man against nature

It was so terribly cold. Snow was falling, and it was almost dark. I had no shoes, no coat, and couldn’t remember anything before this moment, how I’d come to be in these woods, where I’d come from. Who I was.  A clean slate, a near mental newborn, stranded in a frozen, impenetrable, forest primeval. 

Toes numb, teeth clacking, I rubbed my eyes, hoping to clear, or rather, fill my aching, empty head with understanding. My basic survival instisnct and my ability for complex thought were both intact, so one thing was clear: if I didn’t find shelter from this cold soon, I would die.

I stumbled aimlessly for a while, blowing into my cupped hands and rubbing my near naked body with useless abandon, scanning the darkness for some sign of human life, bargaining with any deity who would listen to make me warm.

Tired, so very, very tired, I gave up, curled into a tight ball at the base of a tree I couldn’t name, and fell into a dreamless, deep sleep.

~

It was so terribly hot. Heatwaves shimmered off the dunes, and it wasn’t yet midday. Bright, so bright, I sat and shielded my eyes. My unprotected skin was already seared to pink, my scalp and hair giving off a burnt smell. I surveyed my surroundings. I had certainly been saved from my previous predicament, but to a reality no less unforgiving than the last, for an ocean of sand, undulating forever in every direction, now stood between me and survival. 

And I still had no idea who I was nor what was happening to me. I stood, wincing as the bottoms of my shoeless feet decried the insult of the fiery golden granules beneath them. I wouldn’t make it a hundred yards. Without water or shield from the sun, I would die out here sure and fast as I would have in that icy wood.

I felt my senses, like moisture from my tender, baking flesh, evaporate in that unrelenting swelter. Unless my sunburned brain had conjured up that snowy countryside as an escape from this hellish reality, something or someone had brought me here. Something or someone had “saved” me from the cold, I reasoned, however misguided the solution. And if I got it right, they might save me from this reality as well. Though a wary little voice warned me against this, I did the only thing that seemed to correlate with my “savior” conclusion: I began to pray. Fervently, I beseeched every god and demon I could conjure, a rather long list considering my mind’s vast shortcomings. 

I walked and prayed until my croaking, cracked throat gave out, until my tongue grew thick and cottony and gagged me, until my lips split and bled, weeping the tears I could not. Skin blistered and flaking, eyes blind shriveled raisins, I sank to my knees, insensible to the flaming sands, ready, happy even, to accept my fate.

~

It was so terribly quiet. Rain was falling, and the empty house felt like a graveyard.

No, not yet.

NO.

~

It was so terribly loud. The crowd was roaring, and soon one of the contenders would die. These gods, if that’s who they were, were cruel. For while I no longer faced life-threatening cold or hot, I now faced something just as deadly--a snarling lion in a massive arena filled with red-faced, jeering people.

Barehanded, bare-naked, and graced with no knowledge of combat or self-defense, I backed away from the beast and cast my eyes around the dusty, packed-earth ring, desperate for anything that might aid me.

My gaze fell upon a sight that made my gorge rise. A dismembered hand beckoned me with insouciant grace from few feet away, and just beyond that, an entire leg, stiff as a gory log, shredded and bloodied at the jutting, white ball joint where it had once connected to a hip.

The lion roared louder than the crowd, so loud my bones vibrated, and stepped toward me, its ropy tail swishing. Gods be damned, I had but one loathsome choice, a slim chance, and I had only moments to enact it. 

Keeping my gaze on the creature, I backed toward my objective one terrifying step at a time.

The lion lunged, and I grabbed the stiff appendage swinging it as hard as I could against his head.

But alas, my aim was bad, and I swung at air. The lion leapt upon me, claws unsheathed, jaws wide and…

~

It was so terribly stormy. Waves were crashing, and it was nearing dawn. I inhaled a lungful of sea water, spluttered, and coughed until the sharp liquid spewed from my raw throat, through my tortured nostrils while I attempted to cling to a bit of flotsam flailed about in the frothing black water.

But the rising sun, clearing clouds and calming waters showed me the truth, that what I held onto for dear life was the leg from the arena, bloated, pale and bloodless. I had not a moment to feel horrified about this, however, as along the swell and dip of the horizon, a half-dozen triangular white fins made their way toward me.

~

It was so terribly quiet. Rain was falling, and the empty house felt like a graveyard. Anything but this. I beg you, pitiless gods. Send me forest fires, swirling tornadoes, a pack of rabid wolves, erupting volcanoes…pain and suffering and imminent death and sweet, sweet oblivion. 

Just not this.

Not this remembering.

~

It was so terribly quiet. Rain was falling, and the empty house felt like a graveyard. Unavoidable now. This game I’ve been playing has run its course. This writer’s game of avoidance. All I can do now is listen to the computer keyclack echo out in the emptiness while I spell out my reality, my unavoidable pain, translating it into written words. 

Around the house now, my bare feet tickled by the ghosts of our lives together. Tracing the divots in the carpet where twin beds once stood. Cut by a stray Lego embedded in the carpet. Slipping on hardwood where a Persian rug, chosen for its deep blood reds, once lay. 

Clack clack.

A life. 

Clack clack.

A life over.

The End.