A Life On Fire (5 page)

   He had no idea how far he’d walked, but he had to have covered some serious distance. When he’d checked his cell phone to see what time it was, the display was alternating between the question mark and the skull and crossbones and wouldn’t do anything else. He guessed it had to have been at least four or five hours, but the sun didn’t appear to be moving and he was extremely hungry. Hunger always seemed to make time go slower.

   He hadn’t found any water yet, either, but had drunk two of the beers. Given the direct sunlight and the apparent unavailability of water, he was trying to conserve everything. But maybe that was the problem. Mr. Holman had said he was overthinking it. That it wasn’t about where. Maybe the point was to let everything go and merely be.

   Or maybe he was hungover, food and water deprived, and plain exhausted. Whatever, Gerald wasn’t quite ready to ditch all his stuff on a whim.

   He continued walking, seemingly to no avail. After what had to be many more hours, he kept walking simply because he had nothing else to do. Eventually, he discovered a water puddle. He was skeptical about the safety of the water, but when one of the vulture-gator birds flew over and drank, he decided it was probably safe enough. Drinking from a water puddle wasn’t the most enjoyable thing he’d ever done, but there was no arguing with the results. After several minutes of gulping, he felt entirely rejuvenated. Maybe not up to running a marathon, but certainly good enough to keep on walking.

   By some blessed coincidence, the sun started to set shortly after he drank the water. Between the extra energy and the lack of sun beating down on him, he felt as if he could go all night.

   And there was an idea he hadn’t given much thought: nighttime in this place. Given that the sun setting was out of his control, he tried not to worry, but pictured the vulture-gators swooping around overhead, and god knows what else he hadn’t seen yet . . .

   He stopped walking, opened his pack, and got out the two flashlights. He tested them both and put them in his front pockets. Just in case. He also made note of the foil blanket and figured it might be a good idea to build a small shelter with it before it got too dark. He knew it wouldn’t do any good as real protection, but it would likely make him feel better.

   He continued walking and, like a ton of bricks, all of his energy dropped away. One moment he was fine, the next he felt dead. “Sit down for awhile,” he said. He knew there was no real point in speaking and that, hopefully, no one was listening, but it helped maintain his sanity.

   Dropping the backpack and removing the flashlights from his pockets, Gerald sat down in the middle of the road. He dug around for one of the cigarette packs, got one out and lit up.
Good thing I started smoking again
, he thought. He had unintentionally guaranteed he’d have a lighter with which to start a fire. The weather was definitely way too warm for one, but most animals were repelled by fire and he’d feel better with one going when he finally went to sleep.

    Sleep proved to come before the fire. He didn’t even finish his cigarette. After he’d drifted off, it fell from the corner of his mouth, rolling into a divot in the road.

Chapter 11

What the hell is that noise oh my god quit screaming
, Gerald thought, as he was woken up by the blaring car horn. He snapped open his eyes to see a car barreling down on him, horn blaring, tires screeching.

   Gerald screamed, rolling out of the road.

   The driver slowed without stopping completely, rolled his window down and yelled, “What the fuck is the matter with you? Get a job you fucking bum!” then sped away. Gerald stood up, thinking about how he’d almost been hit by the car—

   A car!

   Was he back in his normal world? He looked around, seeing only road and trees, but noticed they looked a little more familiar. Up ahead, he could see a stop sign with a road name sign adjacent to it. He ran full tilt, got to the road, and found he was within a mile of his house. He cut through some woods, across a field, and was back in his own yard within the hour.

   He felt like a sailor who’d been in a lifeboat for weeks, falling to his knees and kissing the ground in front of his home. He almost stood up and screamed “Hallelujah,” but managed to stop himself. He wasn’t so sure of his sanity any longer, but didn’t think there was any reason to convince the neighbors he was crazy.

   He unlocked the door, walked inside, and went straight for the kitchen, pulling a box of cereal from the top of the refrigerator and pouring it into his mouth. He saw a bag of potato chips on the counter, dropped the cereal, and went for them. After that, he stuck his mouth under the tap and drank greedily, slurping and gulping until he thought he would vomit.

