by Dave Welch
I couldn’t believe this, or maybe I didn’t want to accept it. I shook my head as Tom continued in his explanation.
“I followed you to a club. You walked right in without paying. I guess you knew the bouncer because he just stepped aside. He didn’t search you or anything. You followed a group of guys to the bathroom. I couldn’t make it in time to see exactly what happened. But when I did, you were physically attacking these guys.” Tom said.
“Go on.”
“You had a knife or something… You stabbed like four or five guys that night. I don’t know who those guys were or what they did to piss you off. And I was too afraid to ask. So, I assumed they were connected with your daughter’s death.” Tom hypothesized.
“That explains my bloody hands.” I concluded.
“After that, I followed you back home. You backed into your driveway, turned your car off and just sat there. For one whole week, you just sat in your car with your eyes closed. I didn’t tell anyone. But I would come over from time to time to bang on your window. I knew you were still alive because I could see you breathing,” Tom mentioned. “You were acting really odd, man.”
To me, this was very enchanting. I didn’t know who those guys were either, and I don’t remember driving off in Okani’s car.
“Where’d I take her car?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t follow you that day. I was too busy playing with microwaves.” Tom smirked as he gulped more of his water. “Sucks. I really wanted to meet her.”
“You just opened your eyes today, Derrick. That’s some major sleepwalking.” He proposed. “Or maybe you were being controlled by something else…”
Tom sat in silence with a peculiar smirk on his face.
“Some kind of strange. I tried to bring you over for Thanksgiving-”
“—Thanksgiving!”
“Yeah man…you wouldn’t budge.” Tom added.
“Na, naa wait…” I stammered while holding my face. “What day is it?”
“It’s Monday, uughhh, the twenty-ninth.” Tom answered.
I almost stopped breathing.
Tom had no idea of my plans for self-destruction. I was unaware of how much time had passed.
“What’s wrong? I mean, besides the obvious.” Tom asked.
I breathed with agitation. Tom kept sitting at the opposite end of the table, looking around as I stumbled about in my venomous thinking.
“Derrick?” Whispered Tom.
I blinked my eyes to prepare myself for the next day. I thought about how I was going to pull this off.
“Should we tell anyone, or just act as if it never happened?” Tom asked as his smirk wiped away.
I was getting extremely pissed, and Tom was the reason. He wasn’t helping at all.
“My name isn’t Derrick.” I retorted.
Tom looked awfully confused as I regained my focus.
“Who?” He asked.
“Don’t act like you don’t know. I’m a wanted man, a fugitive. I’ve committed many crimes, and I have assisted in numerous criminal activities. The police are looking for me now, and I would rather they shoot me on sight. I guess they think they’re going to get some answers out of me.” I bluntly stated.
Tom began to crumble as I looked vividly through his soul.
“I’m a dangerous and unstable, recovering crackhead. My daughter is dead because of me and my encounterable enemies.
You, Tom, are probably the only friend I have left. And I don’t want to endanger you or your family. I have to… I must ask you to distance yourself. There’s no help for me. Besides, after tomorrow, you’ll never see me again.” I sternly concluded.
Tom kept sitting there as if he was in denial, like he didn’t hear me. He was looking down to the table, holding onto his glass of water.
A peeling clash of duct tape trashed his ears as I snatched my 9mm from under the table.
Wham!
I slammed the gun down, sloshing water from his glass.
“Tom!” I hollered, startling his head up. “Please leave.”
He looked at the gun and then up to me with a face of fear. A terror like none other beat his eyes open.
“Please…” I begged, gently.
He began to tear up, and so did I. But I couldn’t let him see it.
Tom was truly a good person. He was a good friend that was only concerned about my well-being. This was why I had to free him from my hellraising, my lies, my contaminated task of purification, my demonic, God-challenging and monstrous excuse of a life.
Tom sat persistently in grief. He dropped his head slowly. I watched as his tears dampened my kitchen table. I felt myself growing all emotional. I could tell that my undesirable truths hurt and disgraced Tom. This fed my tender side.
But before I could come to tears, I exploded.
“Now!” I screamed while snatching the gun up and cocking it all in one motion.
Tom immediately pushed back from the table, throwing his hands up. “Okay! Okay…” He bellowed.
He tapped his hands on the table with an uneven pattern of anxiety.
“Well… I guess that’s it.” He whispered, standing slowly.
He backed up to the door while keeping his eyes on me.
I stood in the kitchen holding the gun so tight that my hand shook. Tom knew then that I was something else. I was a loner, a neglected crackhead, rebounding in youth but full of remorse and uncharted anger.
We continued to stare into each other’s eyes.
Tom forsakenly grabbed the doorknob as he gawked to the floor. Then, still procrastinating, he opened the door and turned into the sunlight, illuminating this dreary situation. He cracked the rickety screen open and turned to me with a face of dejection.
I was empty now, and it was all in my eyes.
“We ain’t friends no more?” He wondered.
I was so delusional that I couldn’t answer.
“Fuck you sayin’ bru?” I yelled.
