There was a distortion in time the moment before the accident happened. It was as if the universe knew something life-altering and unnerving was about to occur and made the necessary adjustment to reality in an effort to prevent it from happening. Unfortunately, not even the cosmic forces governing the universe could stop it. Or perhaps it was the opposite. Maybe our reality is the cruel and unforgiving cosmic force of oppression, and the distortion gave us our chance at survival. Either way, everyone made it out alive from the accident, and I’m thankful beyond words for this.
Gretta, in the passenger seat, was turned around, fussing with Little Carmine in the backseat. Carmine had dropped his stuffed monkey on the floor, and was wailing in that octave only children can reach that tears a hole in your sanity. It was jarring, irritating, and distracting. Nothing as distracting as trying to read a text while driving. Nothing as dangerous as falling asleep behind the wheel. Nothing as irresponsible as operating heavy machinery under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Those folks tend to survive their accidents despite their culpability. Everyone else around them dies.
As for me, I only took my eyes off the road for a moment. Not for some asshole reason like a text, being drunk, or falling asleep. I did it to give comfort to my crying son. To help my wife with him. Yet that’s all it took for us to end up at death’s door.
When I turned my eyes back to the road, something darted out in front of the car. I cannot tell you if it was a human, animal, or ET looking to phone home. It really doesn’t matter. I swerved to avoid it. In doing so, I lost control of the car. Hitting the brakes didn’t help. Turning the wheel against the spin made it feel as if it was only making things worse. I did everything I could to get it back in control, but there was nothing I could do as our car went sideways and rolled over and over again until it came to a halt as we crashed into a patch of trees lining the road.
Saying it rolled over is an understatement given the terror of the chaos. There’s glass shattering all around us, sending shards everywhere and cutting into our flesh. The exterior of the car is crumbling into itself like a plastic bottle being crushed, except we’re inside of it. The air bags deployed with an explosion of sound, and the wind knocked me out as my torso and head slammed into them. Gretta’s screams fill my ears. Carmine’s cries are the worst sound of all, at least until another sound replaces them. The sound of silence followed by my own screams filled my ears, except they weren’t screams; they were gasps. I couldn’t breathe. It felt as if I was drowning. Stars filled my vision. They were bright like the sun but moved like a swarm of angry bees descending upon a trespasser in their hive. Then they seemed to disappear before my eyes, and my vision started to go black. My last thoughts before passing out were of Gretta and Carmine.
Were they alive or dead?
Would I live through this?
Was that smoke I smelled?
I ceased to exist with those questions lingering in my mind. However, the answer to each question came immediately in a form I never expected or imagined.
Coming back to consciousness, I found myself standing on the side of the road. I don’t know how I’d gotten there. The stench of gasoline filled my nostrils. Something must have punctured the gas tank during the wreck. The upside-down, crumpled mess of twisted metal and plastic, formerly known as our Hyundai Tucson, now a death trap, held Gretta and Carmine as prisoners. Gretta hung upside down with her eyes closed and her arms dangling. Her long, dark hair gathered around her face. I couldn’t tell if she was bleeding or had sustained any other injuries. Carmine was the same. His little form hung upside down too, stuck in his child’s seat. There were cuts on his face from the shattered glass. The wreck was silent, and neither my wife nor my son were conscious. I couldn’t even tell if they were breathing.
Yet, what bothered me the most wasn’t seeing my wife or son in such a perilous and unknown state. I mean, of course, I was concerned for them; I’d do anything for them to survive. But in this moment, what truly disturbed me and sent me into hysterics was seeing myself also stuck in the vehicle and hanging upside down while still strapped to my seat. I stumbled backwards as if the unconscious body was going to reach out for me and fell on my ass.
What the fuck was happening? Was I dead? Was my family dead? Wasn’t there supposed to be a light at the end of the tunnel or something? If I was dead, where were Gretta and Carmine? Why weren’t they with me?
As the questions raced through my mind, each of them bringing more and more dread and fear, I noticed something else bringing a whole new level of confusion into the mix. The clouds floating past the moon weren’t moving. It made the sky look like a portrait. As if it wasn’t real. This is also when I noticed all sound had ceased. While we were in an isolated, back road area, we still should have been able to hear the low hum of engines roaming the night. Even the air felt as if it had stopped functioning and I was living in a vacuum.
