Flash: Avital Gad-Cykman
Insomnia
After the fight with Mom that took place on the first of October 1999 and flamed during three days until Dad confessed that he did hate family vacations and it wasn’t just the fruit of Mom’s imagination as he had claimed earlier, he woke up at three o’clock in the morning and hasn’t been able to sleep ever since.
On the second year of his insomnia he rode his car right into a ditch and crawled out through the broken window into the mud and the dusk.
The police officer who found him thought he was dead, while he was simply trying to sleep.
The accident provoked a lilt in his step, but otherwise, he’s been well, only exhausted. He gave up work, too tired for a high-level management and too proud for a low-level one and started reading about monks who achieved control over time, and technology that allows the same thing.
Mom and the children are too busy to accompany the studies. Mom sells home-made cakes and the children distribute milk products to grant him his daydream and get him a racecar to ride so fast the days will become shorter and the nights will grow longer, a better opportunity for sleep.
As a matter of habit, nobody makes a peep at home, but if a spoon falls or a child runs around, Dad inquires, “What on earth is going on here?”
They don’t call him for dinner anymore. He takes his meals on his own when he’s hungry.
Since the time alone has made him lonesome, he shares his solitude on the Internet. Nobody else in the family knows who is awake in the world.
Every morning Mom asks him, “Are we less lonely yet?”