I jumped in my questioning with a gutter tone. I hadn’t even heard what he said. I couldn’t discern anything. All I could see was red.
Tom finally stepped softly out of my house, closing the door behind him, largo in style.
I stood alone and friendless…
In the end, I was the one who felt like someone else. Wallowing in prejudice, I hated myself again. I felt as if I had been cheated of my own right to remain amongst humanity. Many riddles and unexplainable anomalies had deceived me. And regardless of the oddities, I found them to be of no comparison to my word. I had lost everything but that. My promise. Ultimately, I lost my will to live. My history replicated itself with no remorse. One could endure so much before calling a quits.
Realistically.
By the ironic zing of death, I had been conquered.
November 30th
The next morning, I stepped lively out of my house.
Tom and his family were standing in their yard looking at me. It was odd, and creepy, like his wife.
They whispered among themselves.
I didn’t give a flying fuck! I had made up my mind.
I brought a tote bag full of guns with me. I tossed the bag into the trunk of my car, and I slammed it shut with an immense amount of anger. The sound echoed through the neighborhood as I stood with my back turned towards Tom and his family.
They continued to whisper amongst themselves.
I walked with alertness to the driver’s side of my car. I opened the door, and I paused. I could feel Tom still looking at me. I then looked up from my car and over to him and his family.
We looked into each other’s eyes for a moment. Then, I looked at his daughter, and I got really sad.
Just then, Tom’s wife bolted over to me.
Tom grabbed her quickly, stopping her in her stride.
“Let him go baby. Let him go,” he whispered in her ear.
I hopped in my car, slamming the door shut.
I cranked the car up and floored the gas.
The
car was in park when I flung the gear into reverse, firing out of the driveway at a menacing speed. But, before I fled off to my quietus, I paused again, glancing over to my worried company.
They watched with a host of dissimilar expressions.
Tom dropped his head. Then his daughter waved bye to me. This slowed me down. It actually cut my anger in half.
Instead of speeding off as I intended, I drove off decently, piercing into my rearview mirror. I saw Tom and his daughter walking back to the house. But for some odd reason, his wife was still standing there watching me.
I caught a glimpse of her lifting her shirt, disclosing a fragment of what I deduced to be a police badge. I know how those things look. Hell, I’ve seen too many of them anyway, especially with Canieya.
I knew it was something about Tom’s wife.
She lowered her shirt and walked off to her quiet, tranquil home with that rigid face. That Russian look about her. It seemed like she never smiled. She looked like she mowed over her parents with one of those old school lawn mowers. You know the kind you don’t have to crank?
Yeah.
For one last time, I searched near and far for my daughter’s killer. The time and hours passed fast. I still wanted revenge, but I couldn’t go back on my word. For certain reasons, I couldn’t side with grace or forgiveness. I only had a few hours before this day would come to a close. I was still empty-handed— my only interest oiled in the sight of the aftermath of the afterlife.
Inevitably, the night blanket fell. And I grew curious by the hour. I was anxious to see what the dead see…
With thirty minutes left in the day, I found myself parking near a cliff. It was about nine or ten stories from the ground.
I took a moment to contemplate on how I would out myself. This only lasted for a few minutes as I stared over the landscapes. I didn’t want anything to modify my urge for self-cancellation.
I turned the car off and left the keys in the ignition. I emptied my pockets into the backseat of the car. I took my duffel bag out of the trunk and sat it next to a large oak tree. Taking all the guns out, I laid them on the ground next to each other in an organized fashion.
I paced back and forth, deciding on which one I wanted to use. It took me about twenty minutes to decide. After that, I had a few moments left to commit to my way of outing.
I grabbed my gas can from the trunk of my car. I doused the inside and the outside of the car down with gasoline.
I took the lighter from my pocket and lit it. I tossed it into the car and the vehicle ignited.
Then it hit me… Why don’t I just jump??
I turned away from the guns, and I peered over the cliff.
Bbbooooommm!!!!
The car exploded as I stood there staring at the setting.
For another four minutes, I psyched myself up.
I wanted to time it just right.
It was literally 11:59 p.m. with about twenty-nine seconds left before midnight. Then, my timing kicked into a clear perception of accuracy. I waited no longer as my thoughts left me.
I sprinted suddenly to the edge of the cliff.
Jumping with all of my might into the air, gravity came to my aid.
I fell without screaming, without tears.
This was it.
The solid cold winds battered my body as my hearing stopped. The wind’s influence pushed my organs to my back.
All of my problems were over. No more stress… No more bills… No more pains and fighting… No more losing and struggling to get to a top that I would never obtain.
I smiled at the relief.
The ground was debatable for a moment, but it formed into a visibly plain of flat land. And as it approached, I felt even more… free. No one cared for this decision. But to me, it made unmitigated sense.
Reality phased me as my face could feel the impact before I even reached the ground.
I was about ten inches from the earth’s surface when my consciousness returned. And for once, I wasn’t thinking about my past. I was thinking, why haven’t I hit the ground yet?
Where was this sting of death that I have so longed for?
Death’s deviation crippled my paralyzed brain to a mushy slush. Could it be? Am I so flicted that not even death would befriend me?
