by Amanda Frame
“Really? Haven’t you been dealing with this for a while? I mean, you’ve got to be…well, you’re just…”
“So old?” He smiled, and I cringed inwardly and tucked my hair behind my ears. I was trying to put it more delicately. He backed away so I could see more of him, and flexed his scrawny, wrinkly arm like he was some sort of pathetic body builder. “This right here?” He pointed at his bicep with mock offense. “This physique clearly isn’t more than forty years old!”
I laughed at the ridiculousness. John was pretty cool. I was kind of mad at myself for never getting to know him better. We clicked in a weird way, and I felt comfortable around him…once I got past the drugging incident, of course. He didn’t seem the grandfatherly type. More like a cool uncle vibe. I thought of asking if he had any grandkids but then remembered how sad he got when I mentioned his family.
His expression became serious again as he continued, “I’ve been traveling back and forth between the Void and our plane for…” He paused as though doing the math. “Ten years, now. Fifteen years, if I am counting from the first time it happened by accident.”
“Wow. Is that how you know so much about it?” I asked.
He chuckled again. “I don’t know as much about it as you think I do. Most of the terms I use I came up with myself. And most of my knowledge is based on assumptions I had that proved to be true. There aren’t really many people I can ask.” He gestured towards the otherwise empty house.
“It’s just us?” I asked, sitting up straight, a pang of anxiety shooting down spine.
“You’re the only one I’ve run into. On this plane.”
“So there are people on the other plane, too?”
John leaned on the counter and looked at me pointedly. “You are certainly asking a lot of questions.”
“How else do you expect me to learn?”
He sighed, “I know, I just haven’t spoken to anyone about this in a long time. I’ve never had to explain it from scratch before.”
“Okay…” I chewed my lip, thinking for a moment. “How about I stop asking questions and you just talk?”
He paused, then nodded. “Let’s go sit on the couch; you might want to get comfortable.”
I followed him into the living room. I took a seat on the couch and he sat in the recliner, which was turned slightly in my direction, pointed at the TV in the corner. He closed his eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, and began.
“As far as I can tell, most people, if not all, occasionally appear in the Void. They don’t know it. It’s like they’re in both places at once and can only see our plane. It’s then that they are vulnerable.” He paused again, clearly gathering his thoughts. It took everything I had not to fill the silence with a barrage of questions.
He began again, “I first saw a Leech when I was a kid. It was drawn to a guy who was briefly in the Void because he was very angry.”
“Because he was angry? That’s why people appear there?” I couldn’t help interrupting.
“Sometimes. I’ve consistently observed that when people are in the Void, they are experiencing strong emotion. Usually negative, but sometimes positive. I have a theory that because the Void is so empty, it’s like a vacuum. When someone is furious or scared or immensely happy, it is strong enough to leak through and get caught in the vacuum of the Void.”
“How have you figured all this out?” I asked, mystified.
“I was trapped there for more than a year.”
~
“What? A year?” I was shocked.
He chuckled sadly, “Yeah. It was quite…life-changing.” He grinned and his eyes lost focus, as though indulging in an inside joke with himself.
“But how? How did you get stuck? How did you get back? What happened?” I was riveted, sitting on the edge of the couch, hands clenched in my lap.
“I think that’s a story you might be overwhelmed with right now. Let’s fill you in on the basics first.”
“Okay.” I tried to not sound disappointed. I was kind of ashamed and embarrassed to admit to myself that while all of this was for sure scary and bizarre, it was also sort of…exciting.
John opened his mouth to continue speaking but I burst out a question before he could start. “What about the root of all of this? What the hell is the Void? Why is it there? Why does it even exist?”
He shook his head slowly and I felt my heart sink. “Those are the questions I’ve been asking myself for fifteen years. I have no idea.”
