The Host's Confession

A lone cabin in the woods, that’s what he’d been reduced to. The angled and desiccated logs barely holding his home together seemed more like a prison than anything else, and leaked the heat of his pitiful fire out into the snowy forest around him. The only food in the house was an old loaf of bread and some cheese he’d managed to steal from town a few weeks ago. Otherwise the horizontal surfaces of the main room in his cabin were littered with empty bottles of Everclear. He’d dilute it with water from the lake, though it was still strong enough to send most men to the hospital after a glass or two. Jim Leslie drank three glasses a night, perhaps more during the day. He had just come back from the lake with a fresh supply of water when he heard a loud pounding at the door. 

The glass of diluted Everclear fell to the ground as Jim cursed loudly. He called, “Who is it?” In his gruff, unfriendly voice. 

“My name is Jordan… I’ve been lost in the woods for some time now. Please, can you let me in? It’s very cold outside.” The voice was thin, yet had the inklings of grandiose firmness in its final notes. 

“Get the hell outta here!” barked Jim, “I don’t got no money and I ain’t lookin’ to make friends with some drugged out hobo who’s lost in the forest!”

“I-I don’t know what you mean… please, I’ve been travelling for a few days now. I’d just like to come in for a moment to rest.”

“Keep walkin’ for about twenty miles south and you’ll find a town. Leave me the hell alone, God damnit!” Jim began coughing in great wheezes, eventually spitting in the corner. 

“I ask only for the chance to rest my feet. I’m not here to rob you, and I do not wish to overstay my welcome.” 

At this, Jim felt a spark of old rage, more than he’d felt in years, go off in his mind, he took a few steps to the door and threw it open, nearly breaking it as it slammed into the wall. Jim opened his mouth to speak, but was silenced by the man who stood before him. 

He was very tall, standing at least a foot above Jim, and yet very thin, with hollowed tan cheeks partially hidden by a long brown beard. His brown hair was long and tangled, coming down to his shoulder blades, and his garb was plain - a long, tattered beige coat, wrinkled khakis, and some old boots. His hands were as thin as his face and yet gnarled as though they’d seen some heavy work. But his eyes… they were by far the strangest thing about him. Pure, crystalline blue, like the shallows of a lake shimmering in summer sunlight, or small sapphires with a flame held behind them. They locked onto Jim’s brown eyes and wouldn’t let go. Instead of yelling at his unexpected company, he found himself gesturing for him to come in. 

“Thank you,” said Jordan with a warm smile. As he stepped over the threshold, he saw the miserable state of Jim’s cabin. The only furniture was a couch in the corner to his right, which was old and torn in many places, and a couple chairs with a rickety table between them. The fireplace on the right held a low flame, and the kitchen at the far left corner was grimy and looked as though it had never been used. Jordan saw the bread and the cheese sitting on the cold counter, with no refrigerator to cool the latter. Of course he also saw the bottles littering every inch of Jim’s apartment. 

A strange sense of shame grew within the host’s heart; though he knew he didn’t care what Jordan thought of the way he lived - or what anyone thought for that matter, something about this tall man’s presence brought a terrible light to his way of life. Quickly regaining his former annoyance with his visitor, Jim said, “See? Ain’t no money, ain’t no food, and ain’t nowhere for you to stay, buddy. So I suggest you start-” Jordan paid no heed to the words said by Jim and simply sat down on the ground by the fire, ignoring the nearby table. 

“This is nice,” he remarked softly, putting his hands out to the dying flame. 

Perhaps Jim had drank too much that day, but it seemed the fire was getting stronger as his guest warmed his hands. He sat down on the floor beside Jordan and asked, “Who are you?”

“I’m Jordan. Jordan Clemence.”

“No, I mean who are you really?” Jim’s eyes were muddy, but they met Jordan’s with surprising strength. 

“I’m… a traveller, lost in the woods. I’ve been here for many weeks now, and I… I don’t know if I can find my way home.” The fire leaped up a little and Jordan smiled. 

“And where’s that?”

“I… I don’t know. I was recently told I have ‘amnesia’ - it’s a memory loss condition-”

“I know what amnesia is!” snapped Jim. 