What the hell?
I looked around me, only to notice that the air had changed. I absorbed it through my nose. And I soon realized that that same hue that covered Okani’s car surrounded me. I couldn’t figure out what was happening. All I knew was that I wasn’t dead, and I had somehow defied gravity.
But how? Gravity is the strongest force on Earth.
I brushed my fingers against the dirty ground. Then, an ungodly feeling brewed through my body, omitting my locomotives. And before I could utter a word, gravity’s exemplary jerk, reversed in every axis.
I yanked with a monumental wrench of straightness.
The pain only lasted for a few milliseconds. But, it was the worst ever… Veritably excruciating.
Imagine something ripping your skin off, only for it to stay fully intact…
Time Buckle Thesis
I thought I hit the ground anyway. But this definitely wasn't your typical ground. This flooring was undeniably grave in density. Its racking touch alone twinged every inch of my skin. The molded texture felt worse than my flesh tugging.
I was laying on my side with my knees tucked into my chest, wishing for comfort.
I struggled to precipitate relief. But I couldn’t move. I couldn’t open my eyes or my lips. The gravity around me was too heavy.
My hands had been bound behind me too. But these weren’t ordinary handcuffs, and I’m very familiar with handcuffs.
I thought that this could only be hell. But hell’s proposedly hot and I don't think demons would bind your hands.
Suddenly, I heard a voice.
A few voices…
Yet, the pain of the flooring was too severe for me to listen. It only forced me to a welcomed coma.
Time elapsed.
I sat up with neck-breaking speed, gasping for air, which came thin and with an absurd odor. I was still sitting on this painful ground with my back up against an even harder wall.
I tried to activate my muscles, and they finally responded as my eyes lifted to a dark abyss.
“Hey!” a voice bellowed from the shadows.
My sight was so dull, it took me a moment to focus.
“Hey!” the voice shouted a bit louder.
Then, from across the room, came a figure, or a silhouette of a man sitting against the wall.
“This hard ass ground crazy, ain’t it?” he said.
The more he spoke, the more his voice sounded familiar.
I peered deeper into the room.
“Don’t struggle, Derrick. It only makes it worse,” said another voice.
This voice I instantly recognized.
“Quincy?”
“What the hell’s going on here?” I asked while looking to verify his facial structure.
It was still too dark.
“God has called us.” He cried.
“God, my ass man! You gotta die to see dat’ cat. And we ain’t dead, Q! Shit! This hard ass ground!” The other voice yelled.
After hearing this voice again, I finally noticed his sporadic sense of dialogue. That could only mean one thing.
“Corey?” I quizzed.
“What’s it to you? Oh! And Okani here too. She don’t wanna talk to you, though,” he said.
I lit up.
All of my problems swept away.
I saw a small portion of her because a very tiny amount of light crept into the room. I could feel her essence. Knowing that she’s here- wipes the slate clean.
“Egh! I dare you to stand up,” huffed the Speedster.
“Corey, why must you be so divisive and tricky?” Said the sweetest of voices.
“Okani??? Baby is th-”
“-Baby?” Corey interrupted. “She ain’t yo’ damn
baby!”
“I’ll punch your face off right now!” I retorted in anger.
“Oh yeah?”
“Guys?” Quincy inserted.
I was so mad I could feel my skin tighten.
“Come get me! Jackass!” Corey screamed. “Come on over here and catch this L!”
Okani just sighed as my spiritual tank filled with hatred. She was simply too tired to alter the outcome.
I was acting off impulse. I at least wanted to kick him.
“Get the molasses outcha’ panties, hard card!” The Speedster blurted. “You move slower than a Walmart check-out! Get that ass over here!”
I was so furious now. I started to stand. It felt like I was squatting a thousand pounds. I tussled with the odd weighting that significantly trounced my quads.
“AAAAgaaaaagggghhhhh!” I screamed
I almost reached an upright position when my legs and hips shook uncontrollably.
“Holy shit…” mumbled the Speedster.
I felt my skull, neck, and spine crushing and collapsing into each other.
I fell abruptly to the ground, vomiting up blood.
“Why’d you do that, Corey?” Okani asked.
“Agghh!” I whimpered.
“That’s for fucking up my gym and taking my money out of my swear jar! Damn menace to society!” The Speedster wailed.
“I just wanted to see if he could do it, sis,” he responded with sincerity.
“Which is odd cause neither of us could even get to our feet, let alone stand.” Quincy proposed.
I was screaming and yelling obscenities in the background as the three of them continued in salient dialogue.
“Yea, but he did,” said the Speedster as he looked over to me.
“You didn’t have to tease him, Corey.” Okani insisted.
“Whatever yo! That’s petty. Ya’ dig? I wanna know what’s on the other side of these hard-ass walls,” said the Speedster.
“Derrick?” Okani purred. “Are you ok?”
I was still coughing, regaining my composure.
“Breathe through your nose.” Quincy insisted.
“Sit up straight, Derrick,” the goddess demanded.
“Yeah, man. Sit like me, with your legs straight out. The pain will subside.” The Speedster noted.