Alright, so a few of you may remember "The Downside." I re-opened that project, changed a few words, changed the focus, changed the name, and finished it. I'd recommend you all read it, I had a lot of fun writing this one.
~
Solitary
June 1, 2007
If I’m going to be here a while, I may as well write to pass the time. I guess when I get out of here I can save this for my memoirs or something. It’s not like they’ve offered me any other way to pass the time in here. Let’s start with the cell. It’s a dingy off-white eggshell sort of color. The walls on three sides are concrete, while the fourth side is wood-paneled with a door. The whole thing is white-washed that same color. The cell itself is about eight by ten I’d imagine. On the back wall, there is a protrusion of concrete about two feet long that I’m currently using as a seat. When I was thrown in here, I found a stack of lined paper and a pen, which I’m now making use of. Well, that about does it for the cell…
I guess I’ll describe the objects I have with me now. I still have my wallet. It’s brown and was a gift from my late father about twenty years ago. I have sixty dollars, two credit cards, a library card, and my driver’s license. I still have my watch. It’s a nice silver color. Not real silver, I’m too poor for something like that. Just a nice silver-colored watch I picked up at a pawn shop for twenty dollars. I have my cell phone, which gets no reception at all in my box here. I have a couple of pictures on the cell phone. One of my new apartment, one of my cat, I hope they don’t keep me here too long; my cat will need food tomorrow. Oh, the pictures, I have a picture of an old man from a gas-station. I thought he looked kind of funny. I have a few pictures from the concert I went to a month ago. I got some nice ones with the band. I recently came into possession of one pen, black. It’s a cheap thing, one you’d probably pass by when offered for free at a convention. It’s free of any logo or marking of any kind. The ink is black, but the plastic is clear. I can watch my words bleed from the pen on to the paper, and constantly see the ink drain out. It has no cap. At the same time, I came to possess a stack of paper. It’s white lined paper, eight by eleven. There’s a good couple hundred sheets of it here. I’m not sure why these were left here, but I’ll make use of what I’m given. I’m a writer in a new town; this is what I’d be doing if I was home too.
I’m still waiting for someone to tell me what’s going on. It’s strange I could be put in here without any information on what I’m being held for. Miranda rights, yada yada. I think that’s what they’re called. I’m going to recount the night’s events the best I can. Maybe I can sue if they hold me here much longer.
So I had been moving my stuff into the new apartment all afternoon. Why did I move? That’s a hard question to answer. I mean, I never felt right where I was before. I don’t know if anybody else ever feels this way, but I’ll try to describe it. It was like my whole life had been planned out for me, and that if I stayed in Stafford, nothing could ever change. I had my whole life ahead of me, and it was a fair enough life. The problem was that I could see everything there was down the road. I had a few friends, a girl, a nice house, I had it alright, the problem was that there were no surprises ahead.
This is going to seem a little weird to whoever reads it, because I’m sure there’s tons of people who would have killed to be in my position. The first time I had the urge to leave was a few months back. Sandra, she was my girlfriend of a year, had asked me over for dinner. I was sitting across the table from her and we were talking about something, who knows what it was. I was playing with my mashed potatoes. I create art wherever I can. That’s a fancy way of saying “I play with my mashed potatoes, so what?” I looked up at something she said, and our eyes met. In that moment, I could see our life together, laid out like the plot of some dime romance novel. I saw myself asking her to marry me a few months later, and her tearfully accepting. I saw our first child, I saw that child’s graduation, I saw us grow old together, and finally, I saw her die. It felt like an eternity. It was like one of those near death experiences people describe, where you see your whole life flash before your eyes, but none of it had happened yet. Those were just the highlights, let me tell you. I also saw in her eyes the crippling minutia of life. I saw myself working a nine to five job eating the same god-damn breakfast of toasted buttered wheat bread and coffee every day, and giving my beautiful wife the same god-damn kiss on the cheek before leaving. In that moment, I saw that I was trapped. The life I led could only lead one way. I knew I had to get out.
I really got off on a tangent there, I didn’t mean to write all that out. I’ll strike it from the final copy I guess, it’s a little deeper then I really wanted to go. Anyway, I had been moving the stuff into my apartment from the storage place I had rented a few weeks prior. This affair had taken a few hours, and I was finished. It was late evening. I drove to the bridge entering town to do what I had come here to do. I pulled over my new car and walked to the middle of the bridge carrying the suitcase I had packed for the occasion. There was a small sidewalk on the side for pedestrians. I got to the very middle, and sat down. I opened up the case and tossed away my old life, one piece at a time. I threw away my old birth certificate. I threw away my old keys. I threw away my last family photo. I had changed my name, changed my address, changed my cell number, and left without telling anyone. It had taken a while to plan, but it was worth it. Finally, I took out the last item. It was a love letter Sandra had written to me when I went on my trip to Europe a few months back. Totally impractical, since I had my cell phone with me, but I remembered how touching it was. There’s something in letters that cannot be captured by spoken word. When someone has taken the time to plan their words, and has scrawled them beautifully in endless graceful etchings across a bright, red and white canvas, the picture is just that much more beautiful then a voice can ever be. Words capture life more brilliantly then it can be captured through even a photograph. Words capture emotion. All the same, I didn’t feel a thing as I watched it tumble into the drink. That was the world I had left behind.
I got back into my car. I had sat out there for a lot longer then I had planned, it was about ten at night. I was driving down I-55 when I saw the red and blue flashing lights behind me. I cursed silently and checked my speedometer. I was going five beneath the speed limit, I was pretty sure I wasn’t swerving. I pulled over, procured my registration and waited.
I hear someone coming. The hall echoes footsteps, and it sounds like there are a million men outside coming this way. I hope I don’t have to come back and finish this.
--
June 2, 2007
Well, I’m back. That didn’t explain much. I guess I’ll pick up where I left off and get to what happened a minute ago when I finish everything else.
