The room was pitch black, shrouded in complete darkness. The small single source of light he had was the faint glow of his short blunt. The gutted rillo was filled with his favorite strand, Spirelia poured itself over the room as smoke. Sitting in the bathroom of an old friend’s apartment, Ashton sat on the edge of the bathtub, waiting for his turn to hit the blunt. This high was very different than usual, it just hit him deep into his feelings.

The light tap on his shoulder signaled it was his turn to partake of the magic bud. There was the awkward struggle as the two high hands attempted to pass without burning each other. Successfully, he pinched the burnt down blunt, a roach, put it to his lips and took in the sweet smoke. Wrapping itself around his lungs, pulling him to another level, it made him want to cough up his insides. Holding it in, because momma ain’t raise no bitch, he let the exhale flow out with a sigh. Waiting to show off he goes for the second hit, an orange glow illuminated the darkness shining light onto Ashton’s face.

He had dark-skin, thick tortoise-colored circle frame glasses, nose-length dreads that sometimes smudged his lenses. The smoked that dripped out of his mouth made his eyes water, staining his brown eyes red.

“You gonna pass that bruh or are you gonna die with it ?”, a deep voice cut through the dark, followed by a chorus of snickers. There must have been 4 or 5 dudes crammed into this tiny bathroom, but Ashton didn’t know for sure. But that didn’t matter right now, what mattered was the fact that he got roasted in a rotation. Embarrassed, Ashton quickly ashed’n’passed the roach to the next outstretched hand. 

“My bad, fam.”, he hated times like these, where he ended up sticking out in groups of his people. Ashton wasn’t used to smoking circles yet, but this bathroom certainly didn’t make him feel welcome. Maybe he was too high,  maybe he was still tight about getting called out, but he didn’t want to be in here anymore. He had started to lose count of how many blunts they smoked now. 10? 13? That, coupled with the splitting headache, gave Ashton the signal that it was time to bounce. Standing up, the sound of shuffling alerted everyone else in the room.

“Ashton you really leaving, nigga?”, another voice snuck its way through what sounded like a big hit.

“Yeah man, I’m tired-”, he began to explain as he stumbled over hand and foot to make it to the door.

Through a deep cough his old friend teased even harder, “Nah, you can’t hang.” Another round of chuckles at Ashton’s expense wouldn’t do this bad high anymore good. He swiftly cracked open the door, breaking open the seal on the hotbox. He heard some ‘hurry man’s’ as he enclosed the others back in the Hyperbolic High Chamber once again. What had happened in there was the least of his worries, he had to get home high as hell.

He ended up letting himself out through the front door of the apartment, and began the walk back to his dorm. The headache naturally faded away just like he thought it would. It made the fact that everything looked like it had so much detail, easier to handle. It may have been around midnight, but Ashton didn’t care. The moon was full, bright, illuminating the whole night sky as if it was fate saying ‘enjoy this journey my dude’. And he happily accepted, adding a little of pep is step, pseudo dancing to the music in his headphones. He danced his way back to his dorm building, big brick with black trim. The Truth Housing, in white letters were plastered to the side of the building, but to Ashton this was home. Thankfully his journey ended with him almost getting hit 3 times, a new record low. 

With the intensity of the high releasing its grip on Ashton’s brain, he managed to stumble up the steps to the front of his dorm, Room 1125. After trying his best to not wake up his roomates, he shut himself in his room. The bud’s charm still buzzed around his system as Ashton struggled to remove his dank, smokey clothes. Eventually, he got his head unstuck from the hoodie, finding success and floated into his bed, and let sleep take him away. *Night’s like these*, he thought with closed eyes, are much more interesting than the mundane day to day. He silently longed for his purpose in life to be more much than what it was. Closing his mind, Ashton fell into the arms of his imagination.