“Jesus Christ, what a mess!” a man’s voice said as he appeared above me, blocking my view of the moon and sky. It was a pleasant voice. Congenial. Far too calm and relaxed for the moment. As if my family wasn’t stuck in a flipped-over vehicle with gasoline slowly leaking all over the place. A single spark could turn it into a funeral pyre.
“Call an ambulance!” I shouted and stood up from the snow-covered ground. I made an attempt to turn toward the wreckage but found I could not move.
“Woah there, buddy! Don’t strain yourself too much. Save that plucky energy for later. You’re going to need your strength,” the man said. “We’ve got to have ourselves a little talk before we start saving lives here. There is no need to worry about them for the moment. They’ll be fine. for the moment.
“How can you say they’re fine? They’re stuck! I’m stuck inside the car. What the fuck is going on?” I shouted at him. He didn’t seem to mind being shouted at. The confident smile never wavered from his face.
“They’re fine because I say they’re fine. Don’t give me reason to say otherwise,” the man replied. His threat struck a chord deep within. There was something unexplainable going on here. Maybe I’d been too shocked by the accident to have noticed earlier. That was my thought at the time to explain how I hadn’t noticed there was a black horse on the road to the side of the man. It snorted and neighed after the threat was made. It sounded eerily as if it were laughing. Laughing at me.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized.
“It’s alright, buddy,” the man replied, and he gave me his hand. I didn’t want to shake it. Instinctively, I knew touching him was a bad idea. Him or his horse. Both entities were one and the same. I was certain of it. Neither was truly man or beast. These were beings in disguise for my benefit. Still, I doubted that being impolite to this entity was a good idea. I took his boney hand into mine and shook it. Touching him was sickening. It sent waves of cold down my arm, and a feeling of despair overwhelmed me.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized again without knowing why. It seemed like the proper thing to do. I thought about apologizing to the horse too, but then I remembered it was probably a part of the same entity I was speaking with now or the entity itself.
“You’ve been through a lot. I’m here to help. Truly. I’m on your side here, even if you don’t believe it,” the Man stated. The horse neighed in agreement.
“Thank you so much. You have no idea how much I appreciate your help,” I replied, and it was the truth. Whatever was happening here, this Entity was responsible for it. At a moment’s notice, it could change its mind and leave us here to die in a fiery inferno. I didn’t want to get on its bad side. Letting my emotions get out of control wasn’t going to help. It was difficult to push away all the fear, anxiety, and panic.
“No problem, amigo. I’m here to help. You’re in a bit of a situation here. Some might say you’re a lucky duck for me to have stumbled upon you in your time of need. Some might say you’re in the middle of a nightmare,” the Entity answered. The horse stomped its feet. I think it was an agreement.
“What would you say about my situation?” I asked.
The man aspect of the Entity smiled. And I’ll be damned if the horse didn’t also display its massive teeth in a repulsive, nightmare inducing rictus. Those disgusting teeth could pulverize bones. I was certain of it.
“You know, no one ever asks me that. Everyone’s always freaking out, worried out of their minds, or in denial about what’s happening. You already understand, and you’re doing great. Better than 99% of the folks I’ve dealt with in the past,” the Entity replied. “So, let’s skip all the formalities and get down to business.”
“Business?” I asked, genuinely wondering what this Entity wanted from me. I didn’t have anything worth a damn. Money wasn’t what this Entity wanted. It was beneath this creature. It wanted much more than that.
“I’m here to offer you the opportunity to save your family from the wreckage. You, Gretta, and Baby Carmine can walk away from all of this without a scratch. It’ll be as if this accident never happened. You’ll drive home, snuggle up with the wifey after you put the kid to bed, and tomorrow, you’ll head to Home Depot to buy new doorknobs,” the Entity explained.
“That all sounds so wonderful,” I said, and I meant it. “I’d do anything to save my family.”
“That’s wonderful to hear. But there’s a catch. As you saw earlier, you’re still inside the vehicle with them. Should you fail to complete the task I give you, you, Gretta, and Little Carmine will be coming with me. And trust me, you don’t want that. I don’t want that. But rules are rules. There’s also a third option on the table, if you’d like to hear it, but you’d never take this offer.”