“I feel like there’s got to be some kind of documentation. Someone has to have written about this. I mean, there are weirdoes who write down all sorts of crazy stuff they think has happened to them.” I began to tick off on my fingers. “Alien abductions, vampires, ghosts, I read an entire novel about a guy who thought he had been to Hell. Someone has info on this. Hell, I bet someone has a blog about this. No one has a filter online nowadays.”
John nodded. “The internet is a huge place. I’ve done research but haven’t found anything concrete. I even went to a lecture series about Greek and Roman mythology hoping to get a hint. I’m sure there is something out there, but I stopped looking years ago. Feel free to take a crack at it.” Damn right, I would.
“For sure. So what are these Leeches?” I asked anxiously, remembering the skittering shadow that followed Brian out of the library. A rock of guilt sat in the pit of my stomach and pressed my hands to belly, trying to ease the ache.
“It’s my name for any creature that lives in the Void because they all survive the same way. They leech off of the emotions that seep through the barrier. It is their primary sustenance. It’s the only explanation. Some are more timid and will avoid me as much as I avoid them. Others seem to seek out confrontation. Whether with humans like me, who are few and far between, or other Leeches. It wasn’t an easy place to live for a year. I learned to…survive…pretty quickly.”
“That sounds so awful.” I shivered, imagining not knowing that there was a creature feasting on you that you couldn’t see or touch.
“It was awful for me, sure. But as far as the people who they are leeching off of, they usually don’t even know. They aren’t killing anyone, and it’s simply how they survive. It isn’t their fault.” I was taken aback for a moment. He saw my expression and continued, “don’t get me wrong, it’s terrifying, and Leeches are dangerous and can be violent and cruel, but they’re simply trying to survive just like any other creature.”
“But aren’t they hurting people?” I asked.
“Well, yes and no. They drain a person’s astral form, which then has to draw energy from their physical body. So a person who was leeched will often be tired and cranky, or if they were leeched badly, they might get seriously ill.”
“So is that why Brian looked so horrible the day after I saw him get uh…leeched?”
“Unfortunately, no. From what you have described to me, it sounds like he didn’t have any sudden emotional thing happening to him, so I’m thinking he was in the Void very dimly, maybe because of stress or anxiety. If I remember from my last days of high school, it’s pretty stressful. There are some places Leeches like to hang out, places where there are a lot of astrals. Hospitals, schools at certain times of the year, any place that’s really crowded, like a large city.”
“Astrals?” I said quizzically. “As in astral projection? That thing where someone can supposedly leave their body when they sleep?”
“Not just when they sleep, but yes. It seemed like a fitting term,” he replied, taking a slow sip of lemonade. It baffled me how calm he was. But like he said, he’d been dealing with this for more than a decade.
This still all seemed like a dream. Or a really riveting movie. The kind that draws you in so you almost forget it isn’t real. Except this time there was no pause button. I was along for the ride whether I wanted to be or not. And I was pretty sure I didn’t.
CHAPTER 21
JOHN
I backed away a few feet, still in shock. Then I snapped. I dropped to my knees
, not even noticing the pain that shot up my thighs from landing hard on the road. Silent sobs wracked me, hands clapped over my mouth to trap the screams.
I sat back on my heels, still gawking at the mangled form on the ground. I leaned forward and gagged, but nothing came up. Then the body, my body, my dead body, faded from existence.
Tripping over my own feet, I got up and ran. How far I ran, I don’t know, but I couldn’t outrun the image of brain matter splattered on the road, staining the gray asphalt a sickly shade of dark pink. It was burned into my mind. I stumbled to a halt and leaned over the dead grass, gagging again.
I looked up shakily to see a house I didn’t recognize. The light blue front door set in yellow stucco reminded me of my own. I needed to stop and rest. Or hide. Or have a mental breakdown.
As was typical of the Void, the colors around me were muted, and the grass looked brittle and dying. It wasn’t hot outside either. The heavy air was a neutral room temperature. As I walked toward the house, I noticed the house lacked texture. Instead of the rough walls typical of homes in the hot climate of southern Florida, it created barely any sensation under my fingertips as I ran them over the wall next to the front door.