   Hunger satiated, he wanted a shower. Discarding his clothing on the way to the bathroom, he stepped into the shower, cranked both the hot and cold wide open, and rejoiced in the blast of water. He didn’t even bother to adjust the temperature for five minutes, content with the water beating down on him. Once the initial euphoria wore off, exhaustion set in, and he sank to the tub floor, shivering in the now cooling water.

   He got out, grabbed a towel, half-heartedly dried himself off and went to his bedroom, collapsing onto the queen-size bed. He didn’t move a muscle for the next 12 hours, didn’t hear his phone ringing when Matilda called to see where the hell he was, nor did he hear her knocking on the front door a few hours later. He didn’t hear the police calling to say his car had been found, wrecked and abandoned, nor did he hear the officer pounding on his door to tell him the same thing a few hours after Matilda had been there.

   Worst of all, he didn’t hear the gator-faced creatures enter his home, pick him up, and carry him, naked, through the field behind his house and into the forest.

Part 2

The body is a damn hard thing to kill.

- Anne Sexton

Tracy lies in the bathtub, numb, but not from the cold water. She can’t remember ever having felt this low. Highs and lows. What she used to have. Now just the lows, with the lows becoming increasingly lower. When she’d first met Gerald, no matter how low she was, she knew she’d bounce back, the high making it worth it. There was always a light, sometimes unbelievably dim, unrecognizable to anyone but her, but still there. Now . . . no high.

   
No light.

   
No anything.

   
A memory: The two of them together at the county fair. They’d gone to eat the deep fried food, ride the nausea-inducing rides, and play the games to win the crappy prizes. It was hot, dusty, noisy, and generally chaotic, but they were having a wonderful day. They’d eaten the food, ridden the rides, and won the prizes.

   
As they were leaving, a girl, seemingly close to their own age, said hello to Gerald. He stopped and responded, giving her a quick hug. Tracy immediately disliked, no,
hated
the girl.

   “
This is Sara,” Gerald said. “Sara, Tracy.”

   “
Hi,” Sara said, smiling a genuine smile. Tracy couldn’t manage the same. Though they’d never met previously, she knew Sara. Sara was Gerald’s high school girlfriend, the one he’d been with for almost five years. They had stayed together through most of college, were each other’s first loves, had lost their virginity together.

   
And Tracy was supposed to shake this bitch’s hand and smile? No fucking thanks.

   
So she’d responded, “Oh hi, great to meet you,” dripping with sarcasm and a purposely fake smile before turning and walking away.

   
Gerald apologized to Sara and ran after Tracy. Gerald caught up with her and, before she could stop herself, before she even knew what she was doing, she began screaming “That fucking bitch” repeatedly.

   
Later that evening, Tracy had collapsed to the floor, sobbing. She had no idea why the jealously had struck her. She’d never heard Gerald say anything to indicate he was still interested in Sara. Never heard anything bad about their time together to give her grounds to hate the poor girl. She apologized for hours and, though he assured her it was okay, she knew it was definitely not okay. That it would never be okay.

   
She’d felt low in her life many times before, but that was the night she realized she wanted to die.

   
She still holds the razor and begins drawing it up her other leg. She stops at her inner thigh, applies a bit too much pressure and the razor slips a little, drawing blood. She watches as the slight trickle drips down, turning pink in the water. Nothing dramatic like she might see on TV, but several small drops, enough to discolor the water a bit.

   
So strange that pink was the color normally associated with little girls. Happy little girls with Barbie dolls, bows in their hair, and dreams of rainbows and ponies. Happy little girls who should never grow up to lie in bathtubs, hating themselves, fascinated by the sight of their blood in the water.

Chapter 12

Everything was upside down. Gerald opened his eyes to see trees growing down from the dirt sky. After the initial disorientation of sleep wore off, it occurred to him that he was probably the one who was upside down, not that the sensible explanation was the prevailing one as of late.