“Let’s hear it,” I said, opening myself up to multiple deals with this devil.
“You can refuse to partake in the task I give you, and I’ll only take Gretta and Little Carmine with me. Believe it or not, there have been assholes in the past who’ve taken this option. So many people are ungrateful for what they’ve got. They’d rather see their loved ones go than risk their own lives for them. But we both already know what you’re going to do. You love your family. You’d do anything for them. However, I’ll still need confirmation that you don’t want to go down this nasty path,” the Entity said.
“No way. I’ll do whatever it takes to save my family. I don’t care if I die in the process. I’ll be with them until the end and beyond,” I replied. The Entity smiled, and I didn’t bother looking at the horse. It was smiling too. It neighed.
“Good. Now, let’s get this party started. What you’ve got to do is simple, easy, and straightforward. No tricks. No double entendres. No monkey paws. There was nothing to renege on the deal. All you’ve got to do is make it home on foot from here. That’s it. Granted, it won’t be easy. Do you see that clearing over there?”
He pointed a boney finger a few yards away from the flipped Tucson, and I saw the mouth of a trail. I nodded.
“Follow that trail, and you’ll have a straight shot toward your house. Yes, I know that doesn’t make sense. You’ll just have to trust me that this path will lead you straight there. There are going to be some pitfalls along the way. You might have to jump over some downed trees. Swim through a big puddle or two. Fight off some random creature. You never know what’s out in the middle of the woods. But that’s not a big deal for you, right? You’d right off the Devil himself for the sake of your family.”
“Wouldn’t you?” I asked.
The Entity chuckled and continued, “Stay on the path. Any deviations, and you’ll be disqualified. I’ll be watching. You won’t see me, but I’ll be there. There is no need to rush. The goal is to make it home in one piece. Or at least in enough pieces to make it home alive. You win, and you get your family and life back. You lose, and everyone you love will die along with you. Sounds fair?”
I nodded again, feeling a knot twist up in my stomach. Was that fear? Or excitement? Most likely a little of both. Either way, it was time to get going. The Entity pointed its boney, pale finger toward the trail. Walking toward the path, I went by the wreckage of the Tucson, and swore I’d make it home from them. I had no other choice.
As I approached the path leading into the forest, I looked back to see that the figure was gone. Not only that, but the car was gone, too. It had been swallowed up by trees and a mist that had wandered in from nowhere. Slipping between the roots and weeds, the fog looked so thick and white, it was almost milky. It was unlike anything I had seen before and had a mind of its own as it stopped short of the path. If I stepped off to either side more than a foot, I would be swallowed up by it, and I guessed that if I did, it would mean the end for me and my loved ones.
Part of me wanted to go back, thinking this couldn’t possibly be real. I was in a coma, or I’d hit my head in the crash and was seeing things that didn’t exist. Deep down, I knew that wasn’t the case. Something told me that if I wanted to get my family back and if I wanted to live, I’d have to do as the Entity instructed. I would have to follow this path until it led me home.
The direction was wrong, as I had been told it would be. My home was west, and I was traveling eastward, which made it feel all the more wrong. I pushed aside a few overhanging branches that blocked my path forward. Their movements stirred up the mist and made it billow and swell, rushing out and then returning to fill in the gaps.
The effect of walking through the tunnel of darkness in the fog was eerie as it swirled and moved all around me. It left the space ahead and behind visible. The only problem was the darkness. I could see nothing in it. I reached down to feel for my phone in my pocket, thinking I could use its light to see better, but it was gone. Of course, that would be too easy. I’d either lost it in the crash or the Entity had taken it from me.
Up ahead, the mist swirled and changed shape as if something had passed through it. My heart beat faster in my chest as I noticed a dark form waiting in the shadows ahead. It appeared to be a man. Approaching slowly, I tried to see his face but could only make out the barest details. He was swaying, as if a strong wind was blowing, and might knock him off his feet at any second. That made me pause because the movement was familiar. In fact, everything about this man was familiar.
When I was within just a few feet, I saw who it was.
