Monday, December 23, 2013

The Culmination

The empty, dark living room is silent as I open the front door and step inside, shaking from more than just the cold. I can hear every quiet little creak of the building as the freezing wind whips past it outside, feel every pang of the subtle little chill from the heater not being on, and sense every article of winter clothing that hits the floor with a soft swish as it drops to the floor from my person…

It happened again today. Another anxiety attack while I was out, just before the storm hit. Another lapse of control, another thing to layer onto all the other things I couldn’t bear anymore. I shuddered at the demon from the church, at the feeling of being watched all the way home.

Enough, stop Michael, stop thinking about them, please… you’re running out of pills, you can’t just keep relying on them to stop it… calm down. Please calm down. Calm down!

But I can’t. I can’t just calm down, not when my mind keeps swimming with a thousand thoughts about the Priest, the Man, the Surgeon, the words of the Old Woman and her Birds… all the monsters that keep following me. My mind aches with thoughts of them, of Andrea’s slow death, of how pointless it all is…

I yank my heavy winter boots off my feet, collapsing onto the couch and burying my face in my hands. My breath comes out in shuddering heaves as I struggle to control myself, and the tears start up again, dripping out between my fingers like water from a leaking faucet. Damn it, I thought I had those under control!

The faucet in the kitchen sink is dripping, but I barely hear it over my own thoughts.

They’re all laughing at me, the things haunting me. I know it. They’re probably watching right now from where I can’t even see them and dreaming up new ways to torture me, new ways to push my buttons and pick at old wounds, new ways to get under my skin… Not to mention the shit that just keeps piling, one after another, onto me concerning poor Andrea… Oh God, I can’t imagine how she’s suffering, unaware even of the pain she’s in, unable to even cry out for help…

Oh God, no. No, Michael, stop; don’t even start thinking about that. Please. Dear God, please…

And then my cell phone rings.

I lift my face from my shaking fingers, glaring at the innocent gadget as if it’s about to bite me. No. You better not. Don’t you even be from the hospital. I swear to God, if you’re from that damn oncologist, you can take your message and fuck right off, because I can’t take any more tonight. Not tonight. Dear Christ, please, not tonight…

My hand, betraying me, quietly reaches for the phone, lifting it to my ear and answering as I shove the anxiety back.

“… Hello?” I’m alarmed at how emotionless my voice sounds for how much I’m burning inside.

“Hello, Mr. Zarkoff?” The oncologist’s voice is filled with weariness. “Are you alright? I don’t want to interrupt if you’re busy…”

“I’m fine,” I lie, cold-voiced. “Is Andrea alright?”

“Well…”

Well. He trailed off. Never a good sign, this isn’t a good sign, he’s going to say something horrible, I know it…

“Well?”
“Well. Andrea’s woken up and is alert right now, and she was looking as if she’d make a full recovery from the surgery, but…”

I remained silent, anticipating the worst.

“Unfortunately, the surgery took too much of a toll on her, Mr. Zarkoff. We’ve done our best, but Andrea…”

I become queasy as my mind races with my pulse.

“Oh God… Doctor, is… Is she…?”

“No, she’s still alive,” the oncologist responds, “But... I’m very sorry, Michael, but at this rate she has maybe two more days left to live. We’ve done all we can for her. I’m so sorry.”

My whole body goes numb, and I almost have to struggle not to laugh at the realization. Two weeks. She and the doctors fought long and hard for two weeks. She lived two weeks despite all that.

And now her life’s going to end in two days.

“… Mr. Zarkoff?”

I hang up, the phone falling aimlessly onto the couch. I’m going to lose her. In two days. When I could have done something two weeks ago. I could have stopped this. I could have prevented it all.

And the worst part about it is that I don’t feel a damn thing.

I don’t feel a damn thing, not as I go about wiping the tears from my face, not as I go about dressing in pajamas for bed later, not as I go into the bathroom to clean up for the night.

