There's only so much you can do before the beast eats you alive.
You can push it away, cover it with a blanket, and lock it in a dark room.
Its growling penetrates its prison, and you can hear it as if it were in the same room as you.

Yet, you put headphones on and make your eardrums bleed.
You shovel food into your mouth and drown everything out.
You let the sunlight in and you move further away from the noise,
but the beast is scratching now.

You press the music into your ears as everything begins to collapse.
The floor beneath your feet rumbles
and you feel the biting cold of winter's wind in your bones.
Your jaw aches from the tension that spreads to your head, and you still say,
"Everything will be alright."

When the beast breaks free, time moves quickly.
There is destruction in your path, holes in walls, bruised knuckles, and bleeding wounds.
You scramble to clean the blood from your arms and you think,
you wonder, if it all could have been avoided.
How to better contain the beast?

But the beast is relentless.
It exists for when the storm finally comes.
The rain signals its approach, but soon, there is thunder.
And eventually, lightning.
And the beast is hungry for pain.
For destruction.
It has no peace, and it searches for meaning.

The beast licks its wounds before it goes into hibernation.
And you are left to sit in the freezing cold as everything goes black.
Nothing exists but time and you,
and here, time isn't linear.
Time is long ago and it is before, and it is then.
If you close your eyes, you can feel the sun on your face.
You can feel your body grow younger.

You hug yourself and pull the hood over your head,
and you think, while in that void,
"This is fine. Life is good here."
"Here, I'll never have to leave."
"I was never meant to leave."