Terminal Drift
Arriving at the airport just before midnight, my flight wasn’t to begin boarding for nearly five hours. The thought of tumbling through the early morning with a dull, post-sleep fog pressing against my skull made sleeping for a few hours a non-starter. Better, I decided, to stay up all night - carried along by a thin thread of curiosity.
Once past security, I drifted toward my gate without purpose, through the cluster of people waiting to board the last flights of the evening, and into a shop.”What time’s your flight?” a voice called from behind the counter. “Somewhere around 5”. "Oh, well, we're open 24 hours!", the attendant announced with improbable cheer. I shoved a 5-hour Max Energy and a bag of trail-mix into my pocket. "Ah, well then you might see me walk by a few times".
I sank into a chair, hoping to pass at least an hour with some light reading or the scrolling phone — as the others seem to do. But the dark of night had weight, and it pressed me steadily downward, dragging me toward a sleep one must not trust. My stasis invited it — silent, inevitable. Though routinely cursed with the fragility of light sleep, there exists an unpredictably deep sleep delivered by a certain exhaustion that was becoming too acquainted to me.
I twisted the cap of my energy shot and sipped it as if it were some magic elixir. About forty milligrams of the three hundred, I measured in my head. The jolt of caffeine served to do nothing more than enhance my delirium. I stood and walked. It was only 1am.
At some point, the walkways between gates and terminals started to dissolve into one another, converging into a single, endless corridor of carpet stretching forward until it vanished into shadow. There was no center, no arrival, only passage. Hours were no longer spent or saved, they were simply suspended.
Suddenly, I found myself in a dimly lit corridor masquerading as the heavens. Harsh, unyielding lights that had cast angular shadows along the walls of the labyrinth softened and seemed to splinter into stars scattered across the floor.
A mirage within the network. Nothing more.
Only the whir of carpet cleaners, the hollow clanking of conveyor belts, and the droning hum of vacuums remained — it was if the machinery itself were murmuring in its sleep.
A placidness overcame me. I questioned no sounds, no blinking lights, no shadows. I submitted myself to the terminal, content to exist within its paradox.
Suddenly, the veil was lifted. A buzz from my phone was followed by the faint footsteps and clamor of travelers plodding towards their gates. Liveliness returned, and with it, the familiar sense of time and purpose. I stood and began to walk without thought. Endlessness had been demarcated, and within that boundary, time returned.
Waiting for my group number to be called, I wondered what dreams my fellow passengers had enjoyed—and what dream, if it was one, had visited me.