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Dreams were his only escape ever since childhood. They were fueled by wild imagination of Ashton, and it only got more vivid as the understanding of the world around him grew within him. Overtime, Ashton could really explore his dreams in full, waking up whenever he wanted. He had complete and total control of his dreams, a world that he could bend to his will. This dream was no different. His body was transparent with a blue tint, only wearing the underwear that he wore to bed. Reminding himself that he was in his dream, he closed his dream eyes and began to craft the perfect adventure, a journey to another world. As soon as he was sure he got the idea right he opened them up and turned around. He was no longer in his room, the world around was an endless sky that stretched as far as he could. He looked at his feet still in his boxers, but he was standing on a clear-like surface that rippled everytime he moved. Surprisingly enough they weren’t wet.

*What the hell did I smoke?* he pondered hard as he was shocked to see the dreamworld wasn’t any idea he came up with. He looked desperately to find a way out, a door, a portal, you know, dream things. To no avail, he couldn’t find a single thing. 

“What do you want to accomplish in your life?”, a similar sounding voice pierced the confusion. Ashton looked behind to find, a clone of himself clad in a white pajama looking get up, with eyes as crimson as blood. “What do you hope to obtain?”, it hurled another question his way that triggered his headache again. The clone walked forward towards him, arm out with the palm facing up, continuing the verbal assault of headache-inducing questions. Clutching his head, Ashton knelt down into the rippling mirror of water. The ringing rumbled his dreamscape, but that stopped the moment the clone touched his shoulder. “Make your own future.”, were the last words it said before it exploded into black ooze that began to spread over Ashton. It  covered every part of him like an inkblot on a pure canvas, the jet black color stained his perfect dream. Desperately trying to fight, he pushed his hand toward the sky grasping at something he couldn’t have. Freedom. The darkness swallowed him whole.

Was he dead? No, he can still think. He couldn’t use any of his senses, nothing, just a pure void, the light emitted from the soft glow of his body gave him the sight he needed. There was a soft whisper in his ear, but making out the words was nearly impossible right now. “Ashton” it rang out within the subspace, echoing even. By now he could hear a heartbeat.

It wasn’t his own.

“Ashton!”, the voice was louder, almost as if it was getting closer. Voices echoed, some were the same others weren’t. It was like a crowd of people were trying to tell him the same thing, at the same time. The kept repeating his name over and over again. “ASHTON!” It called out to him, beckoning him to turn around and face it, whatever it was. But he had to find the source he couldn’t go another second in this hell. The dread within him increasing with each passing heartbeat that reverberated inside this seemingly endless void.

Ashton began to turn around slowly but carefully, moving his eyes to take in the being that called out to him. Before he knew it, he was face-to-face with a pair of crimson eyes in the darkness. Both laser focused on him, from deep behind them a final voice rang out clearly dispelling the chaos inside his head. “Ashton”, it pulsed inside this abyss pushing his dream form farther and farther away from the monster residing in this space. It was almost like he was forcibly ejected from his own mind back into his body, causing him to sit up in a cold sweat. The cold grip of fear still trickled down his spine, but Ashton tried to calm himself down. *What was that ? Why did I have that dream? What did it want?*

All these questions and more stumped him, pouring this uncertainty onto the already full plate Ashton had to deal with. As a college student, things like money, grades, and social skills needed constant monitoring. He didn’t have the time to be having otherworldly Skype calls, he barely had time to clean his room on a consistent basis. Although he wasn’t the best at keeping his life organized, his room being the most notorious example, he had a clear system that has sort of worked all his life. He needed to take a T-break, as he began to wipe the sleep crust that lined his groggy eyes. The longer he stayed in bed, the greater the temptation to take a day-long nap grew exponentially, but the fear of having Round 2 with Mr.Dream Demon didn’t sound too appealing.

He groaned as he turned over to grab his phone of the desk. 11:45, it read. On a Tuesday, which meant no class for Ashton. What would he do all day? 

Suddenly, there was a swift, but strong knock at the door, nearly send him into cardiac arrest.

“Yo, Ash wake up and come eat!”, a younger voice yelled from behind the door. “I’m planning to eat your plate too, bitch!” That string of words were the few that Ashton believed could start a war in this dorm suite.

Not wanting to starve he bolted off the bed dodging the random clothes strewn about the floor of his room. Flinging open the door, almost denting the wall, the wonderful smells of Soo Yeon’s breakfast cooking wafted out of the kitchen, down the hall.