Oliver decided it was fear that he was experiencing. He had awoke from a disturbed nights sleep anxious and confused, uncertain as to quite why he felt that way. The day ahead of Oliver was potentially the start of the most exciting chapter in his life so far, turning the corner on years of unfulfilled potential. Today could open a door that would provide a way out from the chains of his medical work and neuroscience studies. Oliver looked at the ceiling and then across his walls, looking at pictures and posters as he tried to collect himself and his jumbled thoughts. He searched for meaning in his uneasy experience.
It wasn’t a dream he knew that but something dreamlike had happened during the night, possibly only a short while ago. He had experienced something, someone possibly and had been left with a message, or a feeling and it was important. `How psychotic is that?’ he thought. Oliver sat up in bed and pulled off his night shirt, stretched his arms and yawned loudly to try to exhale his odd senses. Message? In the future he would die at his own hands, what did that mean? Suicide? No, he would take his own life but would not be murdered. That’s just stupid he thought. And why was he sat there trying to make sense of this when it will have been a dream, as odd and as different as it felt. Today was a pressure day and an anxious night’s sleep would make dreams and thoughts more vivid and bizarre. So get up Oliver and get your arse into gear and get focused on the day, which he did.
In the shower Oliver let the hot spray pummel his head, soaking his hair and creating a constant stream of soapy water that ran off his face. He thought about the day ahead and his presentation, or pitch to the FTSE 100 Company. He still could not believe his idea formed at the V music festival last year, might be about to be backed by a squillion pound organisation. He had been at his most inspired during the summer break last year when Professor Blooms had threatened to throw him off the course. One year on and as a new summer approached Oliver believed his own personal investment of thousands of pounds on patent applications may well deliver him financial success and recognition. Rinsing himself off he switched off the shower and stepped out. He wrapped himself in the largest towel he had, which portrayed a giant green `Hulk’ face.
Oliver walked from his bathroom down the hall of his flat to the kitchen. He went to the fridge, poured an orange juice, sipped a little and then returned to his bedroom. As he walked he muttered to himself a range of opening lines for his presentation; `it is with great excitement’, I cannot thank you enough for the opportunity’, ` Together I believe’, `Good Afternoon’. On the last one Oliver stopped and looked up, one hand on the door handle to his room.
“They are all shit, I am going to crash and burn, no stop, no negative thoughts, stop, stop them, no, I won’t think like that, no,” Oliver looked ahead and then down, took a calming breath and entered his bedroom.
Oliver dropped his towel and went to a large set of wooden drawers, opened his drawer after three attempts (he really should fix that drawer he thought) and pulled out a pair of Billabong boxer shorts, which he put on. Oliver took two steps towards his walk-in-wardrobe door then stopped, suddenly feeling fearful once more. He looked around the walls of his room. Less than one half hour ago, when he had laid in bed with a nagging fear he had searched the walls, not looked around but searched. With increasing anxiety Oliver walked slowly to the door of his cupboard, he gripped the handle and opened the door. It wasn’t the darkened small room that Oliver looked at, eyes wide, heart racing. Pinned to the inside of the door with four coloured pins was a large sheet of paper. On the white piece of paper Oliver looked over its drawings, a diagram, a sketch of the human brain, arrows showing directions, indicating actions and many numbers, lines and formulae.
That paper and its contents were from last year and that fevered night before his public flogging the next morning at the end of term UCL lecture by Blooms. Now mostly forgotten by Oliver, suppressed even he would occasionally recall this ‘work’ with embarrassment. He felt none of the original excitement or passion he had held for some time before. But now this archive of wishful thinking and naive ambition held him gripped in fear. His fear upon waking was because of this, an old fanciful idea, prompted by his rising invention of today. In making progress with his latest big idea, he had forgotten this original biggest and most outlandish idea of all.
Somehow in the night he had recalled this original proposal as his mind swirled around the possibilities of the next day. On the cusp of real success he had revisited his primary creation. One for which he had suffered ridicule and scorn from his University. These stirring recollections were a trigger, disturbing something. That something was looking for him.
4.
Tempus Genesis Page 3