To be most comfortable, I need to be surrounded on all sides but one. It doesn’t matter what side it is that is missing. It can be above me, to my left, to my right, or right in front of me, but I must be surrounded.

My bed is shoved in the corner opposite my staircase and boxed in by my ancient dresser. These three walls are the walls that hold in my dreams. The postcards on the slanted wall above my head are tokens from road trips and bookstores: placed in chaos so when my dreams escape from my body, they get trapped in the maze. Pictures of my family stand protective to my right. My bed is my vulnerability. What I surround myself with is my protection.

Five blankets. Every night. Lavender Fleece. Blue Comforter. Pink Fleece. Purple Fleece. Multicolored Fleece. The order is important because the order knows me. And what knows you best is supposed to protect you. The stuffed horse I sleep on was a gift from a babysitter that had to sell her real horse. She cried when she handed it away. I keep her safe underneath my head so she won’t be handed off again.

The dip in the bed cups my body as I move from one uncomfortable position to the next until I finally rest on my right side. I always land on my right, facing the pictures of my family and my semester, and the postcards in my peripheral.

Lying on my right side I can hear the fan better. White noise has always held my hand through sleep. If I could have one thing to make my bed better, it would be a tin roof, so when rain fell I could forget about my fan. I could forget about the electricity running through night in night out wasting away energy that could go someplace more precious than my bed.

But my bed is my sanctuary; it is where my mind runs free. Free from the constrictions of paranoia and free from my constant overanalyzing. My bed hugs me and tells me that I am allowed to think, that my thoughts will not be penetrated and that what I do think is for me to hear alone. One does not take for granted trusting their own mind when one is in a constant battle between not giving a f*** and not wanting to be manipulated.

My bed is where I am able to be the purist form of me. The layers of fleece sink into my skin and remind me when I was seven and my paranoia used to come in the form of an eye. How silly. This will seem silly in due time.