marnie’s urgency and rush, Kaede regarded him with a warm smile and led him to the door. On his way out, the apothecary even gave him a clover patterned umbrella in case of another sudden downpour. Marnie couldn't deny, it was an overall rather pleasant experience. Even after the bizarre dream he had while intoxicated, something about it all gave him a sort of fuzzy feeling.

Was it…really a dream, though?

Marnie couldn't help but wonder as he walked home, fiddling with his new umbrella. It all felt so…real. Incredibly real.
The fear. The exhilaration. The unnerving feeling in his gut when he met Chez’s burning eyes.

Even more than any of that, for the first time Marnie felt an unshakable, irrefutable closure. Therapy had never given him a feeling like that.

It took a lot of willpower for Marnie to stay focused on his trip home. Luckily, this time he was closely following his phone's GPS so that he didn't accidentally get lost again. By the time he finally made it home, the sun was nearly set, and he felt like doing nothing more than collapsing in bed.

However, Marnie's sleep took him to a much darker place than the RabbitHole did. A pitch black and cold place, filled with white noise. Voices overlapped — screaming, shouting, chiding — one after another, until they became an indistinguishable din of negativity. Something about it felt familiar.

Where is that coming from?

Marnie's inner voice rang out clearly against the chatter, echoing around the void.
It sounds like…my parents…

The cold feeling intensified at his back, as if he was laying on a slab of ice, freezing and wet. His surroundings were no longer a void, and his ears were no longer consumed by static. Instead, there was nothing but a deafening silence, and the hard floor of his childhood home.

Marnie felt frozen in place, unable to even squirm as the strange wet sensation spread across his back, making its way to his shoulders and legs. Something in the back of his mind said that the wetness was pouring out of him, like there was a hole in his chest. An absence of something vital. It left him feeling hollow and disoriented.
What was missing?
Where did it go?

In the midst of his panic, Marnie noticed two shadows looming over him. His gaze shifted to the imposing figures, glowering at him with disappointment and disgust.

Mom..? Dad..?

Marnie had never felt so ice cold; so transfixed. It was as if his entire body, puny and insignificant as a child, was turned to stone. Though, none of it was as indescribably horrible as the feeling in his core when his mother's figure turned away in shame, and his father scoffed his opinion in an insidious voice.

“Good riddance.”

Marnie shot up in bed, gasping. His heart was pounding like a drum in his chest, making his ears ring for a moment before fading away. As his adrenaline slowed and he registered his surroundings, Marnie found himself in the safety of his apartment. It was still dark, with only the first silver-blue rays of dawn light streaming in through the bedroom window to keep him company.

“A…a nightmare…” Marnie whispered to himself, catching his breath. “It was only…a nightmare…”

With a heavy sigh he glanced at the clock. It was about 6am, too late to go back to sleep if he wanted to arrive at work on time. As disappointing as it was, he resigned himself to starting his day.

Like any other, Marnie's day consisted of a fairly predictable routine. A hot shower where he lost ten minutes staring in a daze at the drops of water on the wall. Changing his shirt five times before he finally felt somewhere between “comfortable” and “presentable”. Silently watching his frozen scrambled eggs and bacon breakfast circle around the microwave like a hamster on a wheel.

All the while, Marnie couldn't help but contemplate the monotony of his existence.

Was this really all there was to his life? Something about it felt so dull. Suffocating. Boring to the point of exhaustion.

Did Marnie's life always feel like this? Sure, being an accountant wasn't exactly thrilling, especially not at entry level, but he didn't remember it ever being so mind numbing. It was a neverending stream of document preparation, data entry, and math checks. Just as one stack of papers vanished from his desk, another stack appeared, and all of his seniors had something to say about his “amateur work” or “juvenile errors”.

Whether or not they meant to be insulting, Marnie couldn't tell. What he did know was it felt insurmountably irritating.

“Marion,” the sudden usage of his proper name made Marnie jump in his seat. One of his seniors approached with a stern tone that made a knot suddenly form in his gut.

“Uhm, it—it’s Marnie, sir,” he feebly attempted to correct the older man standing beside him.

“Eh? Right, nevermind that,” the senior accountant dismissed it with little respect or regard. “Listen, I know you haven't been here long, but I have your first performance report here with me. I wanted to deliver to you personally so that maybe we could discuss a couple topics.”

“Oh, uhm, could we maybe do this another—”

“Now, the gang and I have noticed that you seem to be making some repeated errors,” Marnie's protest was completely bulldozed by his senior’s prompt voice. “Growing pains, I'm sure. Nothing to worry about now. But, of course, if we don't address them, well—”

“Mr. Casey, now really isn't—”

“—then how are you ever to improve, lad? Haha, again, no worries. It's just some simple clerical errors, a few oversights. We've managed to catch them now, but if it becomes a habit for you, Marion—”

“Would you piss off, already?!”

As soon as the words left Marnie's mouth, he realized he'd made a grave mistake. Charles Casey was a bit stubborn, but an overall kind man, and Marnie had never seen such an offended look on his face before. The guilt consumed Marnie like a black hole in the pit of his stomach, driving the familiar feeling of panic through his veins.

“I-I’m so so sorry,” he insisted, scrambling to stand and collect his things from his desk. “I’m— I really don't think I'm feeling well. Forgive me, Mr. Casey, I think I should go home. Let's talk about my performance report on Monday.”

Hastily taking the file from his senior’s hand, Marnie hurried away from his desk and out of the building.

On the street, with growing distance between himself and the social disaster he'd just created, it felt a little easier to breathe. He couldn't believe how easily he blurted that out… More importantly, he couldn't believe how remarkably good it felt to do so. Marnie wasn't used to standing up for himself; he never imagined it would feel so invigorating.

It felt almost as invigorating as when he was using RabbitHole.

Except, this time that uplifting feeling almost immediately gave way to anxiety. Yet, under the spell of the drug, it resonated through his body and absorbed into his entire being. It empowered him.

The incident at his office didn't empower him. All Marnie felt was humiliation and stress. The sort that was so unbearable it made one desperate for a release.

Marnie didn't know what to do with this desperation, he'd never felt anything like it before. An intense yearning threatening to consume his very soul, it brought his thoughts to the Other Side. The sweet fog and the pink trees… Chez's crimson gaze and sly grin… The exhilaration of defeating a dragon…