Not even as I look up into the mirror at the man reflected there, his face tired and worn from stress and his eyes red from tears. On some level, I know it’s my reflection, but he looks… he looks so defeated, so broken, so jaded…

I watch as the reflection’s face curls into a mask of pain, tears flowing down his face.

I look down at the wet spots forming on the bathroom sink’s countertop. It’s too much. Too much pain to bear. Too much on top of the pain of watching her die, of just how little I can even do besides watch her die…

I could have been there for her more. I could have done something sooner. I could have done anything besides just sit here and cry like a weak little boy. Why?

“Why?” I murmur, looking back up at the man in the mirror. “Why are you so pathetic, why are you so weak? Why didn’t you help her? Why are you such a goddamned coward, Michael?!

The image in the mirror snarls back at me as I scream at it, eyes filled with pain and rage. He stares at me, daring me to say another word, quietly seething just the same as I seethe…

My hand clenches into a fist against the slick glass of the mirror, and my gaze drops. I can’t. I can’t stare into those angry eyes again. I can’t stare into my own hate like that. I can’t. I can’t…

“Of course you can’t, Michael.”

I look up, confused at the voice that sounded so much like my own, and yet… yet I never spoke, I never said a word…

I almost cringe at the creature in the mirror in front of me. It looks like me, but… no, it’s not me, it can’t be me. I don’t have ragged, long hair, I don’t have predatory fangs and sharp, black talons for nails. The more I look at the image, the more I realize it’s nothing human. No human’s skin is marred with deep, black cracks like this creature’s is; no human breathes out thick black smoke with every breath like this thing. And no human has such demonic eyes, glowing like embers in the sunken sockets, malice in the darkness of its slit-shaped pupils…

“What’s wrong, Michael?” It coos in my own voice, snarling. “You scared again, you coward? Scared of yourself? Scared you’re losing it? Maybe you are, you lunatic. Maybe you’re finally going crazy, about damn time!”

I back against the far wall, staring at the demon mocking my own form, saying nothing. I’m not crazy. I’m not going crazy! I’m not!

“Oh yes you are, you loon,” the reflection accuses, pressing its hands against the glass from the inside. “You’re finally losing it because of that whore Andrea, right? Because you couldn’t do a damn thing to help her, because you were just so busy being a pitiful little wreck in the corner like you always are. All those creatures you keep seeing, they’re real, and you’re so weak that you couldn’t fight them off if you tried, could you? Could you, Michael?”

“Shut up,” I mumble, glowering at the image in the mirror and wiping at the tears on my face. “Don’t you dare talk shit about Andrea, and don’t you dare talk shit about me…”

“Ooh, I’m so scared, Michael!” The creature in the mirror grins, mocking me. “What’re you gonna do, throw Xanax at me until I go away like all the others? Oh, not the pills, oh no, my one weakness!”

The creature began to laugh deeply, cackling, and I felt my hands begin to shake with rage.

“Aww, is the little boy mad now? Is he finally fed up with all the bullshit he keeps feeding himself, or is he just pissed because I hurt his sensitive little snowflake feelings? Maybe if you weren’t so damn self-centered you could do something besides stand there and make an ass of yourself while your slut of a wife suffers.”

“Shut the fuck up!” I shriek, face burning in anger, “I’m done! I’m done with all this shit right the fuck now and you’re not helping!”

“Words and more stupid words,” the creature taunted, looking very bored. “Still waiting for your candy-ass to do something, Mikey… Oh wait, you won’t, will you? Because you counted on the bitch to do everything for you. The hell are your balls at?”

Before I could shout a response, another voice cut me off, feminine and familiar.

“He won’t do anything,” the voice said, “Because he’s burning.”

I look back towards the mirror again, staring at the image of another person, a familiar person… But there was something wrong with her – she was on fire, burning, positively glowing from the heat in herself.

“Dr. Hearth…?”

“You’re burning because you just keep on feeding the flames, don’t you, Michael?” Her face was a dispassionate mask. “How many damn times do we have to tell you not to add fuel to the fire before you stop doing it?

