The Labyrinth is now all I am; my entire being exists within these twisted marble walls. Sometimes I wonder if I am not more than another turn in the unending pathways of this place. Yet I am unsure of how long ago it began, this fusing of myself and The Labyrinth. I feel that many days, or maybe even years, have passed since that one terrible evening, though I will never guess how long it has been. Time is fluid within The Labyrinth. There is neither day nor night, moon nor sun. Only memories.
The night went like this: I was out on a walk after an unremarkable dinner, listening to the fading sounds of the birds and crickets when there must have been a sort of unexpected hole in the path since I tripped and fell down. What I fell into was a dark and empty cave, with a mysterious air to it. Had there always been such a deep cave near my house? I cannot recall anything about it. After falling, I do not remember what happened – the lines of my memories have become so blurred – but I am sure that it wasn’t long afterwards that when I woke up within the walls of The Labyrinth.
~
It is certainly a strange place, The Labyrinth. Though I always prided myself on having an impeccable sense of direction, there seems to be no conceivable end to this hellish land. Cold, harsh marble surrounds me while I stumble from one Not-End to the next. I think of these mind-puzzling locations as “Not-Ends” because each is the opposite of what I imagine an end to The Labyrinth might be like: Not-Ends are collections of the past. They are my old memories; they are the only things that exist within The Labyrinth.
Walking into a Not-End is like entering a thick haze that seems as if it could only exist within the mind, yet it persists all around. As far as I know, the only way out of a Not-End is to go through its memory, exist fully within the past until I somehow make it back to The Labyrinth’s marble walls. I do not know how I am transported between the present and the past, but I am always returned to confines of The Labyrinth.
~
As time has passed – guessing how much is difficult – the contents of the Not-Ends have become more alien to me. The memories I am brought to are now strange: someone paddling a canoe in a small pond, the thrum of a computer as it reboots, turning the page of a book that contains many stories built off of intangible images that shade the mind, a disturbing argument with a loved one. I have a perplexing feeling that I once felt as if the Not-Ends manifested my own memories. Yet I have not been near water in ages or looked into a computer screen or held a book in my hands, nor can I recall any people. I am the sole inhabitant of these marble walkways. There is nobody here but me.
~
I have started to become fond of the Not-Ends’ outlandish memories. The continual recounting of the past has become a dear friend – what would life be without the past? I used to be anxious about encountering Not-Ends and would attempt to resist their intoxicating haze. Now I allow the haze to swiftly enter me and whisk me away from the confines of The Labyrinth. I exist for The Labyrinth’s memories. Who else is there to give themselves to perpetual remembering? Without me, the Not-Ends would go unseen. The past would be forgotten.
~
Much time passed like this, with each moment spent within the Not-Ends. As the importance of the obscure memories increased to me, there was no longer anything in my mind but the necessity of preserving the Not-Ends. It became difficult to imagine a time when anything more had ever existed.
Slowly, I began to wonder: what was the meaning of this world of the past? Everything dissolved away from me until I realized how blinded I had become by the memories hidden within The Labyrinth; I no longer existed, I was now nothing but a memory myself, wandering the empty hallways of The Labyrinth, completely alone and unremembered.
Where was everyone? I had devoted my life to recounting the past, and nobody was there to care. In remembering so many useless stories I had forgotten myself; the stories of The Labyrinth were now all I was. I had disregarded the importance of living and instead handed myself over to the world of what once was. Moving from Not-End to Not-End, I had not allowed myself to be. My life only existed within memories. I had simply become another wispy, unknowable part of it all.
The night went like this: I was out on a walk after an unremarkable dinner, listening to the fading sounds of the birds and crickets when there must have been a sort of unexpected hole in the path since I tripped and fell down. What I fell into was a dark and empty cave, with a mysterious air to it. Had there always been such a deep cave near my house? I cannot recall anything about it. After falling, I do not remember what happened – the lines of my memories have become so blurred – but I am sure that it wasn’t long afterwards that when I woke up within the walls of The Labyrinth.
~
It is certainly a strange place, The Labyrinth. Though I always prided myself on having an impeccable sense of direction, there seems to be no conceivable end to this hellish land. Cold, harsh marble surrounds me while I stumble from one Not-End to the next. I think of these mind-puzzling locations as “Not-Ends” because each is the opposite of what I imagine an end to The Labyrinth might be like: Not-Ends are collections of the past. They are my old memories; they are the only things that exist within The Labyrinth.
Walking into a Not-End is like entering a thick haze that seems as if it could only exist within the mind, yet it persists all around. As far as I know, the only way out of a Not-End is to go through its memory, exist fully within the past until I somehow make it back to The Labyrinth’s marble walls. I do not know how I am transported between the present and the past, but I am always returned to confines of The Labyrinth.
~
As time has passed – guessing how much is difficult – the contents of the Not-Ends have become more alien to me. The memories I am brought to are now strange: someone paddling a canoe in a small pond, the thrum of a computer as it reboots, turning the page of a book that contains many stories built off of intangible images that shade the mind, a disturbing argument with a loved one. I have a perplexing feeling that I once felt as if the Not-Ends manifested my own memories. Yet I have not been near water in ages or looked into a computer screen or held a book in my hands, nor can I recall any people. I am the sole inhabitant of these marble walkways. There is nobody here but me.
~
I have started to become fond of the Not-Ends’ outlandish memories. The continual recounting of the past has become a dear friend – what would life be without the past? I used to be anxious about encountering Not-Ends and would attempt to resist their intoxicating haze. Now I allow the haze to swiftly enter me and whisk me away from the confines of The Labyrinth. I exist for The Labyrinth’s memories. Who else is there to give themselves to perpetual remembering? Without me, the Not-Ends would go unseen. The past would be forgotten.
~
Much time passed like this, with each moment spent within the Not-Ends. As the importance of the obscure memories increased to me, there was no longer anything in my mind but the necessity of preserving the Not-Ends. It became difficult to imagine a time when anything more had ever existed.
Slowly, I began to wonder: what was the meaning of this world of the past? Everything dissolved away from me until I realized how blinded I had become by the memories hidden within The Labyrinth; I no longer existed, I was now nothing but a memory myself, wandering the empty hallways of The Labyrinth, completely alone and unremembered.
Where was everyone? I had devoted my life to recounting the past, and nobody was there to care. In remembering so many useless stories I had forgotten myself; the stories of The Labyrinth were now all I was. I had disregarded the importance of living and instead handed myself over to the world of what once was. Moving from Not-End to Not-End, I had not allowed myself to be. My life only existed within memories. I had simply become another wispy, unknowable part of it all.
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