Lost in the Right Direction

“He was lost and now he’s found,” the stupid words were running through my head and wouldn’t leave me alone.

I wasn’t lost, I knew exactly where I was, sitting in front of the River Thames, a sweater pulled close around me and the hood lowered over my face.

My face was cold, hair tucked on my right shoulder, finger stuffed in the sweater’s front pouch.

It looked like I was a kangaroo, but at least it kept my hands from becoming too chapped.

Sighing, I stood up and headed down the way, my worn in runners making no noise against the old cobbled streets.

I don’t know if there were cars, as far as I knew I was the only person surrounded by bright lights that were fading off, fuzzy around the edges, blurs around each corner that could have been people or vehicles.

I wasn’t lost. I knew exactly where I was; maybe not where I was, but that didn’t count.

Did it maybe mean where my thoughts were?

Before I continue on a fruitless mind game, I looked up, just slightly, as the sky cracked open, a bolt of lightning showing its jagged body, searing its light to my eyes until all I saw was repeats of it all across my vision.

Cursing quietly under my breathe I wondered if now would be when I’d get lost.

An ambulance roared past, shocking the lightning patter away from my eyes.

The vehicle bumped and roared its way down the narrow street, sirens wailing, echoing, coming back a hundredfold, bouncing off the cobbles and buildings.

The lights kept me entranced, and I stood there in the pouring rain, each raindrop part of a steady rhythm as they fell, only to crash against the street.

I managed to make it home, how, I walked, but I couldn’t tell you what route I I took, how long it took me, or whether or not I passed anyone on the way.

I just know I walked because my feet ached, calluses bubbling on my heels.

Entering the bathroom, I flicked the light on, started the shower, and slowly peeled off every later.

I stepped into the steaming shower, and barely noticed that it was too hot.

“He was lost, and now he’s found,” how I hated that verse. I don’t even know why I was thinking about it.

Stepping out of the shower, I grabbed the top towel off of the stack that I kept there.

Wrapping the sea foam green towel around me, I wiped the steam off the mirror with my right hand, and stared at my reflection for a moment, not really seeing what was visible, trying to peer through my pores, trying to see if I could see everything that made me up, what made me work, what I was thinking.

After a bit, my vision fuzzed over, the mirror re-fogged, and I was no closer to finding out if I was all there or not.

Sighing, I crept away from the mirror, and re-dressed myself in a pair of sweats and a sweatshirt, and shuffled my way to the small kitchen where I turned the kettle on.

I could hear the rain, it was pounding on the roof, I could tell, like I was standing outside, even though it should have all been muffled.

Suddenly, I felt like I had just run a marathon, heard feet pounding one after another on the uneven cobbles through an alley, narrow buildings on each side, trapped, encased.

Heard nothing, but saw noise. It ricocheted off of the brick buildings, metal ladders that grew from buildings like ivy, footsteps that stumbled onto wet stones, breathe hitch, whoosh out, and cascade into white fog, dissipate.

Looking around, it took me a moment to realize I was in my apartment, and I had fallen asleep on the narrow couch.

“He was lost and how he’s found,” I muttered under my breathe, while pouring the evaporating water into a mug, and dipped the teabag in. Once, twice, three times.

I knew if I pondered in much longer I was going to give myself a migraine, which I sure did not need.

Leaving the tea by the sink, not eve really knowing why I had made it in the first place, I decided to see if anything was on TV.

Flipping through channels, I watched mindlessly as a group of cartoons paraded across the screen, intending, I’m sure, to make people laugh.

Finding nothing to catch my interest, I switched it off, mad at myself. I needed to snap out of whatever I was in.

At the rate I was going, I would be insane before you could say asylum.

I drifted off to sleep and ended up dreaming of feet running, footprints staining the group, showing where everyone was headed, and how we were each lost in the right direction.