So I was waiting in my car for the cop. I turned off my music, kept my seat belt on, and waited. It felt like this waiting lasted a lifetime. I stared at my dashboard and became immensely fascinated by how black it was. My whole car was black. The back lighting on the dash was a pale green against the darkness. I drummed my fingers on the wheel. 1234123412341234. I looked in my rear-view mirror. There was a man approaching. It was like he was approaching in slow motion. His stride seemed to last forever. More drumming. 123412341234. I felt like looking at my watch, but that seemed absurd. Suddenly, as he was approaching, I drowned. I’ve been a hydrophobe all of my life. I’ve never been able to swim. I’ve showered as long as I can remember, because bath tubs give me the shivers when full. In an instant, I drowned. This wasn’t on water, however, I drowned on the whole world. I’ve had more than one dream about drowning, but none of them were quite as frightening as this.
My head jolted back and the atmosphere rushed in. I felt the world was collapsing, only instead of falling down; it was falling into my mouth. Before my eyes, my whole perception collapsed into my mouth. I saw the dashboard rush towards me, and I tasted it in an instant. I felt the open road hit the back of my throat. I felt the bulge in my throat as I swallowed the world, felt the burn of the sun smashing to the back of my throat, and felt the ocean steam as it met with the fire in my belly. All the while, I watched reality fold in front of me. My eyes no longer provided me with information I could use to determine what was going on. It was as though my sight itself had become liquid, and I was watching the ocean of vision drown me. Then, I felt cold, unimaginably cold. I was all that was left.
Then I jolted forward and felt my hands grab hold of the wheel.
I looked up and saw the cop in the mirror, nearing my car.
I never got to see his eyes. He was white, probably in his thirties. His name tag said “Ducaine.” His light nearly blinded me. As off put as I was by my hallucination of swallowing the world, I choked through a conversation with him. Seemed like a normal happening. He asked me if I knew what I had done wrong. I told him I had no idea. He told me I should come with him. I complied, I’m new in this town and the last thing I need is trouble. I figured it would clear itself up in the end, since I hadn’t done anything wrong. I got into the car, and we drove in silence. I tried to talk to him, but I didn’t get a response. We arrived at a non-descript building I guess must be the police station. He led me quietly to the cell I sit in now, and told me to wait until I was needed. I noticed the pen and paper, and so I started writing.
So I was led into a room down the hall from here. The walls are the same dingy white color of the cell. The door at the end of the hallway is white too. The room inside, however, is black. The floor is black, the walls are black, I couldn’t see the ceiling, but it was probably also black. There was a light in the middle that shined a pale yellow light into a small circle in the middle of the room. In this middle, there sat a stool. Ducaine told me to sit on the stool.
I didn’t want to walk forward. The blackness in front of me threatened to swallow me. I stepped forward. I could swear the darkness smiled at me. A subtle trick of the shadows, but without shadows. A billowing black snake on a bare black background shifted, slithered, slightly and I thought I saw the slightly slithering sliver seem to shake into an “S” and then into a slightly hooked sour smile. Then the floor disappeared. I write disappeared because I am fairly sure it existed in the first place. Either way, I could feel myself falling. Or was it rising? It’s strange how the extremes merge. I was either falling or rising. This wouldn’t have bothered me so much if it hadn’t been for the dark. The impenetrable dark. Shifting, swirling, writhing, choking, smiling. As ridiculous as it sounds, the darkness was alive. I was watching a world behind a world waking up. Again, the eyes could not tell me this. All they saw was black. I could feel it.
Then I took another step.
And then another.
I sat down and waited for a long time. Finally, I heard his voice over the speaker. He asked me some questions, name, date of birth, marital status, survey questions. I answered them all, and eventually he stopped talking. I heard him murmur “I guess he’s of no use to us right now.”
Ducaine led me back to my cell and told me again to wait. I sat down and grabbed my pen to put my experiences in ink. I’ve been writing for a while. I should try to sleep, but I don’t think I could do it here. The only thing for me here is the paper and the pen.
The second time I felt it was looking at my father a few days later. I guess I should put this after the section about my vision of Sandra. If I keep the section about Sandra. Should I keep the section about Sandra? Oh well, a job for the editors, not for me. I was walking with my father through his church. My father had been a pastor since long before I was born. He had a booming voice and a potbelly. The second service had just ended and I was taking him out to lunch. I took his hand, and that’s when I heard it. I heard everything my father had ever said about me. All at once. His voice resounded a million times in my head, yet it was only once. I heard everything. But I could pick them apart. I heard it all, but I heard each one. I heard him praising me, I heard him chiding me, I heard his excitement at my graduation, I heard his disappointment when I had wrecked my first car. These were the things that I had heard before. There were other things. I heard the first words my father had ever spoken about me. They were: “Oh hell, the condom broke.” I heard the things he said when I wasn’t around. I heard how he was secretly angry at me for not wanting to take his pulpit, how he couldn’t stand my arrogance and lack of faith, how he thought my writing was terrible and that I needed to get my life on track. In retrospect, it wasn’t that bad. At the moment, it was devastating. I let go of my father’s hand and flailed my head from one side to the other looking for the source of the voices, knowing I’d see nothing but my father to my immediate right. He asked me if there was anything wrong. I told him: everything.
I can’t help but stare at the letter Y in that everything. I’ve always loved the letter Y. A letter that contains in itself a question. A fork in the road. Two rivers converging. A wine glass. Y. Why. Y am I here.
It’s odd, but I think this may be a different cell from the one that I was in before. This cell is a different color. It’s still off-white, but it’s darker, like a gray. And that makes the room seem smaller. Maybe it is smaller. I can’t tell. I hear steps. Time to put the pen down again.
--
I’m sure this isn’t an actual police station. If my treatment up to this point hadn’t given it away, I think that last meeting did. When the door opened, Ducaine was waiting with two other men. They were both much taller then I. Ducaine thanked me for my cooperation and led me into the black room again. No falling this time. I made it to my seat. This time, Ducaine and the men came with me.
