Forgotten

Silence is the only thing that follows me and shadows nameless and cold. Shadows, shadows are the absence of light the wonderful light. The light is something I can only hope to reach, a place without pain, without darkness. A place where I can remember, remember my name. My name, the thing that I cherished most became forgotten after the accident, lost to the dark depths of my own mind. The accident that landed me in the darkness to never be able to escape. Nowadays I go by many names, some days I am Angelo and some days I am Osric and some days, the days I despise most, I go nameless. This is because I am afraid the darkness will catch me and bring me into the deep, dark pits of my own mind. As I am walking down the dark, monotone streets all I see is sadness and poverty. When I find myself gazing into a storefront window, that is when I believe I am staring into someone new, a stranger’s eyes. 

I find myself walking down a long narrow street. A man I do not know waves at me, he calls out to me in what I think to be the first part of his greeting but for some reason, I cannot hear it. But I hear the rest of his greeting it’s odd because he asks, how are you feeling. I say “ Excuse me but do I know you.” He smiles at me, “sadly I don't think you really know yourself anymore.” With one last smile, he says “the key to remembering is accepting the truth and knowing who you are.” I don’t smile back but I do think to myself what an odd man to have said something so sincere to a complete stranger. I continue on my way down the dark streets and try to find out why I can’t seem to remember anything, even things that I have just said or heard only five minutes ago. I return to my home which is an alley and lay in bed. My bed is not real it is merely a few blankets bundled together. I found it just laying in the alley almost as if someone left it here. It’s not in a good area but it is comfortable. The alley is one of the few things I remember finding, which is probably why I always return to it. I am just laying awake on my bundle of blankets, I can’t go to sleep but I slowly sit up in bed because I hear whispering I look up and I am blinded there is a pillar of what appears to be fire with a man standing on top of it. But the man seems unharmed with not a single burn on his body. I jump upwards as I shout “who are you.” No reply, I feel a strange attraction to the figure but I can’t explain it. The figure begins to walk away. Wait not walking, he is floating. “Wait,” I say “don’t go!” I begin to chase after the man but he speeds up. He turns into an alley, I follow in hot pursuit. Finally, I realize why I felt that same attraction that familiarity, It is the light. The very thing I have been trying to reach this entire time, as some would say my holy grail.

My holy grail, like others', I may never reach but I will always persist because the darkness, the gruesome, evil, terrible darkness may catch me and bring me into its pits of despair and sadness. The only reason I think I can stay sane is because of my faith. I don’t remember what I said five minutes ago but somehow I still remember partially being a faithful person. I promise myself that if I ever do remember that fully, I will attend church daily. I get up and decide to take a stroll because what else do I have to do. I see that there’s a church on the road, I decide to go in. The first thing I hear is the beautiful songs of the canters, this was almost like the light was coming closer to me and I had a jolt of memory. Strangely I seem to remember all the prayers and all the actions. Soon it became the time I have been yearning for, the receiving of communion. When it becomes my turn to receive communion I take it in my hands and then step aside. I put it in my mouth and suddenly I felt an amazing rush of emotions. The only time I’ve felt like this before, was when I saw the strange man riding the pillar of fire. I leave church that day feeling like the light has returned inside of me. On my way back to my alley I feel a shadow cross over my heart as I find a horrible scene. There is a child in my alley lying on the blankets at first I feel enraged that someone would dare rest in my beautiful alley. But, as I go to pursue the child I realize that this particular child was just like me, running from his own darkness. I also notice that there is something different about this child. He has many bruises, wounds, and cuts along his body. His breathing is shallow and he doesn’t seem like he is going to make it. Carrying him in my arms I begin to walk towards the Church, I figure the most I can do for this poor soul is get him a blessing before he passes on to the light. I open up the door to the church and I am lucky to find that there is a priest still there at this late hour. The priest seems to understand because he does not ask questions. As he sets the child down he sees something. It is a vision of what appears to be a young boy holding a bloodied woman in his arms. The boy says in a barely audible whisper “ I love you” then a teardrop falls and hits the woman’s cheek. The last thing he hears before the vision ends is the blood-curdling scream of a broken soul.  He continues with his blessing, as he does this he realizes something that he doesn’t tell me until after the child dies. He realizes that the boy screaming and I are one in the same. As he tells me this I don’t know what to think because I know that this memory will be the same as anything and everything I’ve known, Forgotten.