purgatory

"I don't want to be here," Alice said peevishly, cocking her head to the side. "The world I came from is above me. It is dark here but still worse below. I have been falling for quite some time, and I'd really like to climb out."

The rabbit twitched his nose and wisely said, "If you should land, you would certainly be doomed. But you would grow accustomed to it in time, the strangeness, the cruelty, the fear, they would soon become old friends. Your fate would intertwine with theirs. You would have your own tree, with a bowed branch, to rest your head upon. You would rename the constellations, and learn to defy gravity. You would swim for hours without drowning. Your companions, no longer unsavory, would console you."

Alice brightened up a bit at this prospect. "I could swim for hours without drowning?"

"You could, and you would. Your skin would bit by bit wear away, and a new skin would take its place, and then you would truly belong."

Alice began to weep softly. "I like my skin, Rabbit. How do I stop falling? I want to go home."

Rabbit sighed, glancing at his watch. "I suppose you'll have to climb."

she was painting her toenails when she got the news. struggling with the lid of the nail polish, she answered on the fourth ring.

before it sank in fully, she had already dropped the phone.

the color drained from the room, ebbing from the lamp shades and the curtains, dulling the upholstery and the carpet to a muted glow. suffocation squeezed her heart like a myriad of tiny tightening ribbons punctuated by an adder's persistent sting. mutely she stared at the nail polish in its bottle, glossy red droplets dripping down the side from the hastily replaced brush. a litany ran through her head like a series of commandments. i will not eat. i will not sleep. i will not talk. i will not breathe.

she marvelled at the puppeteer controlling her body as it stood up and briefly wondered if it was god.

a soft, warm sponge gently wiped her mind clean. the objects she encountered no longer had definition in form or function. dazedly she stepped outside and tried to recollect what the object in her driveway was before dismissing the effort. she sat on the bench, tracing her finger along the chipped paint of its hard wooden surface, watching a small drop of blood pool up where a sliver of wood had entered, she tilted the finger back and forth, watching the sun play with the dark red surface. she sat there some time. she shifted on the bench; it felt hard, real, uncomfortable.

quietly the forms around her regained their outlines and again had substance, suffused with painfully over-bright hues, overtaking her consciousness like wind over blades of grass, gently bending each thought, leaving brief impressions that hardened into wooden memories. her mind now raced with the quiet din of what had come to pass.

a new litany began. i loved. i was loved. i love still.

a beginning and an end

Once upon a time a child was born whose parents loved him very much.

...

That night the boy went to sleep and dreamt that everything was perfect and no one was ever sad.

may 21, 1964

I had that dream again last night, the one where Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny loom menacingly in front of me, gongs sounding in the background, cameras pointed at me, and all I feel is pure, abject fear. I told my wife about it, and she told me to stop hitting the hooch so often. It's her answer to everything. The thing is, I've started to see them in my waking life, too. If I see a man with a white beard out of the corner of my eye, I break out in that same cold sweat, and only sheer willpower keeps me from running like hell in the other direction. We now never visit Jane and Howard, friends of ours, ostensibly because they've become too busy since they had the fourth kid, but I've been maneuvering us away - they have a white cat.

Went to the bar after work with a couple buddies, that dream was in my head all day, I was hoping a few stiff ones might knock it right back out. It worked like a charm. A few hours of banter and I was feeling pretty good, walking home in the crisp evening air, I even felt up to seeing my wife. I can bear her disappointment better when everything is a little bit muted, when my brain is a little bit numb. And I can certainly bear it better without the fear that Santa Claus is lurking around the corner to get me. Sheesh, like I don't got enough problems.

She didn't seem as willing to see me as I was to see her, however. She greeted me with a cold, appraising look, then turned heel into the kitchen to remove supper from the oven. "I kept it warm for you," she said.

"Thanks, honey," I replied, grabbing her waist to pull her in for a kiss - or so I thought, but she flinched and wiggled away.

I sighed, grabbed the plate she offered, then skulked into the den. I settled into a book while eating, dropping bits of casserole on the oriental carpet that I ignored, tonight, I wasn't in the mood.

Gretchen

I pull the trigger and the wall behind her is sprayed red. I know she isn’t dead though. Gretchen is too big of a pain in the ass to die easily.

“You bastard,” she spits. “You God damned bastard.”

But this isn’t a movie. This isn’t a novel. This is payback. This is business. Hell, this is pleasure. There will be no long winded speech. I walk up to her, put the barrel against her temple, and paint the rest of the room.

Sarah has dinner ready for me when I get home. Meatloaf. It must be Friday.

“How was your day?” she asks.

“Fine. Good. Same as usual,” I say. This is not a lie.

Daybreak.

Last night I dreamt that I was driving in a snow storm, and when I opened my eyes I was staring at the muted sun coming through the hotel room's curtains.