The light shone down on me from above. It seemed much hotter this time than the last. I wanted to melt. Suddenly, I did melt. I felt my hair begin to stick to my head, and then I felt the sliding begin. The sliding was the worst. It wasn’t so much painful in the physical sense as it was unfathomable to the mind. I was melting. As my eyebrows dripped bit by bit to the floor, I wondered what would happen when my brain melted, if I would continue to feel anything. Well, when it started, I certainly did feel something. The nervous center isn’t located anywhere near the top of your head. I felt my head melt down. When the contents of my mind began to spill to the ground it did feel painful. I could see most of it. My eyes appeared impervious to this gruesome death. The odd thing (if my head melting was discounted from being “odd”) was that I never saw my mind drip, I saw memories. I saw fleeting images that I held close to me fall with a splash. I watched as my first kiss from sixth grade splattered on my shoes, and I watched the river of my first drinking binge flow down my arm. I think I was screaming. I have no idea.
Then I looked up and realized I was fine. Ducaine and the goons were standing directly in front of me. Ducaine spoke quietly to me.
“First question. Can you die?”
That’s not exactly what I had been expecting.
“Yes, I think so.”
The blows came fast. The two men walked to either side and began to rain them down on me. I think I tried to dodge the first one only to slam into the second. I felt the crack of a knuckle against my cheek bone. The pain arched through my face like the roots of some great tree, twisting and weaving through the soil of my skin. I had heard stories that when getting beaten up, eventually you just stop feeling it. They aren’t true. Anyone who says this has never truly had the life beaten out of them. I felt every punch in it’s fullness. There were thirty two in total. I’m certain I felt my bones crack and snap. Over and over again, the tree planted itself in my face, and was uprooted. Yggdrasil. Then it all stopped. They stopped hitting me, I stopped trying to stand, everything stopped. I should have fallen, but I stopped. I was horizontal in mid-air on an angle. I should have been falling flat on my face. I looked up, and the two men had stopped too. Ducaine, however, was smiling at me.
“Don’t lie next time.”
Then everything started again. I started falling. The men kicked me a few times for good measure, and then dragged me back to my room. I curled up on the slab and waited for the pain to lessen. It did fairly quickly. What didn’t lessen was the bleeding. I wasn’t sure why I was bleeding. I don’t think I had been bleeding while I was in the room. It was coming from a cut above my eye and from a gash in my right arm. This wasn’t slight bleeding either; it was a river of scarlet.
I was instantly reminded of my experience in melting, but this was different. It dripped from my brow to the floor. It flowed from forearm to concrete. The blood gathered in the crevices and cracks of my prison. Everything it touched turned to scarlet. My blood was running, running, running to where? There was a puddle at my feet. I noticed a hole had opened at the end of either pointer finger, and both were now bleeding. I was like some morbid fountain with a steady stream of red wine issuing forth from my being. There was a few inches on the floor now. I moved up on to the slab, taking my feet off the ground. This was a mistake. I felt my feet scrape the concrete, and they too started releasing the red hot mercury. The small lake was growing, and had nearly overtaken my stone island, which stood at least two feet off the floor. I felt the drip begin from my ears. I felt the canals and waterways of my body flow with the water of life until it joined the ocean of my cell. The blood was rising. I could no longer see from my left eye, there was too much blood dripping from the brow. It had reached my waist now. I wished for it not to get higher. I could not swim.
It got higher. It continued to rise faster and faster. I tried to swim. I tried as best I could to recall everything my parents had ever told me about how to stay afloat. None of it worked. More wounds opened and more blood spilled. I felt the blood overtake my head. I closed my eyes tightly and clamped my mouth shut. I had a minute’s worth of air. It lasted less than twenty seconds. I could hold no longer. I tried to gasp for air but was met only with the red plasma that had once fueled my being. I was drowning.
Then I woke up. Curled up on the slab. I didn’t even ache from the beating. My cell phone had died, and my watch no longer worked. I don’t think it was waterproof. I took up my pen and I started writing, which brings me to the present. I’m not going to lie to a stack of paper, I’m scared witless. This being said, I’m going to try to sleep.
I have no idea if I slept or not. I cannot tell the time anymore. I don’t even know Y I’m writing this anymore. I won’t ever get out of this box. This prison will contain me for the rest of my time breathing. This misery aside, it’s getting smaller. I’m sure now. I can almost see it. It’s like watching the hour-hand on a giant clock. It’s small motion. Impossible to see. Imperceptible. But it’s there. Even if I cannot see it, I feel it. It closes in on me. I know it. Looking back through this manuscript, this cell used to be white. I don’t remember it ever being white. It’s scarlet. I think it’s always been scarlet. I don’t know anymore. All I know now is that I’m frightened. I’m trapped in a box. I have nothing. Nothing but this. These sheets of paper are my letter to the world that the world will never read. If you read this, whoever you are, remember me. Remember me because nobody else ever will. That looks so clich?. So ridiculous. I’m losing it now. It’s ironic. I fled from a life because I feared normality, and now that which I fear is nothing any man can claim to have seen but I. And they’re coming. Oh god, they’re coming. I can’t do this again. The feet echo. A million men march to greet me though I know only three will be there.
--
I want to die. I pray to die. I’ve never been religious in my life. I’ve scorned god and the sheep who call themselves his followers. I ask any being who can hear me to end me. Please. End me. The torments I have seen and felt are simply too much for me. Ducaine was alone this time. He took me to a different room. The hallway seemed longer then ever. The new room was made entirely of a rusted metal I couldn’t identify. There was a seat, and an ax. I sat down. Ducaine strode back to the door seeing me sit down, and mentioned my visitors would be arriving any time now. I sat, wondering exactly who could possibly visit me in this place. Suddenly, I heard breathing behind me.
Slow
Rapid
Shallow
Then I turned. Upon turning, I saw myself, and saw myself seeing myself. It was as though a mirror had been placed directly behind me, and the world reflected had become an equal part of reality to my own. I leapt up, both of me, and we, or should I say I, stared at me. What did I do then? What did we do? What would you have done? I attacked. We attacked. I attacked. I don’t know who struck first, me or me, but the battle was brutal. I sliced then I diced then he who was I bashed with the handle of his axe while I who was me attempted to claw out my eyes. In the end, I succeeded at knocking myself so hard I could no longer get up. I lied on the ground watching myself. Victorious, I took my place back in the chair. I looked at myself in the chair, and I looked at myself on the ground. There was no separation, I simply was. I don’t know which one I was or if I wasn’t the one that wasn’t I or if I was simply both. What came next was much worse for both of us. Or me. Or whatever.