“Hey, nobody asked you, Burning Bitch,” the corrupted duplicate snarled at the therapist, turning towards her. 

“Oh, shut your yap, you dumb Brute, you couldn’t tell a fire from a mushroom cloud!”

“Fuck off and let me do my job, sweetiepie, the adults are talking,” the creature responded, dismissing the woman as her flames increased in intensity. “Besides, doesn’t matter whether he jumps in the fire, or sets fire to himself – he’s too damn weak to put it out anyway. And he always will be, won’t you, Michael?”

My eyes snapped back towards the sneering, corrupted version of myself in the mirror, and the dam burst.

“I thought I told you to shut the fuck up!

My fist came down on the nearby glass shelf full of candles, sending both it and the contents scattering all over the place. All I could see was red. All I heard was the sound of glass shattering, plastic shower drapes rending, the wooden door of the cabinet splintering as I tore it off its hinges…

“You think you got the better of me this time, you stupid motherfucker? You think you can tell me what I can and can’t do? This shit is not my goddamn fault and I am so fucking sick of all of you! I’m tired of being told I can’t do jack shit; I’m sick to goddamn death of the cryptic bullshit you assholes keep spouting at me! What the fuck do you expect me to fucking do when even the goddamn doctors can’t fucking save her?!”

I cocked my fist back, watching in a sort of animalistic pleasure as the woman vanished and the corrupted creature therein gave me a look of confused shock. It was almost as if he didn’t know what to do anymore, almost as if he were completely lost.

And then the mirror shattered under my fist, breaking with every blow in a spider-web of cracks. Again, I punched it, and again, and again until it was more crack than smooth surface, until the corrupted being was no longer visible, until it melted back into my own reflection, seething ten-thousand fold in the mirror’s ruined surface as I slowly began to calm back down.

Better? A voice asked in the back of my mind as I stared in horror at the destruction I just caused.

Oh God. I… Had I really been this angry at myself this whole time? So angry I destroyed my bathroom? So angry that even stupid, meaningless insults could push me over the edge?

So angry I could have hurt someone?

Jesus Christ, I need help…

Shaking, I stumble out of the bathroom, ignoring the little bleeding cuts on my knuckles as they dripped onto the floor. Dear God, I could have hurt someone. I can’t even control my anger, how in the hell can I control anything else?

But that’s the thing, I thought, numbly curling against the wall near the Christmas tree. I can’t control anything. Not because I’m weak, or pathetic or not strong enough. Because I didn’t act when I should have. What if I had? What if I had helped her before, or visited her more often once she got sick, what if I had taken control of the little things I could have before it got this far…?

The building creaked and groaned, the wind whispering in a raspy death’s rattle against the glass of the windows. Except… no, it wasn’t the wind, it was closer than that, in the building, in my apartment, in the walls…

Something began to scrape at the inside of the walls nearest to me, and I froze up in panic.

“You could have fixed it,” the dry, deathly voice hissed. “You could have fixed it all. Made it better. Told her it would be better…”

“I could’ve,” I murmured to myself, “So why didn’t I?”

“Because you are selfish.

You’re selfish, Michael, my thoughts responded, thoughts almost not my own, in a voice that wasn’t quite my own. What if you weren’t? What if you cared about her more? What if you had better control of yourself?

No. No no no. Shut up, you all shut up right now, it’s not my fault, it wasn’t my fault, I didn’t do this to her!

It’s not what you didn’t do, the alien thoughts continued, It’s what you did do, and you know it. You let the demons in. You let them all in. You let them push you into the corner, you let them squeeze out every drop of courage, you let your own fear devour you. And it’s still devouring you, it’s eating you alive, inside out. It’s going to kill you, Michael. One of these days it’s going to kill you, slowly, choking you alive…

Oh God. Oh God I don’t want to die, I don’t want to, I can’t think I can’t breathe I can’t do anything someone help me!

