Backspace Cycle - Phobia

He awoke with a sharp jolt of throbbing pain flowing through his neck and trickling down his spine, causing his legs to tingle in protest as they awoke from prolonged pause. Face down on his expensive but worn keyboard, each key boasted a glowing blue underlight into the small apartment, illuminating each cracked wall with a nearly heroic sense of efficiency. It was out of place among the shoddy furniture and humble surroundings, but seemed to receive more attention than any other item in the home. The backspace key in particular was more soaked in blue gleam than any other key, for it was the key most tapped in gentle musings, most hammered in frustration, more than any of its kin. The thin coating of black paint that had once covered it had now completely decayed due to the excessive amount of attention it received from its user.

Even now, while he blinked in groggy, drooling semi-consciousness, his thumb was firmly pressed on backspace, a pale lump of flesh with its nervously chewed nail resting in the sea of extravagant blue light. Lifting his head ever so slightly, with eyes rimmed with smoky insomnia, he observed a setting sun. He squinted through the break in the thick floral curtains adorning the small window, which was his only view of the outside world other than pictures on the screen of his monitor. Had he really toyed with his sleep schedule and gotten so caught up in his documenting to the point that he was waking up when the sun was going down? After unleashing an exasperated sigh, he came to a simple revelation. Today, there wouldn't be much to record; glancing to the bottom right corner of his old, flickering bulky monitor, it was already past 6 P.M. A single blank document was opened in the center of the screen, neatly positioned between his most important programs. This was an untitled, unsaved document he could only assume his sleep-deprived self opened to be fresh and ready for today's entry.

Looking out the window reminded him of the rising sun's glare on his monitor nearly twelve hours earlier… oh, how sure he was that he didn't record what the sun looked like in yesterday's entry! He couldn't afford to miss a single detail of such an eventful day. He could simply use the rest of the day to improve yesterday's entry. Of course—he recalled yesterday quite clearly, still crisply burning in his mind, as he had spent the previous night mulling over the injustices and infuriating betrayal that was inflicted upon him. He would simply write a brief entry documenting his edits for today's entry before he went to sleep—that sounded like a sure plan. Leaning to a dusty desk lamp and flicking it on with a weak twist, pale yellow light invaded the blue territory and claimed victory. Revealed by the light were his clumped locks of blonde hair sticking out wildly around his ears and a rough, unshaven face. He hunched in his tattered computer chair with terribly lazy posture, resting his chin in his palm, but a spark of intense obsession lit up his eyes that made him look more alive and aware than his body language let on.

He had been doing this, brooding over documentations of his daily life, since he was nine years old. Nothing terrorized him more than the thought of losing one moment, one single shred of memory, to oblivion. He always remembered the first entry of his massive collection without having to go back and read it—back when he was just a nine-year-old still writing it in a spiral notebook. He remembered that one shakily-written crude sentence that throbbed painfully in his mind:

"I just noticed… I forgot what my mom looked like today."

He grit his teeth with barbaric force, his jaw joints squeaking painfully into his ear like tightened ropes about to burst. His mother died in a fire when he was very young, not even two years old, and all photographs of her had also been devoured by flame. She was a single parent and he had no idea who his father was or where he might be. Other than her, he had no family that he knew of. He relied on the memory of others in town to remind him of his mother, but it simply wasn't enough for him. Thus, he vowed: never again would he forget a single day. Never again would he forget anything. Forgetting was the most intense pain he had ever felt.

He clicked yesterday's entry with more force and exuberance than he needed. He smiled feebly, then scooped his head out of his hand in one swift invigorated moment. Reading over his memories, reminding himself while they were still fresh, and engraving them permanently into his mind… nothing was more fulfilling in the world. He reread one passage in particular over a dozen times in a row.

Rickar Spiral, Age 21, Day of Documentation 4380
Today, I woke up happy. But now, at the end of the day, I'm angrier than I've ever been. I thought Lenoire was my best friend and the only one I could rely on, but she is just like everyone else. Ever since grade school, she pretended to worry and care about me, but in actuality I am just an amusement to her. When she's bored with me, she doesn't answer her phone. When she finds something more important to do, she doesn't visit me anymore. I have exhausted all of my efforts to see if maybe there was something more to this relationship, but she is a terrible human being. I deserve someone more attentive.

I went to the emergency room today because I've been having severe migraines again, and I couldn't recall a full memory of last week's occurrences. I think I may be slipping. Is it a brain tumor, I wonder? The doctors greeted me coldly, as usual, because I had just been there last week, but the migraines haven't stopped. As I recall, clearly logged in Day of Documentation 4000 of last year, my medical history is forever plagued by the diagnosis of hypochondria. Just because I take extra precautions to protect my head from trauma and put forth an effort to catch any and all neurological abnormalities in their early stages, my record has been stained forever by this horrible label. I refuse to wait until my future brain cancer is stage 4 before being diagnosed—is that so unreasonable? Am I now doomed to die before being diagnosed, simply because I am more careful than the average person? Simply because I value my memories?!