When the door opened again we both moved our heads. I saw from two different perspectives as my mother, my father, and Sandra entered the room. At this point, I experienced two most distinguished viewpoints. From one, I watched myself murder my family with an ax. From the other, I watched myself lie helplessly on the floor as my family was murdered with an ax. This wasn’t an illusion. I saw it. With my own four eyes. I watched them bleed. I saw the looks of disbelief. The looks of terror. Then Ducaine came and guided me back to my cell, and I started writing. I want to die. I tried to kill myself, but I don’t have the will for it. I’ve always used the pen to put my life on paper, not to spill it on the floor. I can’t do it. I’ll be stuck here. Forever. I’ll never escape. And here they come again. The sounds. The echoes. I can feel the urge to vomit rising. Suddenly, I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. They’ll kill me eventually. This will all eventually end. It doesn’t matter what I must endure, eventually it will come to an end.
--
And I’m alive. Somehow. For some reason. I’m alive. Ducaine and the others took me back out of my cell. We walked down the hallway, and time repeated. We strode down the halls, left, right, left, right—but then it happened again. We strode down the halls, left, right, left, right—but then it happened again. We strode down the halls, left, right, left, right—but then it happened again. Just like that. A loop. Each time, exactly the same. This sound echoing in the exact same manner. It looped for an eternity. I could feel myself age, yet I did not age. I wanted to do something different. To break step, to turn differently, to say something, but I could not. It was not possible. On the seven-hundredth repetition, I counted them, Ducaine stopped, and smiled. Then, time continued.
We made it back to that room. I sat down in the same place I had before. In an instant, the men pulled me upwards and placed me on a table. The room lit up and I could see the ceiling. I liked it better as a dark unknown. The ceiling was a giant screen projecting the smiling visage of my captor. I could see the sweat on Ducaine’s brow in high definition.
Before he could speak; however, I ate him. I ate him and everything else. It was just as the time I had drowned on reality, but so much slower. I watched, as piece by piece, the world was shucked like a corn cob and thrust into my unwilling mouth. Behind the world I was confronted again by a black curtain of nothing, writhing and snakelike as ever. When the world had been eaten, I began to be eaten myself. I saw my hands peel away and had the odd impression of feeling the back of my throat as I swallowed my fingers. I felt my eyes peel away, and watched as I traveled down my digestive system, fully conscious of my continued eating, and far away, as my fingers sizzled in the soup of stomach acids. As I felt my eyes begin to dissolve, it all disappeared, and I was once again looking at the smiling face of Ducaine.
“Now, let me show you what you are made of.”
I suddenly realized I had lost my shirt. My bare chest was moving up and down as I breathed rhythmically in the chilly room. One of the men approached and with a silver sliver of a shining scalpel drew a slat of my skin to the side. I heard a scream, and realized it was my own. I stared as the blood began to flow once more. If I was to drown again, I prayed I would actually die this time. This time, something different happened. I bled and bled until there was no more in my body to bleed. Once I had dried, they came out. Small squiggles of darkness in the shape of snakes, insects, and arachnids. As they emerged, they began to eat me. I felt as the world must have felt when I ate it. Devoured, piece by piece. Each tiny morsel of my being sustaining a being that should not be. Every fiber of my soul lost to fuel an engine of darkness. But then, as the last darkness emerged, something changed. A light shone forth from my chest. A beam as bright as the sun. The dark beings shivered and shattered. My blood returned to my body, and Ducaine stopped smiling.
“Can you die?”
I shook my head.
“Good.”
At that they took me back to my cell. I am no longer afraid, because I know something they don’t. They may know that I can not die, but they do not know that I am God. I discovered it as I returned to my cell. I prayed, and prayed, and cried for who knows how long, and then I understood. The only one to hear my prayers was myself. The only person who can perceive the prison I am trapped in is myself. I am God. I am the master. They don’t know it yet, but they will. I will be free. I will kill them all. I will make them pay. Right now, I know it to be true. I warp the walls around me. My room expands and contracts at my will. I will kill them, and all who have seen my weakness, and then I shall lord over the world as I should. I will kill you too. If you’re reading this, I can see you. I have been able to see you since you read the first word. I will still be watching as you read the last word. As you put down the last sheet of paper, you will put aside my words as a writers delusional rambling, but know that it is not. I will kill you. The deaths that I have endured here are nothing compared to the torments I can put you through. I won’t do it immediately. I won’t do it today. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe a week from now. When you’ve put this whole story out of your mind. When you feel safe. That’s when I will take everything from you. I recommend you pray. Look away from this and pray. Pray that you forget. Pray that I don’t see you.
But I do.
With my new found powers, I have dressed up my cell a bit. I now have a bed, a mirror, and a wardrobe. Looking in the mirror, I don’t know how I’ve ever endured this mortal shell. I look as I always have, but so much more feeble. So much more weak. The eyes are different too. I remember in my life before this I had blue eyes. They now shine a bright yellow. Even when I turn out the lights, I can see them. They match the color of the walls. The bright yellow eyes in the darkness. I almost scare myself.
It all makes sense now. My departure from the world, my hallucinations, they all make sense. I was not meant to toil with the wretches of this world. The world bends itself to me. If I am thirsty, I shall expend the world to quench my thirst. If I am hungry, I will eat existence to sate my hunger. Once I am free I will wreck this world with my fury. All will shudder as they feel the earth quake beneath their feet. A God has awakened, and he is furious beyond imagination.
Here they come again. Those fools. They know not what they have awakened.
--
Wrong
Afraid
Wrong
Wrong again
Sandra?