“Da-“
I spoke as I stepped forward and was cut short as suddenly, I was falling, plunging into freezing cold water, swallowing me up, taking me under, grabbing me, and pulling me down. With each breath, I took in water. It filled my lungs as I gasped for air, gurgling, screaming, and crying for him to help me.
It was the day when I was a kid. We’d been at the beach, and the undertow was too strong. I looked around to see that I was the only person in the water. My dad didn’t notice. He was too busy standing there, drinking a beer, and holding it up occasionally as if to say, “Cheers, sonny-boy, well done. Good swimming out there.”
But I wasn’t a good swimmer, and I wasn’t okay. I was drowning and gulping down cold, salty water. The sun was too bright. There wasn’t anyone around to help me. I was going to die down there with the spiny creatures, the sharks, and the little fish that would eat my eyeballs.
I completely forgot about the path, saving my family, and any Entities watching from the ether. At that moment, because I was THERE. The misty trail had disappeared. I was really back there again, drowning in the water.
“HELP!” I managed to cry out.
But my dad didn’t hear. He was reaching down to grab another beer from the cooler.
I went under again. My lungs filled with more water, making me feel heavier. Filling me full of the ocean and taking me from this world.
You have to save yourself, I thought, coming up and gasping in one good breath of air. He’s not going to do it for you. He was a ghost. An image of the man who’d been responsible for my entry into this world Too drunk and dim to understand that his son was leaving this world.
I began to swim. It occurred to me that my panic was settling, and I was remembering something about what to do if stuck in this situation. You don’t fight the current, you swim at an angle. You can’t try to beat it. You have to let it take you.
Picking an angle, I began to swim faster, cutting a path through the water while aiming for a spot fifty yards down the shore. I put my head down, paddled, and kicked until my legs burned and my arms went numb. Every few seconds I would check to make sure I was still on course, and a few times I nearly panicked when I noticed I had veered off the line and was paddling deeper out into the ocean.
Each time I looked, the shore was a little closer until finally I looked up, and my dad was there, pulling me up out of the water, which was up to his waist.
He had finally noticed that I was drowning. And as he held his beer-smelling mouth up to my face, he let out a loud burp, and carried me onto the beach. Dropping me onto a beach towel, he said something about how we should head home soon, it was getting late. But he didn’t apologize. He didn’t know.
I turned around to look at him, but he was gone. The beach was gone. In an instant, I was on the trail again, surrounded by trees older than man and the thick, heavy fog obscuring the way back home.
Once again, I was alone.
Move,” I said to no one but myself, “Gretta and Carmine are counting on you.” The first step was shaky, but with each consecutive stride it settled, and I felt like I could do this. The fog cleared as I moved into heavy forest cover. Beams of silver moonlight streamed through gaps in the canopy, and those pinprick spotlights were my only guiding light, along with the Entity’s single rule.
I put one foot in front of the other and groped at the inky darkness, hoping nothing else would obstruct my way. I don’t know how long I was lost here, in spaces like the dark forest, time loses meaning. But it did come to an end. The creak of wood splintering against the weight of something colossal reverberated throughout the night air. I froze, strained my ears, and waited. A low groan of wood buckling and contorting as whatever was leaning against a tree shifted its weight caused me to bolt into a sprint. Caution was no longer an option, and neither was stealth, as my pursuer let out an ear-splitting roar and charged.
The earth trembled at its gait, and a hundred footsteps all headed towards me. My lungs burned with the sudden exertion. I’d only almost drowned a few minutes ago. A stray branch caught my calf, bit deep into the flesh, and caused me to stumble briefly. Knowing Gretta and Carmine’s salvation rested in my hands kept me running despite feeling as if my heart or lungs would explode at any moment. I flinched at another deafening, world-shattering roar, and when I opened my eyes once more, I saw salvation. A break in the tree line, and a light from the heavens poured in, a beacon. I leapt the final steps, evading my pursuers grab, and felt the whoosh of air as it missed my ankle.
