Eat, sleep and think. Eating is as monotonous as any bodily function.

Sleeping is a welcomed escape from reality, or an intensified nightmare filled with large doses of hellish-reality. There is no compromise.

Then, there's thinking. That's one that can't be escaped. There's no door out. Trapped inside an unrelenting world of twin parallels... Heaven and Hell. Notation to self;  list Heaven first.

Heaven was a loving marriage. The national census of two-point-four children, a few token grandchildren, dreams of great-grandchildren, a three- bedroom house, a bordering white picket fence, rose bushes decorating the landscape, a flower garden eloquently displayed inside the backyard, a swing set, a barbecue grill that used to supply the basic ingredients for memorable times, a family dog and calico cat that completed Heaven. I mustn't forget about the parakeet, and aquarium full of brightly- colored fish-- which I've since concluded were watching us instead of us them. A predisposed misconception conceived by normal people. The type of normal person that I once was.

Hell is a nightmare in which one can't arouse from, no more than one could awaken from a comatose state. A torturing cycle of repetition, with evil resurfacing, haunting, biting at the essence of one's being. That's only the brevity of Hell.

Hell is not having physical freedom, not having choices. It's forced upon you unwillingly against your better judgment and will. It's shoved in your face, down your throat, making you swallow it whole in an attempt to choke you into submission. Minute by minute, second by second.

Hell has no escape. No exit. It forces you to live inside your head, within what little is left of your brain. Sane or insane, Hell isn't biased.

I'm really not sure what day it is anymore. They all run together like one never-ending cluster headache and there isn't any aspirin. But sadly, my Heaven is long-gone now. That's my personal dilemma. I own it. It's all that I do own now.

I've had sufficient time, thanks to Hell, to think about it. My family is gone, never to be again. My house is now boarded up, vacant and abandoned. I should have thought about that then. I didn't.

It was just a split moment. A brief moment of uncontrollable gripping madness, that swept over me unannounced-- no warning signs. It suddenly visited me from out of no where. I've never been able to understand it, no matter how long I've been trapped inside my head. It still has no rhythm or reason. Only feelings of despair and regret.

This is the Hell that I must live with. The infinitesimal of my existence. It's my personal Hell, my retribution for what I did to my family.

I can't escape my longings that throb eternally inside my head; Oh God, I wish they'd let me out of this straight-jacket, it's much too tight.

"No Choice But Hell" was a flash fiction contest entry story
based on the term "I don't know what day it is" and took first place.