Still Afraid
I’m still here and I was wrong
Why am I here
Y am I here
Wrong
Afraid
End
But not the end
Yet
When
Why
Bother
Skipping
Lines
Or
Spacing
Anymoreit’snotlikeanyonewillreadthisanywayI’monlywritingtoholdontoasmallpieceofwhatIambeforeIamlostforevertothedarknessofinsanityifIcankeepwritingIcankeeplivingIcanfeelthesnakescomebehindmetoconsumemeonceandforallandtomakemattersworseitlooksnowlikemypenmayberunningoutofin-
~
Solitary
June 1, 2007
If I’m going to be here a while, I may as well write to pass the time. I guess when I get out of here I can save this for my memoirs or something. It’s not like they’ve offered me any other way to pass the time in here. Let’s start with the cell. It’s a dingy off-white eggshell sort of color. The walls on three sides are concrete, while the fourth side is wood-paneled with a door. The whole thing is white-washed that same color. The cell itself is about eight by ten I’d imagine. On the back wall, there is a protrusion of concrete about two feet long that I’m currently using as a seat. When I was thrown in here, I found a stack of lined paper and a pen, which I’m now making use of. Well, that about does it for the cell…
I guess I’ll describe the objects I have with me now. I still have my wallet. It’s brown and was a gift from my late father about twenty years ago. I have sixty dollars, two credit cards, a library card, and my driver’s license. I still have my watch. It’s a nice silver color. Not real silver, I’m too poor for something like that. Just a nice silver-colored watch I picked up at a pawn shop for twenty dollars. I have my cell phone, which gets no reception at all in my box here. I have a couple of pictures on the cell phone. One of my new apartment, one of my cat, I hope they don’t keep me here too long; my cat will need food tomorrow. Oh, the pictures, I have a picture of an old man from a gas-station. I thought he looked kind of funny. I have a few pictures from the concert I went to a month ago. I got some nice ones with the band. I recently came into possession of one pen, black. It’s a cheap thing, one you’d probably pass by when offered for free at a convention. It’s free of any logo or marking of any kind. The ink is black, but the plastic is clear. I can watch my words bleed from the pen on to the paper, and constantly see the ink drain out. It has no cap. At the same time, I came to possess a stack of paper. It’s white lined paper, eight by eleven. There’s a good couple hundred sheets of it here. I’m not sure why these were left here, but I’ll make use of what I’m given. I’m a writer in a new town; this is what I’d be doing if I was home too.
I’m still waiting for someone to tell me what’s going on. It’s strange I could be put in here without any information on what I’m being held for. Miranda rights, yada yada. I think that’s what they’re called. I’m going to recount the night’s events the best I can. Maybe I can sue if they hold me here much longer.
So I had been moving my stuff into the new apartment all afternoon. Why did I move? That’s a hard question to answer. I mean, I never felt right where I was before. I don’t know if anybody else ever feels this way, but I’ll try to describe it. It was like my whole life had been planned out for me, and that if I stayed in Stafford, nothing could ever change. I had my whole life ahead of me, and it was a fair enough life. The problem was that I could see everything there was down the road. I had a few friends, a girl, a nice house, I had it alright, the problem was that there were no surprises ahead.
This is going to seem a little weird to whoever reads it, because I’m sure there’s tons of people who would have killed to be in my position. The first time I had the urge to leave was a few months back. Sandra, she was my girlfriend of a year, had asked me over for dinner. I was sitting across the table from her and we were talking about something, who knows what it was. I was playing with my mashed potatoes. I create art wherever I can. That’s a fancy way of saying “I play with my mashed potatoes, so what?” I looked up at something she said, and our eyes met. In that moment, I could see our life together, laid out like the plot of some dime romance novel. I saw myself asking her to marry me a few months later, and her tearfully accepting. I saw our first child, I saw that child’s graduation, I saw us grow old together, and finally, I saw her die. It felt like an eternity. It was like one of those near death experiences people describe, where you see your whole life flash before your eyes, but none of it had happened yet. Those were just the highlights, let me tell you. I also saw in her eyes the crippling minutia of life. I saw myself working a nine to five job eating the same god-damn breakfast of toasted buttered wheat bread and coffee every day, and giving my beautiful wife the same god-damn kiss on the cheek before leaving. In that moment, I saw that I was trapped. The life I led could only lead one way. I knew I had to get out.
I really got off on a tangent there, I didn’t mean to write all that out. I’ll strike it from the final copy I guess, it’s a little deeper then I really wanted to go. Anyway, I had been moving the stuff into my apartment from the storage place I had rented a few weeks prior. This affair had taken a few hours, and I was finished. It was late evening. I drove to the bridge entering town to do what I had come here to do. I pulled over my new car and walked to the middle of the bridge carrying the suitcase I had packed for the occasion. There was a small sidewalk on the side for pedestrians. I got to the very middle, and sat down. I opened up the case and tossed away my old life, one piece at a time. I threw away my old birth certificate. I threw away my old keys. I threw away my last family photo. I had changed my name, changed my address, changed my cell number, and left without telling anyone. It had taken a while to plan, but it was worth it. Finally, I took out the last item. It was a love letter Sandra had written to me when I went on my trip to Europe a few months back. Totally impractical, since I had my cell phone with me, but I remembered how touching it was. There’s something in letters that cannot be captured by spoken word. When someone has taken the time to plan their words, and has scrawled them beautifully in endless graceful etchings across a bright, red and white canvas, the picture is just that much more beautiful then a voice can ever be. Words capture life more brilliantly then it can be captured through even a photograph. Words capture emotion. All the same, I didn’t feel a thing as I watched it tumble into the drink. That was the world I had left behind.
I got back into my car. I had sat out there for a lot longer then I had planned, it was about ten at night. I was driving down I-55 when I saw the red and blue flashing lights behind me. I cursed silently and checked my speedometer. I was going five beneath the speed limit, I was pretty sure I wasn’t swerving. I pulled over, procured my registration and waited.
I hear someone coming. The hall echoes footsteps, and it sounds like there are a million men outside coming this way. I hope I don’t have to come back and finish this.
--
June 2, 2007
Well, I’m back. That didn’t explain much. I guess I’ll pick up where I left off and get to what happened a minute ago when I finish everything else.
