Tunnel Vision

I close the door to my work and trot across the parking lot, the full moon shinning down on me.  I check my chrono, five minutes to midnight. I arrive at my bike, an elegant black body with violet highlights. Putting on my helmet I climb on and start it up. Revving once I am gone, speeding onto the highway. I travel for a little while, at a cruse. Lazily passing the other vehicles on the road. It's at about five minutes later things change. The tunnel, every night, I hit it at twelve o' clock midnight. It's a one way, one lane road the goes through a mountain. My home lies on the other side. I pass through the threshold and notch up the speed. The tunnel closes around me, leaving me in darkness.

I travel for a short distance in the darkness before my lights kick in. Just in time for me to weave around a slow small red car. A narrow dodge, an every day occurrence for me. I keep turning the speed up, speeding past more and more. The objects seem to fill the tunnel, like one of those old arcade games. With each pass I go faster. The tunnel is restricting, hard for me to change patterns and take a new path. My actions bolder and faster, I bob and weave through the tunnel. Hoping to get home early. I wanted out. I couldn't move. Couldn't breath. Couldn't think. Faster, I think to myself. I have to go faster.

All faster can ever hold for me is more danger. The sharp turns and winding pathways soon start. Before long, I am stuck navigating a maze at high speed, still dodging obstacles. Some time in, a split off to the side, leading up. I take it, and enter the cool night time air. A stretch of clear road. Respite and rest for the tired. I cruse this strip for a few, before I am inevitably drawn back in again. The tunnel once more closes around me and the same sense of terror grips me as it has so many times before. Faster, faster. I have to get out.

Now driving at break neck speeds, I hit a dead end. I will have to grind the wall to make it around, and there is no stopping. With only miliseconds to choose, I choose survival. The bike hits the wall and car. The grinding is insufferable. My pants legs tear apart and my helmet jostles on my head, but I make it through. One close call, of many in this tunnel. Many I have survived, but only by barely. As soon as it had begun, it is over.

I burst through the exit and high speed it home. I make it home just in time. The woman I love, leaving for her duties, before I can even attempt to closer. Always just out of reach, unable to obtain what I need to live. I begrudgingly drive in and sleep. I head inside and make myself food, and then sleep. Morning comes, and I return to my bike, and ride the tunnel to work. Like I do every day of my life.