My landing fumbled as my foot touched asphalt, and I tumbled end over end. I lay there exhausted, catching my breath, and trying to get up. As I got myself back together, a clear picture of my surroundings came into focus, and I only felt confusion. I was in a parking lot. Through the clearing, the moonlight illuminated the faded lines and concrete tire stops. Its surface was pockmarked by countless trees, an amalgam of man and nature, but wholly unnatural to me. Looking back into the dark forest, I saw the emergence of my pursuer. Hands reached out from the darkness, hundreds of them, and gripped the black top. I leapt up and turned to run, but my gaze lingered on the forest path. The emerging horror’s face nearly stopped me in my tracks.
Malcolm, I thought, and it gave me a second wind.
Within the mass of limbs, set at the center, was Malcolm’s face. How? I watched Malcolm die, and faked my surprise and horror at finding his body. Face blue-gray, and vomit congealed within his mouth. It was ruled an accidental drug overdose. Everyone assumed he took something, drank too much, passed out, and choked on his own vomit. Which would be true if I hadn’t come back to the dorm earlier in the evening, and found him alive, moaning, and reaching out to me for help. I was pretty damned drunk myself and wanted nothing to do with taking care of my sick roommate. I turned away, left him there, assuming he’d take care of himself, and went back out to spend the night at a friend’s dorm room.
Yes, this might sound cruel, but Malcolm wasn’t exactly a saint. He was a drug dealer, and it wasn’t simply marijuana and ecstasy pills. He sold heroin, meth, and prescription pills. The worst of all the drugs he sold were the ones he’d call his “Spanish Fly” pills. Otherwise known as roofies. Upon moving into the dorm room, he bragged about having connections, and being able to get whatever he wanted to sell. And indeed, he did sell a lot of drugs right out of our shared room, especially the roofies.
At all hours of the day and night, addicts would come and buy their poison from him. It made me feel uncomfortable having these people show up in my room. You never know who is unhinged and looking to score by any means necessary. You never know who is going to break in and try to steal from him. There was so much that could go wrong that I immediately requested a room transfer but didn’t list the true reason why. I didn’t want to deal with the aftermath of school officials, a police investigation, and crackheads angry at me for getting their dealer busted.
My request was denied as there wasn’t any available housing left on campus. I felt like a stranger in my own home. I tried to never be around, and I did a good job of it as friends let me stay in their rooms. Eventually, it became tiring to beg others to let me stay with them. I was paying for this room. Paying for a formal education, and it was being ruined by a third-rate Pablo Escobar wannabe. It came to a boiling point when I finally confronted him. This turned out exactly as expected. He didn’t give a shit, and threatened to have some of his “buddies” kick my ass if I didn’t get in line.
As much as Malcolm liked to sell his drugs, he also liked to party. Like Tony Montana, Malcolm liked to get high on his own supply. Eventually, it caught up to him on the night I came back to the dorm room to find him slowly fading away into an oblivion of his own creation. To be fair, I thought about helping him. It would have been the right thing to do. Unfortunately, being drunk and recalling the threat to kick my ass, the complete and utter lack of respect for me, and the thought of all the lives he ruined, I left him there to suffer. The possibility of him dying hadn’t crossed my mind. We were all young and immortal. Death wasn’t even remotely close to happening. At least not to us. Yet Malcolm did die, and it was possible for me to have saved him. Does this make me a monster too? Did I make a terrible mistake by letting him die that night when I could have saved him?
The thoughts ran through my mind like another roar, tinged with anguish and humanity this time. Malcom was gaining, and the parking lot was about to come to an end. I couldn’t plunge myself back into the dark forest; Malcom was blocking the path. I couldn’t run from him anymore. I had to stand against him. With a heel planted firmly into the ground, I pivoted to face him and saw the monstrosity he had become, or maybe a reflection of what he had always been.
Limbs and bodies conjoined into one massive, fat snake. All writhing and undulating, grasping at anything and everything. All balanced atop countless hands moving like millipede legs, bringing Malcolm closer and closer. All the bravado I had evaporated, and the scream in my throat never got the chance to be voiced. Instead, it came out as a cry of pain as a segment of the flesh abomination struck out and sent me sprawling on the ground, muscles screaming in agony, lungs hissing as the breath left them.
“Get up, get the fuck up!” my mind screamed, but I coiled into myself like a spider in its death throes.