So I was waiting in my car for the cop. I turned off my music, kept my seat belt on, and waited. It felt like this waiting lasted a lifetime. I stared at my dashboard and became immensely fascinated by how black it was. My whole car was black. The back lighting on the dash was a pale green against the darkness. I drummed my fingers on the wheel. 1234123412341234. I looked in my rear-view mirror. There was a man approaching. It was like he was approaching in slow motion. His stride seemed to last forever. More drumming. 123412341234. I felt like looking at my watch, but that seemed absurd. Suddenly, as he was approaching, I drowned. I’ve been a hydrophobe all of my life. I’ve never been able to swim. I’ve showered as long as I can remember, because bath tubs give me the shivers when full. In an instant, I drowned. This wasn’t on water, however, I drowned on the whole world. I’ve had more than one dream about drowning, but none of them were quite as frightening as this.
My head jolted back and the atmosphere rushed in. I felt the world was collapsing, only instead of falling down; it was falling into my mouth. Before my eyes, my whole perception collapsed into my mouth. I saw the dashboard rush towards me, and I tasted it in an instant. I felt the open road hit the back of my throat. I felt the bulge in my throat as I swallowed the world, felt the burn of the sun smashing to the back of my throat, and felt the ocean steam as it met with the fire in my belly. All the while, I watched reality fold in front of me. My eyes no longer provided me with information I could use to determine what was going on. It was as though my sight itself had become liquid, and I was watching the ocean of vision drown me. Then, I felt cold, unimaginably cold. I was all that was left.
Then I jolted forward and felt my hands grab hold of the wheel.
I looked up and saw the cop in the mirror, nearing my car.
I never got to see his eyes. He was white, probably in his thirties. His name tag said “Ducaine.” His light nearly blinded me. As off put as I was by my hallucination of swallowing the world, I choked through a conversation with him. Seemed like a normal happening. He asked me if I knew what I had done wrong. I told him I had no idea. He told me I should come with him. I complied, I’m new in this town and the last thing I need is trouble. I figured it would clear itself up in the end, since I hadn’t done anything wrong. I got into the car, and we drove in silence. I tried to talk to him, but I didn’t get a response. We arrived at a non-descript building I guess must be the police station. He led me quietly to the cell I sit in now, and told me to wait until I was needed. I noticed the pen and paper, and so I started writing.
So I was led into a room down the hall from here. The walls are the same dingy white color of the cell. The door at the end of the hallway is white too. The room inside, however, is black. The floor is black, the walls are black, I couldn’t see the ceiling, but it was probably also black. There was a light in the middle that shined a pale yellow light into a small circle in the middle of the room. In this middle, there sat a stool. Ducaine told me to sit on the stool.
I didn’t want to walk forward. The blackness in front of me threatened to swallow me. I stepped forward. I could swear the darkness smiled at me. A subtle trick of the shadows, but without shadows. A billowing black snake on a bare black background shifted, slithered, slightly and I thought I saw the slightly slithering sliver seem to shake into an “S” and then into a slightly hooked sour smile. Then the floor disappeared. I write disappeared because I am fairly sure it existed in the first place. Either way, I could feel myself falling. Or was it rising? It’s strange how the extremes merge. I was either falling or rising. This wouldn’t have bothered me so much if it hadn’t been for the dark. The impenetrable dark. Shifting, swirling, writhing, choking, smiling. As ridiculous as it sounds, the darkness was alive. I was watching a world behind a world waking up. Again, the eyes could not tell me this. All they saw was black. I could feel it.
Then I took another step.
And then another.
I sat down and waited for a long time. Finally, I heard his voice over the speaker. He asked me some questions, name, date of birth, marital status, survey questions. I answered them all, and eventually he stopped talking. I heard him murmur “I guess he’s of no use to us right now.”
Ducaine led me back to my cell and told me again to wait. I sat down and grabbed my pen to put my experiences in ink. I’ve been writing for a while. I should try to sleep, but I don’t think I could do it here. The only thing for me here is the paper and the pen.
The second time I felt it was looking at my father a few days later. I guess I should put this after the section about my vision of Sandra. If I keep the section about Sandra. Should I keep the section about Sandra? Oh well, a job for the editors, not for me. I was walking with my father through his church. My father had been a pastor since long before I was born. He had a booming voice and a potbelly. The second service had just ended and I was taking him out to lunch. I took his hand, and that’s when I heard it. I heard everything my father had ever said about me. All at once. His voice resounded a million times in my head, yet it was only once. I heard everything. But I could pick them apart. I heard it all, but I heard each one. I heard him praising me, I heard him chiding me, I heard his excitement at my graduation, I heard his disappointment when I had wrecked my first car. These were the things that I had heard before. There were other things. I heard the first words my father had ever spoken about me. They were: “Oh hell, the condom broke.” I heard the things he said when I wasn’t around. I heard how he was secretly angry at me for not wanting to take his pulpit, how he couldn’t stand my arrogance and lack of faith, how he thought my writing was terrible and that I needed to get my life on track. In retrospect, it wasn’t that bad. At the moment, it was devastating. I let go of my father’s hand and flailed my head from one side to the other looking for the source of the voices, knowing I’d see nothing but my father to my immediate right. He asked me if there was anything wrong. I told him: everything.
I can’t help but stare at the letter Y in that everything. I’ve always loved the letter Y. A letter that contains in itself a question. A fork in the road. Two rivers converging. A wine glass. Y. Why. Y am I here.
It’s odd, but I think this may be a different cell from the one that I was in before. This cell is a different color. It’s still off-white, but it’s darker, like a gray. And that makes the room seem smaller. Maybe it is smaller. I can’t tell. I hear steps. Time to put the pen down again.
--
I’m sure this isn’t an actual police station. If my treatment up to this point hadn’t given it away, I think that last meeting did. When the door opened, Ducaine was waiting with two other men. They were both much taller then I. Ducaine thanked me for my cooperation and led me into the black room again. No falling this time. I made it to my seat. This time, Ducaine and the men came with me.
The light shone down on me from above. It seemed much hotter this time than the last. I wanted to melt. Suddenly, I did melt. I felt my hair begin to stick to my head, and then I felt the sliding begin. The sliding was the worst. It wasn’t so much painful in the physical sense as it was unfathomable to the mind. I was melting. As my eyebrows dripped bit by bit to the floor, I wondered what would happen when my brain melted, if I would continue to feel anything. Well, when it started, I certainly did feel something. The nervous center isn’t located anywhere near the top of your head. I felt my head melt down. When the contents of my mind began to spill to the ground it did feel painful. I could see most of it. My eyes appeared impervious to this gruesome death. The odd thing (if my head melting was discounted from being “odd”) was that I never saw my mind drip, I saw memories. I saw fleeting images that I held close to me fall with a splash. I watched as my first kiss from sixth grade splattered on my shoes, and I watched the river of my first drinking binge flow down my arm. I think I was screaming. I have no idea.
