The Gruelling Home Stretch
16 Nov 2016Kyla Emmerich
Previous logI spy with my little eye, something beginning with ‘N’. Can you guess what it is, Boomer? Nothing! Yep, a whole lot of nothing! Let’s see, I have… 150 light years to go! Close! But I find it very hard to feel excited. Or feel anything for that matter. I feel so numb.
Time has dragged on so slowly. I am rapidly losing my mind, and the “home stretch,” as they call it, is always the most gruelling and psychologically brutal part of the journey. Every lightyear feels like just that, a year. Okay, that is an exaggeration, but that's not the point.
The plus side is that I have had plenty of time to think about things, because that’s about all there is to do during jumps, though my mind is a scary place when I'm alone with it for so long.
It’s funny, because a couple of weeks before I left, someone told me that I am like the horse that can be lead to water, but can’t be made to drink it. Well, jokes on her! I skipped the water and buggered off instead.
Jokes on me actually… I’m out here, she’s back in the Bubble - probably not miserable like I am. Imagine if she knew what I was up to right now. She’d be laughing at me… Probably be telling me I am getting what I deserve.
Maybe I am. Maybe this is karma for all the shitty things I’ve done in life.
What’s that beeping? Oh… Right. About to exit the jump. So that leaves me with four more jumps. Four more long, boring, lonely jumps, with nothing but a toaster keeping me company.
Boomer, I’m not doing this right now. No, just stop it.
You bitch! How dare you! That was cruel. Fuck you! I don’t need to you to remind me of how much of a disappointment I was to Dad. I fucking know, alright? I know I wasn’t his perfect-little-angel, A+, graduated-from-university, dream child that he wanted me to be.
God damn it, Dad. Why couldn’t you just accept me for who I am? You fucking prick.
No, Boomer. I’m not talking to you right now. You’re a horrible toaster. You’ve upset me.
Well... I guess feeling upset is better than feeling nothing. Right? At least I can still feel something.
Jesus, I’m crying over something a toaster said to me. I have lost my mind. It’s official. I’m going to get to Amundsen Terminal and immediately be put into a padded cell. Yup. Kyla Emmerich’s legacy is going to end in a straight jacket and a room made of foam, all because I decided to run away from my problems for a while instead of facing them.
Do they even have padded cells this far out?