I rested my forehead on the wall for a moment, arms dangling limply by my sides, and took a deep shuddering breath. Get it together.
I opened the door and some of the frame crumbled and fell next to my feet. That was when I noticed I was still wearing both sandals, even though I swore I had seen one sitting near the mangled corpse miles behind me. I shuddered, once again seeing the image in my head.
I stepped inside, into a foyer with dirty cracked tiles and a crumbling wooden staircase to the right leading to a second floor. As I walked into the house I immediately realized my stupidity. There might be other monsters hiding out in here. Was the Void full of them, or were they rare? Maybe they took shelter in the empty houses, just like I was planning on doing. But what the hell else was I supposed to do? I couldn’t stay out in the open. I would be vulnerable. I could climb up a tree, but how would I sleep? And that mantis thing was at least seven feet tall, and who knew if it could climb. I figured I had no choice.
I was a pretty muscular guy, having been on the wrestling team for a few months now. Well, I used to be on the wrestling team.
But now I’m dead.
I was strong and capable. Maybe I could find a weapon and if worse came to worst, I could fight one of these monsters off. What was the worst that could happen? Could I die again? And if I did, the nightmare would be over, and maybe that would be a relief. What was I, anyway? What part of me had survived in this place? My mind? My soul? It certainly wasn’t my body, even though I felt like a physical being.
I pushed that thought aside for now and looked for a weapon. I tiptoed further into the house and came across a living room with a gaudy fake fireplace. There was a full set of decorative fireplace tools, which included a poker and a small shovel with a long handle. They were rusting and dusty but looked like they had potential to inflict damage. I grabbed both and crept back towards the stairs.
I decided to leave the front door unlocked—although it wouldn’t be hard to break through anyway—to make a quick exit if necessary. I treaded delicately up each step, trembling, but straining my ears for the slightest noise, clutching the poker with a white-knuckled grip. The stairs creaked, but it was muffled as though they were covered in carpet.
There were three rooms and a bathroom upstairs, all in poor condition. There was no water in the cracked toilet and the faucet didn’t turn on. The largest bedroom had a bed with a stained mattress and some bare shelving. Another bedroom was painted a dull pink and had a bare twin bed frame. The last room contained only a desk.
I had learned through my several trips to the Void that there were rarely details or personal items anywhere. Every once in a while when I crossed over, I’d see an abandoned toy in a front yard or a personal ad tacked to a telephone pole.
Crossed over…I hadn’t thought of it that way before.
I went back to what was presumably the master bedroom and sat on the bed, placing my newfound weapons beside me on the mattress. I hung my head and scrubbed my hands over my eyes, thinking.
Okay. I’m probably stuck here. I tried to think of any way this might not be true, but how could I not be? I had no body to return to. I choked back a sob.
I don’t know how or where to find food and water. I wasn’t hungry or thirsty, though, which was good news, even though I hadn’t eaten since this morning and hadn’t drunk anything since the lemonade, which was probably hours ago, and then ran God only knows how far.
How would I keep myself safe? Would these things hurt me if they had the chance? And what other dangers were here? I couldn’t imagine that there were none.
I decided to just lay low for a while. Maybe try and sleep. I wasn’t tired, though. I prayed for sleep to take me. Anything to escape reality for just a little while. I was afraid of being alone with my thoughts.
I noticed through the presumably west-facing window that the foggy, slightly green-tinted, dull sun was setting. It had been midmorning when this whole ordeal started…
since I died
…and I couldn’t imagine that it was dusk already. Had that much time gone by? Or did time flow differently here? What is here? What is this place?
Where was I?
CHAPTER 22
ANNA
I stood in the middle of my room staring at the ten numbers on the screen, the giant green phone icon just waiting to be touched. I hovered my finger over it with a mix of dread and anticipation boiling in my gut. Just do it. Sighing, I hit the button and held the phone to my ear.