Then I looked up and realized I was fine. Ducaine and the goons were standing directly in front of me. Ducaine spoke quietly to me.
“First question. Can you die?”
That’s not exactly what I had been expecting.
“Yes, I think so.”
The blows came fast. The two men walked to either side and began to rain them down on me. I think I tried to dodge the first one only to slam into the second. I felt the crack of a knuckle against my cheek bone. The pain arched through my face like the roots of some great tree, twisting and weaving through the soil of my skin. I had heard stories that when getting beaten up, eventually you just stop feeling it. They aren’t true. Anyone who says this has never truly had the life beaten out of them. I felt every punch in it’s fullness. There were thirty two in total. I’m certain I felt my bones crack and snap. Over and over again, the tree planted itself in my face, and was uprooted. Yggdrasil. Then it all stopped. They stopped hitting me, I stopped trying to stand, everything stopped. I should have fallen, but I stopped. I was horizontal in mid-air on an angle. I should have been falling flat on my face. I looked up, and the two men had stopped too. Ducaine, however, was smiling at me.
“Don’t lie next time.”
Then everything started again. I started falling. The men kicked me a few times for good measure, and then dragged me back to my room. I curled up on the slab and waited for the pain to lessen. It did fairly quickly. What didn’t lessen was the bleeding. I wasn’t sure why I was bleeding. I don’t think I had been bleeding while I was in the room. It was coming from a cut above my eye and from a gash in my right arm. This wasn’t slight bleeding either; it was a river of scarlet.
I was instantly reminded of my experience in melting, but this was different. It dripped from my brow to the floor. It flowed from forearm to concrete. The blood gathered in the crevices and cracks of my prison. Everything it touched turned to scarlet. My blood was running, running, running to where? There was a puddle at my feet. I noticed a hole had opened at the end of either pointer finger, and both were now bleeding. I was like some morbid fountain with a steady stream of red wine issuing forth from my being. There was a few inches on the floor now. I moved up on to the slab, taking my feet off the ground. This was a mistake. I felt my feet scrape the concrete, and they too started releasing the red hot mercury. The small lake was growing, and had nearly overtaken my stone island, which stood at least two feet off the floor. I felt the drip begin from my ears. I felt the canals and waterways of my body flow with the water of life until it joined the ocean of my cell. The blood was rising. I could no longer see from my left eye, there was too much blood dripping from the brow. It had reached my waist now. I wished for it not to get higher. I could not swim.
It got higher. It continued to rise faster and faster. I tried to swim. I tried as best I could to recall everything my parents had ever told me about how to stay afloat. None of it worked. More wounds opened and more blood spilled. I felt the blood overtake my head. I closed my eyes tightly and clamped my mouth shut. I had a minute’s worth of air. It lasted less than twenty seconds. I could hold no longer. I tried to gasp for air but was met only with the red plasma that had once fueled my being. I was drowning.
Then I woke up. Curled up on the slab. I didn’t even ache from the beating. My cell phone had died, and my watch no longer worked. I don’t think it was waterproof. I took up my pen and I started writing, which brings me to the present. I’m not going to lie to a stack of paper, I’m scared witless. This being said, I’m going to try to sleep.
I have no idea if I slept or not. I cannot tell the time anymore. I don’t even know Y I’m writing this anymore. I won’t ever get out of this box. This prison will contain me for the rest of my time breathing. This misery aside, it’s getting smaller. I’m sure now. I can almost see it. It’s like watching the hour-hand on a giant clock. It’s small motion. Impossible to see. Imperceptible. But it’s there. Even if I cannot see it, I feel it. It closes in on me. I know it. Looking back through this manuscript, this cell used to be white. I don’t remember it ever being white. It’s scarlet. I think it’s always been scarlet. I don’t know anymore. All I know now is that I’m frightened. I’m trapped in a box. I have nothing. Nothing but this. These sheets of paper are my letter to the world that the world will never read. If you read this, whoever you are, remember me. Remember me because nobody else ever will. That looks so clich?. So ridiculous. I’m losing it now. It’s ironic. I fled from a life because I feared normality, and now that which I fear is nothing any man can claim to have seen but I. And they’re coming. Oh god, they’re coming. I can’t do this again. The feet echo. A million men march to greet me though I know only three will be there.
--
I want to die. I pray to die. I’ve never been religious in my life. I’ve scorned god and the sheep who call themselves his followers. I ask any being who can hear me to end me. Please. End me. The torments I have seen and felt are simply too much for me. Ducaine was alone this time. He took me to a different room. The hallway seemed longer then ever. The new room was made entirely of a rusted metal I couldn’t identify. There was a seat, and an ax. I sat down. Ducaine strode back to the door seeing me sit down, and mentioned my visitors would be arriving any time now. I sat, wondering exactly who could possibly visit me in this place. Suddenly, I heard breathing behind me.
Slow
Rapid
Shallow
Then I turned. Upon turning, I saw myself, and saw myself seeing myself. It was as though a mirror had been placed directly behind me, and the world reflected had become an equal part of reality to my own. I leapt up, both of me, and we, or should I say I, stared at me. What did I do then? What did we do? What would you have done? I attacked. We attacked. I attacked. I don’t know who struck first, me or me, but the battle was brutal. I sliced then I diced then he who was I bashed with the handle of his axe while I who was me attempted to claw out my eyes. In the end, I succeeded at knocking myself so hard I could no longer get up. I lied on the ground watching myself. Victorious, I took my place back in the chair. I looked at myself in the chair, and I looked at myself on the ground. There was no separation, I simply was. I don’t know which one I was or if I wasn’t the one that wasn’t I or if I was simply both. What came next was much worse for both of us. Or me. Or whatever.