With the night sky above me, the moon was a witness to my failure before it was eclipsed by the sneering face of Malcom. His hands pinned me down, wrapped around and gripped my throat, and I was face-to-face with him. A snarl rumbled deep within his throat, and I knew his intentions. Rage boiled within me, and I leveraged my hand free, with as much ferocity as I could muster, I launched it at his face and took hold. This son of a bitch wouldn’t stop me from saving my family. When he was alive, he wasn’t worth a damn. As an abomination generated from whatever deep, dark depths of my psyche, he was less than nothing.
When I took hold, the skin was frail, like papier-mâché, and it clumped together in my hand.
“You know what you fucking did! You deserved to die!” I hissed and peeled back the mask, shattering it.
A fist plunged into my abdomen, and I felt something give way. A warm trickle of blood. Still, I had won. Malcom desiccated before my eyes. With a breeze, he crumbled to ash. I stood, looking down at the puddle of goo he’d become, and grimaced. The quarter sized wound punched into my gut hurt. It wouldn’t kill me, but it hurt a lot. I looked at the tree line, the path I’d been walking, and what was behind me. I understand now. This is what the Entity wanted. Confront the past and gaze into it, but never walk backward and stray from what lies ahead. Never stray from home. Never stop thinking about Gretta and Carmine.
“What the heck are you?” I asked the night air and the Entity, which could pluck what I had long buried and give it form. In response, I heard a bird cry from the sky above me. The Entity did say it was watching. None of it mattered now. There was a road to get back to and save my family.
I continued down the path, on edge, knowing another obstacle could appear at any moment. As before, time felt different here. Like it was being distorted or manipulated. Since encountering the creature with Malcolm’s face, I felt as if I’d been walking for hours. I felt no discomfort except for the stab wound in my stomach. Even this feels numb now. The encounter with my father on the beach felt like a lifetime ago, much like Malcolm’s true death. Even the Entity seemed like something from a dream long ago, recalled only in tiny bits and pieces. Above me, the bird continued to cry as if cheering me on.
It was hard to gauge how long it had been since the last ghost of my past came to haunt me, but it seemed like a longer break between the first and most recent. A sick part of me wondered if this was all a trick, and if I and my loved ones would be sent to hell once I reached the end. Or if I was still in that crashed car, with this entire journey being my mind replaying traumatic points in my life through a twisted hero’s quest. Each anxiety-ridden scenario filled me with more dread than the last. I’d always tried my best to be optimistic, but the higher the stakes, the more difficult it was. The Entity promised no tricks or deception, so I had to take it at its word.
As I pondered morbid possibilities, something grabbed my ankle. I wasn’t surprised to see a dismembered hand gripping me. I stepped forward, attempting to shake the hand off me, when another dismembered hand grabbed my other ankle, followed by one that clasped my shin. I started running, occasionally making attempts to dislodge the limbs to no avail. In a matter of seconds, both my legs were entirely covered in them. I fell to the dirt, landing flat on my face. I cursed at them, and tried to pull myself along using my arms. There was no chance in hell that I was going to allow myself to be stopped by these hands. The Malcolm creature’s hands.
To my dismay, more hands took hold of my arms. They held me down as if I were a child throwing a temper tantrum. Every time I thought I was getting close to freeing myself, more would come from the surrounding trees and bushes, adding their incredible grip to the horde. Two of them lunged at my face and squeezed my mouth shut. Another pressed against my nose, and I could no longer breathe. There was nothing I could do to stop them as the multitude of hands overwhelmed me. As I asphyxiated, another hand crawled over the others, and the last thing I saw was a pair of fingernails stab me right in the eyes. Their sharp, dirty fingernails were piercing through my retinas. I tried to scream in pain. To close my eyelids. To do anything else except feel excruciating pain. Those disembodied fingers pushed inward beyond my eyes as if trying to pierce my brain. When the fingers couldn’t move any further inward, they slid out, slick with blood, eye goo, and whatever other damaged viscera were within my eye sockets. Then, like a rapist not yet finished with brutalizing his victim, the hand brutally shoved the fingers back into my eye sockets. It stabbed over and over and over again, and yet it did not pierce my brain. It didn’t give me the relief of death.