What if nobody comes to help you? What if you’re all alone? What if they find you dead in your apartment all alone, years later after everything has crumbled to dust?

The tears slide down my face as my breathing comes out in gasps. Oh God. Oh God I can see it, I can see it clinging to my walls in little grey veins, spreading like mold, rotting the walls, growing and spreading and destroying everything slowly, and… oh Christ….

Oh Christ, it’s inside of my body, too. I can feel it! It’s there, spreading its little mycelia through my flesh, through my veins, polluting my blood, devouring my mind. Oh God. I feel it, I feel my flesh rotting, I feel myself dying, I’m dying, I’m dying!

I shriek, and I feel the fuzzy spores clogging my throat, muffling the sound. I clutch my scalp and feel the skin peel off in flakes…

You always needed her, didn’t you, Michael? The voice continues, and now I recognize it, now I realize whose it is, now I hear her…

“Andrea?!” I cry out, panicked eyes searching the ruined walls of my home for her, seeing nothing. “Andrea, please, help me! Please, I…”

And no one responds. She’s not there. Of course she’s not there. She’s gone, she’s been gone since the cancer first invaded her body…

And the voice in my head laughs, and the whispering in the wall laughs, and they both just laugh and laugh as I curl up, sobbing, whimpering, begging for death to come. I’m losing her. I’m losing myself. She’s lost, and I’m lost, and the world will never be anything but wrong ever again. Because I let it happen. I caused this. I let her slip from my fingers and let myself crumble, I let the demons win. The world is all wrong now, and there’s not a damn thing I can do about any of it…

Another voice joins my sobbing, a small voice, filled with anguish. A child’s crying, I realize as I look warily up at the front door. And now… now, a knocking on the door, constant and insistent…

Horror reels in my gut and my head swims as I stare at the door, dreading the idea of it swinging open. The knocking had become a frantic pounding, desperate to get in. Had I locked it? I’m sure I have. Dear God I hope I did, please tell me I locked it, please…

There’s someone there. There’s someone there and he’s going to hurt you. Don’t open the door. Don’t open it. Don’t open it!

My breathing hitches, my hands tremble. The voice… the child’s crying, the knocking… it had been just enough to bring me back to reality, just enough to focus my mind, just enough to help me start to calm myself even as the fear continued to rise in a fever pitch…

I shove the fearful voice to the back of my mind and stand shakily, edging nervously towards the door.

Michael no. Michael please, Michael don’t!

My hand, the skin on it clear and completely healthy, reaches for the deadbolt, unlocking the door as I peer warily out of the peephole.

The Man is outside, the Man and the little girl, the Man without a face. He’s slamming both fists against the door as he stares back at me through the small opening. The little girl is staring up at me through the peephole with a look of extreme concern and fear on her face.

I stumble back from the door, falling onto my back as I start to scramble away from the door. Please, not you two. Not now, not again, I can’t deal with you right now too!

And still the pounding on the door increases in urgency.

“Michael, please!” cries Mori’s voice over the din, “Let him in, please!

“No!” I scream back, staring at the door as if it were a rabid wolf. “No!

“Michael…” Her voice cracked in a sorrow I didn’t know was possible for a child. “I don’t understand… Why do you hate him so much?”

“Because you won’t leave me alone!”
“But that’s what it wants, it wants you alone! Please, Michael, just calm down and think…
No, they’ll devour you, why trust a demon?!

“Because,” I murmur shakily, standing back up and touching the door, “They’re my demons.”

The door’s smooth, round handle turns in my hand, and the front door swings open, revealing…

Nothing. Nothing at all.

My skin crawls. Where are they, if they’re not outside…?

A tug on my pajama pants gives me the answer as I turn around. There in the corner stands the Man, observing with that nerve-wracking, eyeless gaze as always. And near to me stands Mori, her black dress tear-stained and her wide blue eyes welling with tears as she sniffled. It was heartbreaking to see, despite the fear both her and the man caused me, and my face fell into a mask of concern. Furthermore, it disturbed me. Every other time I’d seen the man and the girl, the little girl never had any sort of emotion on her face whatsoever, not even so much as a frown. So why now was she crying?

