Dreaming for 10,000 years

Chapter 244 One Day (End of this Volume)
October 1925, 10, Loft 23, Red Hook Apartments, Brooklyn, New York.

The morning light reflected from the tall building opposite slanted in through the air vents, with a sickly paleness, like an afterimage filtered through coal smoke and fog.

Howard Phillips Lovecraft opened his eyes, and the cracks on the ceiling were still winding like yesterday, like a silently mocking face.

The attic smelled of dampness and mold, mixed with the sickly smell of pickled herrings from the delicatessen below. Lovecraft was awakened by a noise coming from the street.

The creaking of horse-drawn wheels rolling over the cobblestone road, the hawkers' cries, and the whistles of distant factories, these noisy sounds interweave together, heralding the beginning of the day.

Lovecraft stood up and opened the window, trying to let fresh air dispel the dullness in the house. However, what came in through the window was only more soot, dust, and noise!

On the street, pedestrians hurried past, their faces blurry and unfamiliar, as if they were phantoms walking out of some distant dream.

Lovecraft looked at the high-rise building opposite. He and Sonia once lived in such a high-rise building, enjoying the happiness of their newlyweds.

At that time, New York was sunny, the streets were wide, and the air was filled with the aroma of coffee and bread. Sonia's smile was like a spring flower, warm and bright.

but……

But the cost of living in New York was too high, and his meager royalties could not support such a life. For various reasons, Sonya went to Cleveland to look for a job.

He was the only one left in this cold city, living in a loft in Brooklyn.

With a sigh, Lovecraft put on his coat and walked out of the apartment, trying to dispel the haze in his heart by walking.

The streets near Red Hook are narrow and crowded, lined with dilapidated brick buildings and garbage-filled alleys. There is an unsettling atmosphere in the air, as if the city itself is a huge cage, trapping everyone living in it in loneliness and despair.

Lovecraft knew this kind of loneliness and despair, that is survival.

New York is great. It can make people rich overnight and become what others call millionaires.

New York is also very bad, it’s impossible to survive!

The enormous pressure of survival makes him feel stressed all the time, especially for an unknown novelist like him.

After walking around the post office, Lovecraft walked into a small cafe disappointedly and ordered a cup of black coffee and a piece of dry bread.

The coffee was bitter and the bread was hard, but both were cheap enough. He hadn't eaten for a day, and the stomach cramps made him need to eat something.

The cafe was bustling with people, and everyone around him seemed to be talking about their lives, work, family, and future, but Lovecraft only felt that those things were far away from him.

Not only were those things far away from him, but those people were also far away from him.

He was like an outsider, unable to fit into their world, nor the world of New York.

After eating, Lovecraft left and walked past the mirror at the door of the cafe, where he saw his current appearance.

His eye sockets were sunken and his cheekbones were jagged, like a walking corpse. His head was lowered as if he had a heavy burden on his shoulders.

In the afternoon, Lovecraft returned to the attic, sat at his desk, and tried to start writing. Every trace of the pen tip on the paper seemed to remind him of the hopelessness of life.

His savings were running low, so he had to either continue waiting for a response to his manuscript or return to his hometown of Providence.

Life in New York was too strange, cold and expensive for him, who came from a small country town.

Lovecraft's thoughts kept being pulled back to the past, the time he spent with Sonia, those carefree days under the sunshine of New York. Now, all of this is gone, leaving only this cold city and cold reality.

As night fell, Lovecraft lit the gas lamps, and the dim light cast flickering shadows on the walls.

Sitting by the window, Lovecraft listened to the quarrels of Italian immigrants downstairs. Their voices were sharp and piercing, as if tearing the silence of the night.

On the fire escape outside the window, a black cat was squatting on the iron frame, scratching a rusty mark with its claws. Its single eye flashed a green light in the darkness, as if it was peeping into Lovecraft's soul.

Late at night, the whole apartment fell into silence. Lovecraft lay on the bed, listening to the slippery wriggling sound coming from deep in the sewer pipe, as if some huge creature was wriggling in the darkness.

Pipelines are the intestines of the city, so what are they?

Lovecraft closed his eyes and tried to fall asleep, but Sonia's shadow appeared again. Her face was still clear, as if it was right in front of him, but he couldn't touch it.

He and she were only a few hundred kilometers apart, but they were separated by a whole world.

He is on this side of the world and she is on the other side.

There is a gap between them, called reality.

Lovecraft could no longer remember when he had experienced a life as beautiful as the sunshine.

This city, this behemoth built of steel and brick, is devouring its own soul in an indescribable way.

Lovecraft felt that he was being eroded bit by bit by loneliness and despair, as if he was trapped in an endless nightmare and unable to wake up.

I want to wake up!

I want to wake up!

Then he woke up from his sleep.

He tried desperately to recall all the good things, but he could only think of himself living alone and stubbornly in this city.

Now, he can't hold on any longer!
In the darkness, Lovecraft lit the last candle, and the flame flickered in the darkness, casting distorted shadows.

Looking at the cracks in the wall, they seemed to be silently mocking Lovecraft's incompetence.

When Lovecraft picked up the pen and tried to write something, the tip of the pen uncontrollably drew a series of meaningless symbols on the paper.

Those symbols eventually came together to form a sentence.

"The universe (the world) is cruel and strange to humans, and human minds and existence are so insignificant!"

The moon outside the window was obscured by clouds, leaving only a vague halo. Lovecraft felt an unprecedented fatigue, as if the weight of the whole world was pressing on his shoulders.

He closed his eyes and let the darkness swallow him.

What is the scariest thing?
It’s probably about survival!
Survival is cruel and strange to human beings, their minds are distorted, and their existence is so insignificant.

(End of this chapter)