When the door opened again we both moved our heads. I saw from two different perspectives as my mother, my father, and Sandra entered the room. At this point, I experienced two most distinguished viewpoints. From one, I watched myself murder my family with an ax. From the other, I watched myself lie helplessly on the floor as my family was murdered with an ax. This wasn’t an illusion. I saw it. With my own four eyes. I watched them bleed. I saw the looks of disbelief. The looks of terror. Then Ducaine came and guided me back to my cell, and I started writing. I want to die. I tried to kill myself, but I don’t have the will for it. I’ve always used the pen to put my life on paper, not to spill it on the floor. I can’t do it. I’ll be stuck here. Forever. I’ll never escape. And here they come again. The sounds. The echoes. I can feel the urge to vomit rising. Suddenly, I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. They’ll kill me eventually. This will all eventually end. It doesn’t matter what I must endure, eventually it will come to an end.
--
And I’m alive. Somehow. For some reason. I’m alive. Ducaine and the others took me back out of my cell. We walked down the hallway, and time repeated. We strode down the halls, left, right, left, right—but then it happened again. We strode down the halls, left, right, left, right—but then it happened again. We strode down the halls, left, right, left, right—but then it happened again. Just like that. A loop. Each time, exactly the same. This sound echoing in the exact same manner. It looped for an eternity. I could feel myself age, yet I did not age. I wanted to do something different. To break step, to turn differently, to say something, but I could not. It was not possible. On the seven-hundredth repetition, I counted them, Ducaine stopped, and smiled. Then, time continued.
We made it back to that room. I sat down in the same place I had before. In an instant, the men pulled me upwards and placed me on a table. The room lit up and I could see the ceiling. I liked it better as a dark unknown. The ceiling was a giant screen projecting the smiling visage of my captor. I could see the sweat on Ducaine’s brow in high definition.
Before he could speak; however, I ate him. I ate him and everything else. It was just as the time I had drowned on reality, but so much slower. I watched, as piece by piece, the world was shucked like a corn cob and thrust into my unwilling mouth. Behind the world I was confronted again by a black curtain of nothing, writhing and snakelike as ever. When the world had been eaten, I began to be eaten myself. I saw my hands peel away and had the odd impression of feeling the back of my throat as I swallowed my fingers. I felt my eyes peel away, and watched as I traveled down my digestive system, fully conscious of my continued eating, and far away, as my fingers sizzled in the soup of stomach acids. As I felt my eyes begin to dissolve, it all disappeared, and I was once again looking at the smiling face of Ducaine.
“Now, let me show you what you are made of.”
I suddenly realized I had lost my shirt. My bare chest was moving up and down as I breathed rhythmically in the chilly room. One of the men approached and with a silver sliver of a shining scalpel drew a slat of my skin to the side. I heard a scream, and realized it was my own. I stared as the blood began to flow once more. If I was to drown again, I prayed I would actually die this time. This time, something different happened. I bled and bled until there was no more in my body to bleed. Once I had dried, they came out. Small squiggles of darkness in the shape of snakes, insects, and arachnids. As they emerged, they began to eat me. I felt as the world must have felt when I ate it. Devoured, piece by piece. Each tiny morsel of my being sustaining a being that should not be. Every fiber of my soul lost to fuel an engine of darkness. But then, as the last darkness emerged, something changed. A light shone forth from my chest. A beam as bright as the sun. The dark beings shivered and shattered. My blood returned to my body, and Ducaine stopped smiling.
“Can you die?”
I shook my head.
“Good.”
At that they took me back to my cell. I am no longer afraid, because I know something they don’t. They may know that I can not die, but they do not know that I am God. I discovered it as I returned to my cell. I prayed, and prayed, and cried for who knows how long, and then I understood. The only one to hear my prayers was myself. The only person who can perceive the prison I am trapped in is myself. I am God. I am the master. They don’t know it yet, but they will. I will be free. I will kill them all. I will make them pay. Right now, I know it to be true. I warp the walls around me. My room expands and contracts at my will. I will kill them, and all who have seen my weakness, and then I shall lord over the world as I should. I will kill you too. If you’re reading this, I can see you. I have been able to see you since you read the first word. I will still be watching as you read the last word. As you put down the last sheet of paper, you will put aside my words as a writers delusional rambling, but know that it is not. I will kill you. The deaths that I have endured here are nothing compared to the torments I can put you through. I won’t do it immediately. I won’t do it today. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe a week from now. When you’ve put this whole story out of your mind. When you feel safe. That’s when I will take everything from you. I recommend you pray. Look away from this and pray. Pray that you forget. Pray that I don’t see you.
But I do.
With my new found powers, I have dressed up my cell a bit. I now have a bed, a mirror, and a wardrobe. Looking in the mirror, I don’t know how I’ve ever endured this mortal shell. I look as I always have, but so much more feeble. So much more weak. The eyes are different too. I remember in my life before this I had blue eyes. They now shine a bright yellow. Even when I turn out the lights, I can see them. They match the color of the walls. The bright yellow eyes in the darkness. I almost scare myself.
It all makes sense now. My departure from the world, my hallucinations, they all make sense. I was not meant to toil with the wretches of this world. The world bends itself to me. If I am thirsty, I shall expend the world to quench my thirst. If I am hungry, I will eat existence to sate my hunger. Once I am free I will wreck this world with my fury. All will shudder as they feel the earth quake beneath their feet. A God has awakened, and he is furious beyond imagination.
Here they come again. Those fools. They know not what they have awakened.
--
Wrong
Afraid
Wrong
Wrong again
Sandra?
Still Afraid
I’m still here and I was wrong
Why am I here
Y am I here
Wrong
Afraid
End
But not the end
Yet
When
Why
Bother
Skipping
Lines
Or
Spacing
Anymoreit’snotlikeanyonewillreadthisanywayI’monlywritingtoholdontoasmallpieceofwhatIambeforeIamlostforevertothedarknessofinsanityifIcankeepwritingIcankeeplivingIcanfeelthesnakescomebehindmetoconsumemeonceandforallandtomakemattersworseitlooksnowlikemypenmayberunningoutofin-
aim: IMB3AU
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