Jordan just continued smiling. “I’m sorry. I don’t remember my home at all. I was just beginning to remember who I was… my family… the love they had for me… but now… now there’s too many questions.”

“Hm.”

“And what about you?”

“What about me?” Jim’s guard went up, but it was lazy from the alcohol in his system. 

“Who are you? I sense this isn’t your true home, or at least,” added Jordan wisely, “It was not always your home.”

Despite being wary of this strange man, Jim dropped his gaze and stared into the fire as he said, “I… I don’t like to talk about it.” There was a tender pause, after which he continued. “I used to live down in Texas… the south, y’know, but then my family and I moved up to Oklahoma. We lived there for a long time… until…”

Jordan was silent, waiting patiently for his host to speak. Jim didn’t feel rushed under the sharp gaze of Jordan’s blue eyes - rather he felt encouraged by their solidity. 

“I did… horrible things with that family,” said Jim hoarsely. “Horrible things. And I was  a brat… so I did them with… with… almost with contempt, but it wasn’t contempt for the actions, it was contempt for-”

“For he who made you perform those actions.”

“And I enjoyed it,” said Jim, tears falling down his face slowly. He grabbed a half empty bottle of everclear and some water from the table and shakily made himself a drink. “I enjoyed doing those horrible things with my family, at least for a long time I did. Would you like some?” he offered Jordan the drink through a sob. 

“No thanks,” said Jordan politely, focused on his host. 

Jim looked back into the fire, swallowing hard. “I’ve killed people, Jordan… and not just a few… a lot of people. Well, I didn’t personally kill them all, but my family and I… we killed them… upwards of fifty people, and that’s just the ones whose names I can remember.”

Jordan’s eyes were sharp. “Why did you kill them?”

Jim was crying in earnest now, and said through racking sobs, “My family… we were… we were cannibals!” He shouted the last word as though it would cleanse him, but he simply cried harder after he was done, taking another swig of his drink. He expected to hear a door slam as Jordan ran away, or a gasp before judgement, but instead he felt something he hadn’t in a long time - a hand on his shoulder. Jordan had moved next to him and put an arm around Jim. 

At this, Jim cried even harder, but instead of drinking he leaned his head into Jordan’s left shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he moaned through heavy sniffs and racking coughs. “I’m so… I’m so sorry, please… I’m sorry!”

Jordan was silent for some time, his troubled eyes on the free chaos of the fire. He noted its ebbs and flows, its heat rising and falling, and its tongues lashing up and down, tasting the air and being quickly satiated. After some time, when Jim’s sobs had reached their weakest point, Jordan said, “It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay!” said Jim loudly. “I’m a goddamn monster… I should be hanged! I shouldn’t be allowed to live!”

“What happened to you? How did you end up here?”

“Because I’m a coward!” He took a few heavy breaths before adding, “My father… he was the mind behind it all. He didn’t make us do… what we did; that was ingrained in us for a long time, but he was… he was an asshole, is what he was. But he was what kept us fed at night. He’d go out and charm lonely women at bars who had no attachments to anyone and bring them home, where we’d kill them. He’d find people lost in the woods and kill them for us. When I got older, I… I went with him on some of those trips. 

“But when I was seventeen, my dad died. We’d been running from the police for a few weeks when my dad just… keeled over. Musta been some sorta heart attack or somethin’, I don’t know… well, my mother was so distraught that she thought we should all turn ourselves in. I think she knew by then that my heart had changed in the last few years - that I couldn’t do what my father did for us. She looked at his cold body in the bed of our motel and knew that the family was finished. 

“My sister just wanted to do what my mom wanted to do, so she agreed right away. But I… I was terrified of what would happen if we confessed to all the murders. That’d be death row, for sure. So the night before my mom planned to go to the sheriff’s office, I snuck outta the motel and ran. I ain’t ever run so hard in my life, and I had no idea where I was goin’. I found little shelters here and there. Ate at soup kitchens in the cities, and stole food in the towns. Many years later, I found myself this cabin up here, and decided this was where it ends. This is where I was gonna die… So that’s what I’m doin’ here. I’m just waiting to die.”