Unable to breathe, overwhelmed by the hands, and getting my eye sockets ravaged, there was no hope left in me to save Gretta and Carmine. Perhaps their deaths would be a lot quicker and less painful than mine. Hopefully, I could at least get them this mercy. If my pain made this possible, I’d endure longer. However, I knew this wasn’t the case. The end was coming for me soon. As the blood poured from my sockets and the fingers continued plowing into me, I made peace with the fact that this was the end. I never imagined my life ending in this manner, but who knows what’s in store for us before the curtains fall? Maybe the Entity?
It was here, I felt the atmosphere change around me again. The hands loosened all at once. With the little strength I had left, I yanked off the hand covering my mouth, and tossed it to the side. I took a deep gasp of breath and choked on it. I coughed, thrashed, and ripped off the hand that had blinded me. Beyond rational thoughts and in a world of psychosis brought on by the endless mass of hands, instead of tossing the hand away like the other, I brought it to my mouth and sank my teeth into the tender flesh below the pinky finger. It thrashed, squirmed, and squeezed against my face, but I did not let go. I grinded my teeth against the raw meat, and whipped it from side to side like a wolf with a rabbit in its jaws. If it took my eyes, I was going to take a few digits from it in revenge.
Unfortunately, this didn’t take as long as I thought it would. The hand wasn’t as strong as before. A hunk of hand meat remained in my mouth as the rest of it fell to the ground, never to be found again. I took a few heavy breaths, still restrained by the multitude of hands, but these too were far weaker than before. I managed to shake off the majority of them and then yank off the rest until I didn’t feel anything on me anymore. Free of the hands, I collapsed to the ground, and allowed myself time to rest and recover from the savage attack.
My heartbeat slowed. The immense pain lessened after a minute or so. I chewed on the hand meat in my mouth. The metallic taste of blood filled my mouth. My tongue explored the texture of the skin and the raw flesh beneath. I wasn’t hungry or thirsty. I don’t think it was possible for me to feel either of these, yet I chewed on the meat until it was mushy enough to swallow. As soon as I did, something happened with my eyes. They began to sting fiercely. I cried out and tried to rub the agony from my eyes until I opened them by mistake. Things were blurred, but somehow I wasn’t blind. My eyes regenerated somehow. As the seconds ticked past, the attack seemed like it had been years and years ago. When I was finally able to see again, I saw that I was alone in the middle of the trail. No sign of the hands. There is no sign of anything having happened. Then I heard a voice speak within the fog, and I went toward it.
“I’m not surprised that all these years later I turned out this pathetic. I feel terrible for your wife and kid having to deal with someone this backed up with unaddressed issues,” the voice insulted with a snarl. As I approached, I saw a young man with jet-black hair, standing in front of me. His skin was lightly tanned. His eyes narrowed. It didn’t take me long to realize that I was talking to a teenage version of myself. He stared at me with contempt, and hatred.
“It might be easy for you to think that, but that’s not the case. You’re right, I still have a lot of traumas I haven’t fully unpacked, but that doesn’t make me weak.” I responded, being reminded of how cynical I was at that age.
“You can tell yourself that, but it doesn’t make it true. You’ve gotten so good at lying about the pain you’re in that you believe it. We both know that under any layer of normality, we are black voids, emotionally draining anyone who gets close.” he stated coldly, playing with the cuffs of his long sleeve sweater.
“Listen, at this point, everything seems hopeless, so you can’t see a future where you’re finally okay. It’s hard to believe it, but things do get better for you. You have people who genuinely care about you and don’t consider you an emotional burden! You still have issues, but you love your life so much that you’re willing to relive some of the worst things you experienced to keep it,” I earnestly responded. He shook his head, still not convinced.
“Maybe that’s how it is as of now, but I guarantee it won’t stay that way. Things always get better before they get worse for us. I think we’re better off dead. The crash was a sign that we shouldn’t keep going.”
The words broke my heart to hear. The days when I wished I wasn’t alive are long gone. Being an adult, I always told myself it was a phase. Something everyone went through in times of immense pain and confusion. Being a teenager is like being in such a strange place where you aren’t yet an adult and you aren’t a child either. There are so many expectations. The future is uncertain. The world is pulling you in so many directions, and you have no idea which way to go. Re-visiting this time was difficult. If my task was to change his outlook and provide him with hope, I could be stuck beating my head against a brick wall.
