No Way Out by Mark David

The stairs were winding but no matter which direction I went, I kept ending up back where I started. Which was nowhere. I tried the elevator, but the result was the same. I started on the ninth floor and I always ended up there. There seemed to be no way out. I had had this dream for many years, but it was always the same dream, the same building, the same place.  But I woke up this day and realized it wasn't really a dream. It was also a reality.
The people there seemed to want to keep me there. They liked that I never went further. Never achieved the greater path. They did achieve the greater path and they liked that I didn't. They could maintain and use me there and know I would never leave. I could not leave. I didn't know the path to freedom from myself, not to that point anyway.
I always found my way there all right, but I have no idea how I got there. Almost as if I had arrived without making the journey. I was just there. When I looked around, I was always there. If only I could figure out how I got there, I might be able to figure out how to leave.  Or, at least how to return to the finish, which might have been the start.
It was always that way for me. Getting there is easy. Getting stuck in limbo is even easier. Leaving when it is complete and not returning to the same endless pit of limbo was much more difficult. Difficult is a relative term. Impossible seemed to be a better one. I could never find my way to the finish line.
Life was a bunch of promising starts with no finishes. Every road led back to the start, which was a promising yet pointless start because that is all it ever was.
The dream always went that way. So did the reality in life. If all my starts could add up to one great finish, then it would all be worth it. So far, it had been nothing but worthless.