Moon River

by Nicholas Knight

  “Bad dog!” Cheri shouted out at her, as she quietly wept and watched Dawn’s innermost feelings be swept away with the tide.

  "I can't get to it right now!” Dawn replied, senselessly, too far away to hear Cheri’s call. “Been swamped out here all month!"

  The music suddenly changes to, White Bird, by the band, It's A Beautiful Day. As the 1969 hit plays, a white simurgh flies over Cheri, raining down seeds on her head. The bird had the body of a tiny dog and the wings and head of a falcon.

  “It’s always darkest before Dawn,” the bird whispered to Cheri, but loud enough for her to hear, as it fluttered and flapped its wings.

  This white bird disappears into thin air afterwards, vanishing as quickly and as mysteriously as it had appeared. Cheri knew that this was likely the calm before the storm, but she kept telling herself that everything was going to be okay. Just then, everything around her went pitch black.

  “I should have been born straight,” Cheri muttered to herself. “I should have married some lucky silver fox, had his kids, and worshipped at his feet,” she said, convincing herself that life would have been so much easier, had she chosen to go the traditional and more conventional route.

  Romance, however, was merely one of the sources of her great heartache. She and Dawn had both come to hear music around them, which nobody else could hear. It was as if their lives had been given their own soundtracks, and it made no difference whether they were asleep or awake. This wasn’t a case of having a song stuck in their heads, they actually heard the tunes. Hearing voices was often misjudged as psychotic, which was almost always a legitimate experience or spiritual encounter. Hearing music that wasn’t there, on the other hand, was an entirely different story. The two lovebirds were clearly on their way to Crazy Town, and the music was just a pit stop. The hippies had trusted in something called, sonic magic, where they believed that sound could cure the sick, heal the blind, and change the taste of food. Dawn and Cheri never saw any evidence of that being true, but they did seem to be haunted by sound.

  Cheri woke up three hours later, drenched in her own sweat, relieved to find her beloved Dawn lying naked beside her in the fetal position. Dawn’s back was to her, as the smooth lesbian slid in closer to spoon her. As she put her moist arm around the sexy Cherokee hybrid, she found Dawn’s skin to be dry and cold. Cheri resumed her slumber mode, while Dawn opened her eyes and had only been pretending to sleep.

  As Cheri fell back into her dream state, Dawn saw a tall, shaggy abomination standing in front of them. It was a white, three-toed creature, with a long neck and a flat face, that looked at Dawn like she was lunch. This beast was different from the others, as it didn’t appear to be hazardous or hostile. In any case, the Cherokee beauty had grown numb to just about everything, so the odds of something scaring her, at this point, were practically slim to none.

  “You’re worried that God will deny you entrance into Paradise because you’re a werewolf,” it told her in a gruff voice, effectively reading her mind, as she just laid there speechless and motionless. “Don’t be. Romans 11:36 says that everything comes from God, and that you have whatever power you have because of God. In other words, you wouldn’t be a werewolf if God didn’t want you to be. Your curse is not a mistake, but is by God’s very design. Embrace your inner child. Embrace the werewolf.”

  Dawn was enthralled at its calm demeanor, which was unexpected considering its horrifying appearance. People had been alleging, since the dawn of time, that if you die in your dreams, you die for real. However, Dawn was living proof that this wasn’t always the case. She had dreamt of her own death, on several occasions, yet she was still here. The Grim Reaper wasn’t out to get her. She was the Grim Reaper.

  DECEMBER 8, 1980

  WINTER MOON

  It was the middle of the night, and Dawn was dreaming about the nasty red dwarf again. “Se noyer,” was all he said this time, and he said it repeatedly. Fed up with the leer’s games, she grabbed the toothsome, Nain, by his pointed head and threw him in the air just high enough to snatch him by his feet. Holding him upside down by his matching, red fur boots, she screamed in his smug face.

  “What the fuck are you saying?! I told you, I don’t understand your fucking language!”

  “Drown yourself,” the devilish dwarf translated his own words, wearing a shit-eating grin as his eyes turned solid black and Dawn awoke from her nightmare. “Drown yourself,” she heard him say again, after she opened her eyes.