“I used to be you, so I know how hard it is to get you to believe that life is worth living. It took multiple interventions from friends, therapy, and a lot of time to get where I am. I alone can’t help you. What I can do is be proud of the progress I’ve made, and be even prouder for the boy in front of me who I know gets there.” The young man started tearing up, curling into a ball.
“No! You have to be lying! I can’t do it. I CAN’T BE LIKE YOU. STOP GIVING ME FALSE HOPE!” He screamed out, digging his nails into his knees.
“I’m not lying. You make it past 16. You live to celebrate 10 more birthdays. You’ll meet Gretta, the love of your life. You’ll be the father you didn’t have for Carmine, your son. You’ll live in a crummy little house. You’ll manage a crappy restaurant serving food you wouldn’t feed your family. And you know what? You’re going to love it because the crummy little house is YOUR HOME. Gretta and Carmine will be YOUR HOME. You’ll endure the shitty restaurant because it puts food on the table for them. Your life is going to be full of love and laughter. There will also be moments of unhappiness and uncertainty. Sure, life is still confusing, but you’ll figure it all out. Nothing has changed. I’m still you. You’re still inside me. Maybe you don’t feel the strength to keep going, but you aren’t alone in this. I’m with you. Gretta and Carmine are with you. You’ll go through literal Hell for them!” I shouted.
Tears pooled in my eyes too now. He looked at me, mucus running down his nose. He cried, babbling incoherently, and reached out his arms to me. At that moment, I took hold of him/me, and locked him up in a warm embrace. He shivered against me.
“You are worth so much more than you realize,” I said to him, and every injury I’d sustained seemed to heal. My eyes fully cleared up, and I saw him now in full. His eyes were missing. A bloody wound appeared in his abdomen. Yet, I didn’t see these as much as I saw the acne scars, dried lips, and scrawny little body I’d once had. We embraced once again, and a bright white light illuminated the darkness surrounding us. It blinded me. It took a few moments to get accustomed to the darkness again, but I found myself with nothing in my arms and a newfound tranquility in my mind. Moving forward once more, I heard the bird let out another caw, and I continued down the path toward home. The trail changed again, and this time I found myself in a ruined city illuminated by streetlights. Vegetation clung to the walls, doors, and windows of the decrepit buildings. Thick trees lined the streets as if they’d been planted on the concrete itself and grown over hundreds of years. Part of me wanted to rest. To sit for a moment to catch my breath. An old bench sat against a wall. It was tempting to stop and rest, but no. I needed to keep going. For Greta. For Carmine. For me. I needed to keep going. So that’s what I did.
The streetlights seemed to be guiding me in a specific direction. Following the lights, I came upon a building, and paused to stare up at it. It was a fairly unassuming, two-story brick office building. Through the glass doors, I could see fluorescent lights inside. Was this part of the path? Or was it something else? I wasn’t sure. I looked around. There were other streetlights towering over some of the scattered trees, but they were dim. Almost extinguished, as if they’d served their purpose in bringing me to this place. The only remaining lights I saw were ahead of me. This was definitely where I needed to be.
Opening the glass door, refreshing, cool air washed over my face, although it had a bit of a stagnant smell to it. A sort of ‘abandoned building’ smell I recognized from my days of urban exploration. However, this wasn’t that smell. When Greta was pregnant, we’d been house hunting. We’d seen places with a similar stench. Our realtor said a lack of air circulation was causing the stench. I tried to ignore it as I continued further inside the lobby of the building.
I wasn’t surprised to see trees growing up through the tiles and reaching toward the roof. Vines climbed along the walls too. Something about them made me feel as if they were sentient. It felt as if they watched me and waited. Despite those trees being there, this place seemed clean. Sterilized. An uncanny mixture of simultaneously being alive and dead. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was trespassing here. But I wasn’t. This is where the path leads. This is the way home. I expected someone to come walking down one of the staircases to tell me I shouldn’t be there. Then, I’d be assaulted again somehow. But no one did.