   The next thing he realized was that he was tied up, hands behind his back, gagged, and hanging from a tree limb. It didn’t seem like he was more than three or four feet off the ground, but that was more than he’d like to drop with his hands bound. He couldn’t remember how the hell he’d gotten here, couldn’t remember anything besides walking for what seemed like forever, finally getting home, and crashing. He couldn’t remember any obvious segue from passed out in bed to upside down in the tree.

   He didn’t get long to think about it before someone (or something) poked him in the back, spinning him around. The someone (which proved to be more of a thing) poked its face into Gerald’s, baring its teeth at him. Gerald had never gotten such a close-up look at the alligator-faces before. Up close it looked less like an alligator than he’d previously thought, but no less disturbing. The thing’s breath, stinking like putrefied rotten death, was the worst part.
If this was a movie, I’d ask if it wanted a breath mint, then punch it in the face, or some other clever shit like that
, Gerald thought. As it was, he was content to hang and hope the ugly bastard didn’t chew his nose off.

   The creature turned to another of its kind, cried out, and gestured toward Gerald. One of the nasty fuckers chuffing that rot breath had been enough. He didn’t think he’d be able to choke back the vomit if there were two of them. Gerald forgot all about the bad breath when the second creature walked toward him with a wicked-looking weapon. It held a stick with a rock tied to each end, one sharpened like a large spearhead, the other blunt and round. Bash their brains in with one end, then stab them to death with the other.

   Gerald tried to turn away from the creature, not that it would have done any good. He’d be no better off with his back bashed and stabbed than his face or chest. He grimaced, closed his eyes, and hoped the creature would finish the job quickly.

   “Shit,” Gerald said as he felt something slicing down (up) his chest. He opened his eyes to see it was the sharp end of the creature’s spear-thing. “Get the fuck off me,” he said in vain.

   The creature stopped for a moment, opened its four-cornered mouth, and shrieked at him. Gerald recoiled, and the creature made a staccato breathing sound. Laughter? Gerald assumed it was, then quit thinking about anything when it started cutting him again. He couldn’t see the wounds, but felt rivulets of blood flowing into his face. One of the streams flowed right into his inverted nostrils, causing him to choke before sneezing blood back out. The creatures stopped suddenly and laughed their choppy laughter. The one with the stick resumed its cutting.

   Gerald didn’t know how much blood he’d lost, was sure it wasn’t as much as it seemed like, but knew it couldn’t be good. As if it could hear his thoughts, the creature quit cutting. Both creatures backed away a few steps. Gerald tried to watch them through his blood soaked eyes, spitting out small mouthfuls. He saw the creature flip the spearhead toward its mouth, saw its tongue extend and lick the blood from the stone blade, moaning as it did so. Gerald didn’t know if the mouthful of blood or the creature’s moaning disgusted him more. The first creature stepped toward him again, extending its own tongue, and began lapping the blood from his chest and stomach. He winced and cried out as the creature’s saliva burned his cuts.

   “Get the fuck off me,” he said again, squirming as both creatures now traced their tongues along his sliced body. His chest and stomach burned in agonizing pain, nearly causing him to pass out. When the creatures began licking the blood from his neck and face, he wished he had.

   Once Gerald was either clean or they’d gotten their fill, they stepped back, and the creature with the spear raised it to the side. It looked fairly similar to a golf stance. Too late to even cry out in protest, Gerald realized what it was doing, and saw the rock swinging toward his head.
Oh, sh—
was all the further he got in his head before the swing connected, bringing first a million stars then utter blackness upon him.

Gerald came to, naked, lying in a heap on the forest floor. He looked around, everything once again right side up. No sign of the creatures anywhere. His hands were no longer bound. He brought them to his head, remembering the five-hundred yard drive swing they’d taken at him. Unbelievably, he felt okay. A swing like that with a rock like that should have split his head open, yet here he was, not a bump, a bruise, nothing. He started to get up and his chest and stomach clenched, nearly seizing. He fell to his side, convulsing slightly. It felt as if he’d been torn inside out and reassembled with pieces left over. He looked down and saw that, even though the head blow hadn’t left a mark, the creature’s work with the spear certainly had.