I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead

Morning. The light creeps in around the edges of my blind and assaults my eyelids. I roll onto my side, away from the clock that digitally chips away at my remaining time. Probing fingers count the bruises on my legs, pressing each one gently until I wince. I find five new ones and one new dent where my leg had yielded against the jutting keys in the filing cabinet. Absently I pick the skin off my fingertips and count the hours to my exam. I'm safe at six.

I half-lift my messy head from the pillow but he says something. I'm not certain yet who he's supposed to be but his tone is urgent and I settle back down. He's smoking. Everybody smokes these days. He's smoking and he's telling me something and it's important. Life changing. But other people encroach on our conversation. The scene changes. I'm walking down a street in a crowd and there's a girl hanging off my arm asking where the relationship is going and who will keep the kitten when I leave. There's always a kitten. Maybe if I had taken psychology like I'd wanted to I could explain it all. But I'd gone with the safe choices, and bombed. She's pulling on my arm, wants to drag me away but I can't go with her. He's going to tell me a secret.

I'm in a lift now. I don't like lifts. He dragged me in and we float between floors and I feel just a little sick. He takes me in his arms and mutters nonsense. It's always nonsense in the end. I pull away from him and the kittens turn up again, winding around our feet. He hits me. My head cracks against the metal walls and I pull myself out of bed. I don't need to see the rest. My legs pick their way carefully around my piles of literature. There's the books I had to study, books I still have to study, books I'm reading, books I want to read. Too many books and never enough time. I stagger to the mirror and check I'm still in one piece.

There's a bit in The Bell Jar where Sylvia Plath starts talking about experiences. How she thought that if she visited the Alps she'd come home and see the reflection of a tiny mountain in her eyes. And when she lost her virginity she'd see something different in her eyes as well. It's something that's always stuck with me. I always wanted to see the change. I used to spend hours staring at my reflection waiting to see something different. When I came home drunk for the first time I ran to the mirror to see but the girl that stared back told me too many unwelcome truths so I burst into tears and didn't drink for another year.

There are no revelations in my eyes this morning so I have no choice but to begin the day.