  Dawn violently banged the sides of her head, while blinking hard and grinding her teeth. She kept thinking bad thoughts about harming Cheri, thoughts which she so clearly didn’t mean or wish to think. Life had become both demeaning and meaningless for Dawn. The world was a cold place, people were cruel, and her detrimental destiny showed no signs of ever changing for the better. She had outlived her welcome. She would either become a brute or a burden, and neither option fancied her. She had lost Wolf, whom she had been inseparable with. Life had lost its flavor. It was time to go.

  “It’s a good day to die,” Dawn thought to herself, as repugnant drums and flutes play privately in her head.

  It was if these musical beats were from a loathsome, 19th Century Calvary Regiment, with the ever-cowardly General Custer as the conductor. She wondered if animals like her could go to Heaven and hoped that it wasn’t out of the question. Dawn had heard the so-called Christian Church give their take on it, but she knew better than to take anything they had to say seriously.

  She leaned over and kissed her pink-haired lover on the forehead, saying goodbye to her while she rested peacefully. The television was playing the national anthem while showing the American flag, before the network signed off for the night. White noise played on the television set, but in Dawn’s head, she heard the TV playing the song, Sad Eyes, by Robert John. She didn’t want to leave Cheri, but there was simply nothing left for her to give. Life had taken away too much from her, as if it had been pushing her to die since the day of her birth. She loved her raspberry-flavored girlfriend, but it just wasn’t enough.

  Cheri had dosed off, reading a book called Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, which she had bought at the airport gift shop. Dawn had briefly considered brushing the rainbow blinds aside and using the sliding glass door that led to the balcony of their high-rise, but decided that it would be too messy and scarring for Cheri. Just to be safe, she carefully took the phone off the hook, so it wouldn’t wake Cheri before she was gone. It was a press-button phone, as opposed to the rotary ones that Dawn had grown up knowing. Dawn quietly slipped on her fringe vest and the imaginary wolf tooth necklace that Julie had given her, and walked out the door, gently shutting it behind her.

  Dawn would have recorded herself with a VHS camcorder, but she didn’t have access to one. So instead, she left a folded note on the nightstand, telling Cheri how she felt about her, but that their love just wasn’t enough to kill her pain. Since Cheri had never let them have their picture taken, she left a crayon drawing that she had done of the six of them. The childish sketch included Reuben, herself, Donnie, Wolf, Julie, and Cheri, and they were all holding hands, as if to insinuate that they were a family. She left this, instead of the Olan Mills portrait they never had taken, for Cheri to find.

  “If you want to see God, just look in the mirror,” she heard the voice of Nikolas Schreck again, who seemed to still haunt her mind. “God is the planets and the comets. Every atom in our bodies was once part of a star. God is the universe, and you are God. Reuben is your star-crossed lover, and he will always be with you. You don’t need to off yourself to reunite with him. You were born to kill, not die. Don’t deny yourself your birthright. Vengeance is yours. Take it!”

  Though the voice Dawn heard sounded like Zeena’s boyfriend, she knew that it was Lucifer impersonating him, trying to trick her into selling her soul before giving up her life. “Get behind me, Satan,” Dawn immediately said in response. “You’re barking up the wrong tree, mother fucker. Don�
�t repay evil for evil. Don’t emulate the cruel behavior of this cold world. Let God transform you into a new creature. The Lord’s words are pure as silver. That’s 1 Peter 3:9, Psalm 12:6, and Romans 12:2, bitch.”

  Before long, she found herself gazing at the body of water in front of her. The moon had a red hue to it that night, as if it was a giant disco ball covered in menstrual blood. This moonlight reflected on the French river, as it waited patiently for Dawn’s generous donation. She takes a hit of acid, accompanied with Demerol pills, to numb her trip. She then stripped off her clothes and laid them on the ground. Walking in a circle, she urinates around the pile. She was scared to die alone, but she wasn’t alone. The Christopher Cross song, Never Be The Same, plays in her head, as she hopes that this won’t be a goodbye, but a ‘hello again’ to Reuben.

