It was raining hard that night.

The wind was blowing and the darkness of the night was compounded by fog.

I was alone. My house was dark, darker than midnight and in my room I lay on my back listening to the sound of the rain and wind pelting against my windows, allowing it to feed my self-seduction.

I was listening to "Anytime, Anyplace" becoming one with myself wishing I had someone next to me. Turning my hand into the semblance of perfection: a man. To soothe me, to cover my body in complete ecstasy and make me yearn for more. As I turned over, I saw lightning flicker. A strong burst of thunder sounded against my heart as the backdrop of Janet ceased. I stopped touching myself and in a second the exterior construction of my body collapsed as I arose and I was rising too quickly.

My room was suddenly not quite as dark as moments ago. It was as if the light from the lightning strike had found its way back inside and remained there. I looked around slowly as a fearful feeling steadily rose up inside of me threatening to take me over. As my head completed its turn I was startled to find someone laying on my bed where my head had just been, it was me.

With that realisation, the fear that was slowly gathering in me came to a head. I felt on the verge of panic but there was a peace in the stillness of the eerily lit room that kept my almost tangible fear from overtaking me. I closed my eyes and commanded my self to relax but it didn't work. I recalled a technique I had learned as a child to deal with my fear and squeezed my eyes tighter.

I imagined myself safe in a place where I would feel protected from this darkness, this light, this silence. A chill colder than I have ever felt before came over me but I felt at ease in it. I somehow knew it would do me no harm as I felt my mind open to that safe world I was trying to create.

The chill suddenly stopped and behind my eyelids I could tell the colour of the light around me had changed. I slowly opened my eyes. Without fear because I knew I would welcome the view that would unfold. The light was a warm candle lit yellow and the room was foreign to me. I turned my head again as moments ago to survey the place I had conjured up in my head. At the foot of the bed I found myself sitting on there was a man surrounded by candles. His head was down, eyes trained intently on the book in his hands. I moved around the bed to get a look at his face knowing that he would not see me though not understanding why.

This room felt real, this man I had never seen before but I knew he was real. I could feel no heat from the candles but I knew they were real. He came to the end of his page and looked up into the emptiness in front of him in deep contemplation. I slouched down so that I could look directly into his eyes knowing that this is where I would find the salve for my fear.

His unblinking gaze into what i knew was empty space for him drew me in and I felt myself falling. The feeling of comfort I had felt looking into his eyes became as tangible as my earlier feeling of fear. It grew inside of me rising up much as the fear had, threatening somehow to overwhelm me. I now knew that I could not continue to look into this man's face and tried to move away finding I couldn't.

I knew what I had to do. Feeling on the verge of panic again as before I closed my eyes, wondering if I would now return to my familiar reality or escape to yet another conjured safe haven. Instead of the chill I was expecting I felt myself drifting into sleep. I welcomed it as something familiar in the midst of this strange experience but I mourned the loss of those eyes, that face, that man.

Sleep came as sleep comes and I do not know how long it lasted but it seemed that no sooner had I reached the depths of it than I was wrenched from it by raging thunder. I sat up startled. I was again in my room in the darkness without the lightning light, my weight was back to normal and I could feel my heart pounding heavily in my chest. My mind raced backwards, recounting what i had just seen, dreamt, experienced? I don't know but I knew one thing with and unquestionable certainty. That candle lit room existed and there was a book in it in a man's hand. It was being scrutinized by those eyes, that face, that man. That... MAN... was real. That man was mine and I would find him.