Only Sleeping

Wandering through the graveyard I find myself strangely drawn to a small stone in the top corner of the thick grassy plot. It is clearly very old as the carved inscription is quite worn.

I kneel down to try to get a better view. I lean into the stone to try to make out what thoughtful message the letters spell out. I can just make out the top line:

J D aged 6 mths

The age causes me to double-take. This clearly is the final resting place for a very small child- a baby in fact.

I cast my glance to the lines below to try to make out the epitath:

Let not your heart for me be weeping
I am not dead but only sleeping.

I recoil in horror upon reading this, gripped by some sudden instinct that a baby must be buried here alive. Unable to seperate the notion of Victorian sentimentality from reality it seems, I feel compelled to act: To free this poor innocent and endangered child.

Like a wild animal I begin clawing at the earth in front of the stone, digging with my bare hands, digging to release this wretched soul.

After burrowing down only several inches, what at first I had thought to be a mist, arising in the graveyard, now starts to take on an altogether different property: A nauseous smelling and tasting vapour which is now attempting to invade my lungs.

Coughing with the sensation, I draw back. I cannot continue for fear I might pass out. I look around me and decide to dive for shelter in the large stone hall just yards to my left. So I stumble off in the direction of the hall.

In The Graveyard

Through the haze I come to a clearing just up ahead. It is a grassy area, the odd gloomy tree dotted about. There are some dark gray slabs of stone standing upright. They look like - yes, gravestones. This must be The Graveyard in front of Bell School.

How did I come to be here? Must....try....to remember.

There was that knock at the door: That's the last thing that I remember. Seems like only moments ago but in fact almost a year has passed since then. I went to answer it in spite of my growing fear and trepidation. Then came the mask- the man in the mask if man it was.

That thing drew me out of the house with the pink door and into the street. I remember wandering down the street to my left, towards what my instincts assured me was the danger. I made it as far as Grünholz the Baker's shop. Then something told me to stop. Walk back in the other direction. No don't walk, run. RUN.

I ran for what seemed like an age but really only got as far as the next building past the house with the pink door. This was a building set back from the main street. It was a large old stone hall and in front of it was the haze which I walked through for days, maybe weeks till finally I reached the Graveyard.

This place is becoming familiar now. I know this place. I taught here. Yes, that is right. I'm starting to remember now that I am, or was, a teacher. But what is my name? If only I could remember my name. I'm sure it starts with a D or something like that. Perhaps I can look to the gravestones for clues. Perhaps my ancestors were buried here. Or perhaps I am buried here.