  Once the narcotics kick in, Dawn slowly walks into the sanctity and solace of the Parisian river, forever sealing and signifying the completion of her story in the bitter cold water. She knew not what was to come, or if God would prove to be empathetic enough to permit her to see her loved ones again. She only knew that her heart was too beautiful for this cold world, and life had become too unbearable to go on alone. Though she still had Cheri, she would always be incomplete without her dominant soulmate, their deceased son, and her feral friend.

  “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love,” Dawn softly quoted 1 John 4:8, counting on this Bible verse to redeem her, since she had nothing but smitten love in her broken heart for her departed lover, their stillborn son, Cheri, Julie, and Wolf.

  She cherished her memories of Reuben, in spite the unbearable pain she felt without him. She hoped that her undying love would be enough to win the unconditional love of Christ. The church had proven to have a heart of stone, but she counted on Christ being decent.

  “You said in Romans 5:8 that you loved me at my darkest. Forgive me, Jesus,” she whispered out loud, as tears streamed down her face. “Remember me, as I step into my own grave.” Dawn had nobody to perform her last rites, so she just implored God to consider her prayer. “For whomever comes to me in prayer with a sincere heart, honors and glorifies me. Psalm 50:23, 145:18-19, and Proverbs 15:29. Be gracious, Lord, and hear my prayer. Psalm 4:1.”

  Dawn could hear the psychedelic 1969 tune, No Time, by The Guess Who, playing exclusively in her head. Stepping further into the moonlit river, she could see something new in her reflection. She had grown a third eye that was now directly in the middle of her forehead. A middle-aged passerby spotted her, who stopped dead in shock and astonishment. This seasoned survivor had seen the dark side of love, but none of the wicked women in his past had frightened him more than the young Cherokee he was currently laying eyes on.

  “Bisclavret,” he murmured, only saying this one word. He stood, frozen in both fear and lust, as he watched the stunning Native American prepare to drown herself. “Rougarou,” he added, under his breath. Even though Dawn had never experienced full metamorphosis, at least not so others could tell, this man had the gift of second sight and could see straight through her guise.

  While imagining herself walking into her watery tomb, she quoted 2 Timothy 1:7 aloud to herself. “For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power, love, and self control,” she says, to try and deny her thanatophobia. She also thought of Matthew 6:34, which tells us to not worry about tomorrow.

  She let go of the build-up of bitterness and resentment that she had been harboring for most of her life, and forced herself to forgive the countless monsters who had taken such joy from hurting her…not excluding God. She thought about the song, Come Sail Away, by Styx.

  “Jehovah, Atius Tirawa, Yahweh, Unetlanvhi,” she prayed, “I may not understand you or your ways, but I ask that you understand mine. I hope you will show me more empathy and compassion in the afterlife, than you’ve shown me here. I’m sorry for the words I’ve said and the things I’ve done, which have wounded or offended you. I pray that you take into consideration what led me to turning out the way I did. The sins of my father and the wickedness of this cold world have infected me,” she says, as she baptizes herself by splashing and rinsing her face. “I have heard it preached that agape love is the only love that matters and that all relationships should come second to our love for you. I also know that sometimes you show us your love by allowing us to love and have the love of another (1 John 4:7-11). Sometimes, if we’re lucky, your love comes in the form of a relationship with someone special you place in our path. Reuben, Donnie, Julie, and Wolf mean everything to me. Have mercy on Cheri, as well, as it is not her fault that she comes from what she does. Let us all be together in your heavenly Kingdom, and forgive us for what we need forgiven. Please don’t throw us away or turn your back on us, the way everyone else has.”

  She remembered Hebrews 10:22, which says, come to God with a sincere heart and believe that he will save you. Be free from the chains of your guilty past, as you cleanse your body with pure water.

  The broken, but beautiful, Cherokee noticed a silvery light that shined over the water’s surface, as she slowly entered the Parisian river. It was as if the stars were dancing, and sprinkling their magic on the water. The light, however, was not solely sourced by the moon, but by Freyja. She recognized the Norse goddess from literature she had read growing up. The fabled soothsayer of superstition had evidently traveled from Norway to see Dawn drown her sorrows.