“What?” I murmured, watching the mold on the walls slowly begin to vanish. “What’s wrong, why are you crying?”

“Because he doesn’t understand, Mr. Michael,” she sniffled, wiping at her face. “He doesn’t understand why…”

“… Why what?” I asked nervously, anticipating something awful from the Man.

“He doesn’t understand why you’re so angry at yourself…”

My fear slowly gave way to nervous confusion as my eyes flicked from her to the Man and back again.

“But I’m… I’m not angry at myself, I’m –”

Mori’s little face screwed up in pain, and her upset poured uncontrollably down her face.

“That’s not what he told me!” the child screeched angrily, blue eyes blazing with as much scrutiny as the man’s stare. “You can’t stop Andrea from dying; it’s not even your fault! So why are you hurting yourself because of it? What good did that ever do?”

I stared blankly at her, then warily shifted my gaze to the Man that was not a man, the creature that had been following me since Andrea’s diagnosis. He stared unshakably back at me, through and into my eyes. Something was almost… concerned in the blank canvas stretched over where his face should be, the gaze of a father disappointed in his child. He didn’t want an answer, not this time. He wanted… he wanted something else…

“I…”

A terrible screech from the other room cut me off, inhuman and hollow, quickly followed by the sound of something sprinting towards me full-force. Instantly, both the Man and girl’s heads snapped up towards the noise, alarmed.

“Interloper! He is mine! He is my prey!

I barely had time to turn around before the emaciated being from my nightmare careened into the room, talons shredding the carpet as it barreled towards me. Except, it wasn’t a nightmare. This was real.

Oh God, that thing is… they’re all real?

“Michael, run!” Mori screams, jolting out of my thoughts as the creature prepared itself to pounce. My mind races, my pulse increases…

No.

No, not this time.

“Not this time,” I murmur, steeling myself for impact.

The creature, all fury and hatred, launched at me full-force, the hit knocking me back and to the ground. Sharp claws sliced into the skin of my arms as I struggled with the howling monster on top of me. Don’t let it hit something lethal, Michael; don’t let it win…

“Why fight me? You should be fighting yourself, you deserve it, I am only giving you what you deserve!”

“No you aren’t!” I screamed, struggling to get my foot in a position to kick the creature off, “I don’t deserve punishment for something I couldn’t have stopped, and I certainly don’t deserve it from you!”

My foot connected with the being’s gut, sending it flying into the wall with a yelp of confused fury. It scrambled to its feet again as I stood up, and I swear for a second that I saw a faintly familiar look in its hollow, black eyes, a look not unlike fear as it looked between me and the Man and the girl. A look that very quickly was drowned out by rage as it ran at me once more, screaming.

Suddenly, as if a switch on reality had flipped, the Man appeared between the running creature and myself, absurdly long arms splayed out to block the attack as he turned his head and looked to me. For a split, horrific second, I could have sworn I saw more arms extending from his back, ten, twenty or more of them all as rangy and spidery-handed as each other, an inhuman amount of branching, freakish arms…

The Man whirled on his heel then, and pushed me out of the way with a single freezing, thin hand just as the screeching, clawed monster launched itself at me.

And I fell, everything a blur.

I coughed and pulled myself onto my knees again, everything a blur of white. Wherever I landed, it was cold, freezing cold, horribly cold…

I blink and pull my shivering hands out of the snow bank, staring between it and the outside of the building. The park. I’m outside, in the park. How…?

I have little time to wonder exactly how or why, all I know is that I can’t stop coughing, I feel sick, it hurts, everything hurts…

The blizzard howls around me, chilling me to the core. The coughing fit turns to hacking, the hacking to spitting out something liquid and iron-tasting onto the cold, ice-covered ground. I stare at the red spackles on the snow, half-laughing as I bring my arms close to my shivering body.

And then I fell into darkness.

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