Jordan was silent for a long time after Jim spoke, but he looked his host in the eyes as he said, “You need not despair. Life is not about what you have done, it’s about what you will do. What you choose to be next. Somehow, I know that to be true… deep within me. It’s a lesson my own family taught me, very patiently. And those who you have killed, whether directly or indirectly, have moved on from this life. They do not dwell on this Earth, so don’t let them dwell in your mind.”

“How can you say that? After all I’ve done?”

“It’s nothing compared to what you could do next,” said Jordan with surety, “Nothing compared to the good, or the bad, that you could do in this world, whichever path you choose. And there’s nothing to fear about death itself - it must come to all. Just as this fire must die. You may choose to continue to feed it, but sooner or later you’ll run out of wood. And if you chop some more, you’ll run out of forests. The fire cares not for whether you’ve been out logging all day, or if there is only one tree left to chop. It will die when you do not feed it. And is there anything wrong with that?”

“But what if I… stomped the fire out?”

“Would it be any different than if the fire went out on its own? Perhaps you rushed it, but the end result was the same. That fire was never meant to be eternal. Perhaps the creatures which drew warmth from it will remember it fondly, even sadly, but they cannot bring that particular fire back. They can only take solace in the knowledge that the fire existed, and that it will continue to exist in some way as long as they remember it.” 

“Jordan, what happens when we die?” The innocent question was asked suddenly, as Jim stared at his guest with red eyes. 

“I… I can’t be certain, though I feel as though I once knew.” Jordan’s brow was furrowed in concentration. “I know… I know there is love, even in death.”

“What does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” said Jordan simply, “but it’s the only answer I can give you.”

“I’m sorry,” said Jim again, this time without sobbing. Their souls locked through their eyes, with Jim’s a shattered image of a brown battlefield and Jordan’s a pure, twinkling energy.

“I forgive you.” The words were simple, stated frankly, and yet they drew fresh tears from Jim’s eyes as the two men embraced fully in front of the fire. “You’re a young man,” said Jordan softly, “Be more… be free of the troubles of your past, be the best that you can be in a day. Grow. Learn. Try. I’m… I’m on my own journey of knowledge right now, I know it. And from this day onwards you should be as well. Don’t be clouded by that old image of you. Take your time to discover a new version of yourself - who you really are.”

“Yes, Jordan.”

They held onto each other for a long time, and Jordan felt tears come into his own eyes simply from feeling the pain his host was enduring every day. Somehow Jordan felt it in his own heart - this wrenching, terrible hurt which grew by the day. If he could only take it from Jim’s shoulders, he would… but he had given Jim all he had to give, and Jim had reciprocated more than he knew… perhaps more than either of them knew. Somewhere under the beige coat, Jordan’s heart began to feel who he had been in the past, and his mind recalled some of its old life. Bits and pieces began to swirl around in his head, and he held onto Jim a little tighter as they formed a new image of what Jordan was. Still incomplete, but more whole than it had been since he awoke in the woods all those weeks ago. He smiled, and felt the smile carry over to Jim subconsciously. The two broke apart. 

“Thanks, Jordan.” 

“Thank you, Jim.”

“For what?”

“For… teaching me.”

“Ah.” An alcoholic drowsiness was coming over the host. His face covered with dried tears, he said slowly, “Can you… stay the night? I… I wanna talk more.”

“I’m afraid I must be going. I can sense it’s my time to be moving on. As it is your time to move on from your past.” Jordan got up with ease and deftly picked up Jim in his arms with surprising strength. “Sleep now, and tomorrow morning be free of that which you were, and be who you could be.”

“Mm.”

Jordan deposited Jim lightly on the couch, and then moved the couch to the fire. There was a ratty old blanket on the ground, which didn’t cover Jim’s feet. So Jordan took off his heavy beige coat and laid it on top of Jim, returning the sleepy smile his host gave him through closed eyes. He took the torn, thin blanket around his own shoulders and fed the fire amply before turning to the door. A few weeks ago, he was afraid of the forest, and of the night. Now he feared neither, but knew his journey was not over. Before leaving, he cleared the empty bottles away and threw them in a large bin outside. As he took the blanket around his shoulders he looked back at Jim once more with a hearty smile which sparkled in his blue eyes. He opened the door and was gone, never to cross the path of Jim Leslie again.