  Dawn’s fear was finally replaced with peace, as she imagined being reunited with Reuben, their son, Julie, and her feral friend. Looking at her nakedness, as she slowly made her way into the freezing water, she noticed that her abnormal body hair was gone. This beastly excess that she had been burdened with for the majority of her life, had mysteriously left her physical being. Though the brisk animal hairs had fallen away, she knew what she still was all the same. She gazed up at the brightly lit Eiffel Tower, which she interpreted as the world giving her the middle finger one last time.

  “My God, I am ashamed and humiliated. Please forgive me, Jesus! My iniquities have risen higher than my head, and my guilt has reached the heights of Heaven! Let me find you, as I seek you wholeheartedly. Let my mind transform me into what you want me to be. I put on my new self with the love I have in me.” Dawn prays loudly, but humbly, desperate for mercy and empathy (Ezra 9:5-6, Jeremiah 29:13, Romans 12:2, Ephesians 4:24, and Colossians 3:10,14).

  The pale horse that she had been raised to believe in, never showed up to carry her to Paradise. Dawn’s clothes turn to stone from the apotropaic qualities of her piss. As the troubled squaw slowly sinks into the icy Abyss, the tune in her head changes to the Head East song, Never Been Any Reason. The chorus, ‘Save my life, I’m going down for the last time,’ plays in Dawn’s unraveled mind, as she has second thoughts a minute too late and tries to swim back up before completely running out of air.

  She still has a death wish, but she is suddenly more terrified of what death may bring than she is of living without her loved ones. It’s at that moment when a sinister mermaid appears out of nowhere, with a wide mouth of piranha teeth and the strength of a shark. She had three heads and six arms. She used two hands to cover Dawn’s mouth and nose, two to dig her claws into her sides, and two to pull her down. This was one of the monsters that Cain had feared, when he was banished from Eden.

  Dawn could feel the mercury poisoning leak out from Eurynome’s hooks and contaminate her bloodstream. She tussled tooth and nail for her empty life, but her struggle was weakened by the silvery mermaid. Dawn’s lungs filled up with water, as her eyes closed for the final time. As soon as Dawn was beyond any hope of recovery or resurrection, Eurynome turned into wood while still restraining Dawn’s fresh corpse. The silver mermaid did this so that the corpse-eating goddess, Cerridwen, wouldn’t be able to take her beautiful prize for herself. Dawn was too precious a treasure to let slip.

  The three Wyrd sisters of time, also known as the Triple Brigittes, hover in the night sky, holding their fiery arrows as they rec
ite this prayer:

  “We bring an offering, fine and free

  The scent will rise within the Sea

  Reach your realms, bless me soon

  O Lady of the Darkened Moon”

  While Dawn bravely chooses her time to die and on her own terms, people around the globe suffer another great tragedy on this same historical night. Around 10:50PM, the Lennons' limousine returned to the Dakota. John and Yoko got out, passed by an unhinged stalker, and walked towards the archway entrance of the building. Mark Chapman fired five shots from a .38 Special revolver, four of which hit Lennon in the back and shoulder, puncturing his left lung and subclavian artery. Lennon was pronounced dead at 11:07PM at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center, and so marked the end of the Peace Movement.

  As Dawn sinks deeper into her watery grave, the news of John Lennon's senseless murder is broadcasted over the radio and television airwaves, thereby causing the rest of the planet to join Cheri in her misery and loss. New Yorkers weren't the only ones who were robbed of a great leader that night, which would be the same date that the beautiful and magical Dawn would be swept away.

  The next morning, Cheri awoke to the childish artwork and the devastating note, which explained that Dawn couldn’t handle life anymore and that Reuben was waiting for her on the other side. Cheri had just awoken from a nightmare, where she dreamed that Dawn had died and was walking up the stairway to Heaven, as the Bob Dylan song, Knocking on Heaven’s Door, played in the background. Panicking and thinking the worst, she ran outside their building and called out Dawn’s name, knowing there would be no answer.