I digress. This is an official documentation of my life, but it's turning into an emotional rant.

Lenoire couldn't confirm my reference to last month's dining out; I was sure that she ate grilled salmon, but she didn't remember… she didn't see the significance of remembering that detail… and this put me at great unease. I checked the Day of Documentation, but it seems that instead of focusing on the details, I focused on my petty feelings for her. I focused on her appearance, with her brunette curls and lovely blue eyes; her green and black dress, the one with the ribbons and the frills that I speak so fondly of throughout my documenting. Alas, she only went with me because she pities me… she doesn't really care about me. I found that out today.

I called her to vouch for me at the emergency room. I desperately needed her help. Usually, when one person with a cleaner medical history says that someone else is sick, they start to follow their ridiculously ignored codes and ethics and start to treat symptoms… they start to do their job. Lenoire answered her phone—she actually answered her phone—but she refused to tell the doctors anything. Her voice was weak. She said I had a problem, that I needed help, and that it wasn't a physical problem but a psychological one. I actually snapped my cellphone in half instead of hanging up. I was in so much pain… ignoring it only irritated the undiagnosed wound.

One doctor, thinking he was a sly and clever man, had offered me a placebo after I had been pacing in the emergency room for about an hour after snapping my phone. I know they were sugar pills. I could see it in his conceited eye that he didn't believe my pain. He didn't want to believe my pain because of the unwarranted blemish on my record. I took the bottle and left, only to realize that I was missing my notes I had taken earlier in the day, to use in this entry… I saw papers of the same size fluttering around in the traffic outside the hospital and I just knew that those were my memory fragments. Those were my memory fragments that would be lost forever if I could not retrieve them…
I began running toward them before I heard Lenoire's voice. She was waiting in the parking lot for me, to capture me and put me in some sort of crazy person prison. She ran toward me, and I didn't want her to injure herself chasing after me, so I stopped and waited. She was so frantic, her eyes wide with tears and her mouth agape. When she finally reached me, she apologized and attempted to lure me back into the hospital. Pff! Like I would fall for that! She is one of them now—one of the people after me, one of the people that don't know that memories need to be recorded and preserved. She would be one of those people that are going to be forgotten, that no one will care about because no one would remember—but I remember her. She will always exist, thanks to me. It's a shame, because I really liked her. Thanks to her, though, I lost my notes. I think I'll go looking for them later this week in the ditch alongside the road. I hope it doesn't rain.

But now I'm hiding out in this apartment, hoping that she won't come here. I know she will, but I hope she won't.

EDIT: I already miss Lenoire. I won't deny it.
EDIT 2: The sun was a lovely shade of pink and orange. It reminded me of Lenoire's favorite coat, the one with the warped buttons because they melted in the dryer.

He grinned, the only sounds being the hum of his computer and the click of his monitor struggling to keep up. He had been rereading it and revising grammar for hours now. It wasn't the most fantastic entry he had ever made, but it was an exceptional summary of the day. His silent grinning was short-lived, however, soon interrupted by a frantic pounding at his door. With the sound of sobs and heavy blows exploding in the air, a voice tattered with misery screamed, "Rickar! Rickar! It's been an entire week. Have you eaten? You have to let me in! You have to!"

Oh no, it was Lenoire. What happened to her sense of time? It was only yesterday that he had entirely lost faith in her. He saw no need to reply to her absurd comments; she was probably just trying to get into his head, to try to convince him to seek mental help again. It wasn't going to work, at least not this time. He frowned profusely and tried his best to sound fierce, strong, and set in his ways. "I still haven't forgiven you. Go away, Lenoire… Come back some other time..." his voice still cracked. Darn it.

He heard muffled arguing a short distance away from his door; it sounded like the firm voice that distinguished a police officer from everyone else. He stood up, straining to hear. "M'am, we can't just break in there. Unless he says that he's in distress and needs help, we can't do anything. Unless he's a threat to himself or others…" Lenoire bawled and Rickar cringed; it still hurt him for her to be distressed like that.

"Come back tomorrow…" Rickar mumbled through the door, "I'll talk to you tomorrow. Just leave, please…" Lenoire protested, and he could've sworn he heard her say the words 'not again,' but she was led away by the police officer that accompanied her. Rickar disliked the police—they were like doctors without a medical degree. However, he was thankful for this one in particular for leading Lenoire off.

Slightly unnerved, Rickar stumbled back into his shoddy computer chair and opened a new file. He fumed, typing about Lenoire's outburst and working on the entry well into morning. Pouring his heart out into his typing, he checked the surge protector and the attached generator that would start in case of a power outage. He would just save the file compulsively after each sentence, but it was his policy not to save until he was completely done with an entry. He did not tolerate anything but a full recollection because half-recollections were what caused him pain. The sun was peeking at him through the slit in-between the curtains and he couldn't stay awake any longer. Gradually, he drifted, feeling his chin pulled with gentle force down toward his desk. He fell asleep again in his traditional position on the backspace key, continuing the loop of amnesia for the amnesiaphobe.