Ring. Ring. Ring. Ring.
I was about to hang up, half relieved, half worried that Brian wasn’t answering.
“Hello?” a female voice answered. I was startled.
“…uh, sorry, wrong num…” I began.
“Are you looking for Brian?” she interrupted.
“Oh. Um, yes.”
“This is his mother. Can I help you?” She sounded exhausted.
“Um maybe? My name is Anna Flores, I was with Brian when…”
“Oh yes, Anna. Hi. You’re the one who called 911? It’s good to hear from you,” she said with a little more enthusiasm.
“It is? I mean, yeah. I uh…” God, I was so awkward. I had had a conversation planned out assuming that Brian would answer his phone.
“I was going to try to contact you to see if we could discuss what happened. The teacher who was there said you and Brian were alone in the hallway when she came across you two. No one I’ve spoken to so far can tell me much about what happened. I was hoping maybe you have some more details that can maybe help the doctors figure out what’s going on.”
I was not expecting this and had no idea what to say.
“Um, well they said he had a seizure, right?” I sat on my bed. My legs had turned to jelly. “The doctors? Like, as in more than one?” I asked.
I heard Mrs. Wilkes take a deep shaky breath, as though steeling herself for her next words.
“Yes. We’ve brought him to three different specialists. There’s more going on than just seizures and we could really use as much information as possible…” she trailed off as though thinking, then began again, “Would you mind just coming over here, sweetheart? I’d really like to write everything down you can tell me.”
“Oh. Uh, yeah. Of course.” I was struggling to keep my voice steady, not let the guilt crack through. “When do you want me to come?”
“Well, I know it’s getting a bit late now…how about tomorrow morning? I know it’s Saturday but there’s a boy stopping by around ten…Aaron, uh, Norman? I think that’s his name. He’s coming to drop off some things of Brian’s that were left in the locker room.”
“Aaron Norberg?” I asked. “Yeah, sure. I can come then.” I felt a bit better knowing Aaron would be there and I wouldn’t be alone with Brian.
“Thank you
so much, Anna. We really appreciate it. I’ll text you the address. I’m sure Brian will be happy to see you.”
I was fairly certain he wouldn’t be.
~
I sat in my mom’s car in Brian’s driveway. She had insisted on driving me but I had finally talked her out of it. I checked my phone for the tenth time. 10:06. Aaron’s car was here. I assumed he was inside already.
With a sigh, I peeled myself off the driver’s seat and pushed open the car door, setting one foot on the pavement. You can do this.
Each step felt like my feet were made of lead, but I finally made it to the front door. Before I could ring the bell, a woman opened the door and ushered me in.
“Oh, hi, Mrs. Wilkes,” I stammered awkwardly.
“Anna, come in, come in.” Her hair was frazzled and she had dark circles under her eyes. She looked drained. I felt awful all over again.
“Please sit.” She led me over to the living room and pointed to the couch. I sat. She pulled up a folding chair and sat across from me, looking uncomfortable, a glass coffee table separating us with a pen and notepad waiting anxiously on top.
She took a deep breath and stared at me expectantly. I just looked back at her, not sure what I was supposed to do.
“Um, so…how’s Brian?” She seemed to not even hear me even though she was looking right at me. Or through me.
“Do you think you can tell me a bit about what happened, sweetheart?” she asked, staring at her notepad with a fierce determination in her eyes. She was a mama bear refusing to give up on her cub.
“Yeah. Uh, yeah. He looked like he wasn’t feeling very well, so I had stopped to ask if he was okay—” not true “—and then when I was about to walk up to him, that teacher came around the corner and saw the same thing I did. He just, like…had a seizure, I guess—” also a lie “—like…like they said.” I shrugged. “I’m sorry. I wish there was something else I could do for him.”
I was hoping to God there was; I needed to make this right. Fix what I screwed up. Whatever that was.