It crept towards her, out of the pages of her diary. Those
empty rectangles of nothing. And from where there were entries and to-do lists it swaggered
out across the pages, parading past her, jeering. When she did manage to
shut out the noise, it whispered derisively instead. Not into her ear, but
directly from the centre of her head, engulfing all else, like backwash on a
beach rattling her logic, dragging all order away and into the deep.
It wasn’t as if she had nothing to do, and it definitely
wasn’t because she wanted to do nothing. It was just that what she did have to do felt like nothing. The
sense of urgency and fear that she relished did not make residence in the items
on her schedule. It didn’t even really feel like her schedule, and definitely
not her agenda. Someone else’s, perhaps. Maybe no one’s in particular. Just a
schedule.
Things to do, things to do. Busy, busy. No time. The
familiar phrases taunted her. She had once felt that way; she felt that absence
keenly. It left a vacuum, now perforated and being slowly inhabited by the
swirling grey of a winter North Sea, carrying sand and seaweed, grating and
tangling with her thoughts.
When had she last been on the beach? Too long ago. The
stretching sands and undulating water reminded her that, despite how she felt,
the tumult in her head was only… not imaginary, but… something that could be controlled
more easily than she could control the heaving mass of water rushing to meet her
feet.
King Cnut. He had been demonstrating that he couldn’t stop
the tide coming in. So misrepresented these days. He knew he didn’t have divine
powers, and that only God did. She pondered this. Then she pondered her train
of thought, wondering why she was now sitting at her desk with her organiser
open in front of her thinking about God.
She flipped it shut, decisively. Although, she knew not what
she’d decided. Only that she would shut it and that somehow, perhaps, that
would change the course of her thoughts. Then she realised actually, that in
imagining the events going on inside of her head as something more tangible, she
had spent a blissful few untouched minutes – she had fought back, stemmed the
tide.
She got up. She knew she should do it more often. She should
get out there. The nothing must become something. And it would only become
something if she made it so. If she found the purpose in it all.
Feeling the sand between her toes she headed to the shoreline,
the retreating surf beckoning. The tide was turning taking with it that which
had filled the void. The emptiness returned, but it was welcome – it could be
filled. And this time she would curate its contents. The sea was back where it
belonged and the pages of her diary remained closed.
Something winked up at her, its lustrous shell reflecting
the moonlight. The world had its order – tides would come and go. She didn’t
have divine powers, but she knew someone who did. Nothing is nothing,
everything is something, she realised. The last sounds of the sea washed away,
the corridor seemed a brighter place and a pearl began to form around the last
remaining grain of sand.
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