Marlie In The Darkness

Everything is black behind Marlie’s eyes. She was floating in the blackness, the darkness, the nothing. She was nothing anymore. Terrible things lurked here in the darkness, she could hear them moving around her. She tries to scream but the blackness has no ears to hear her. She begins to struggle as she realizes that she can’t breathe. She tries to inhale but she chokes on the absence of air. She’s stuck in the suffocatingly dark, blackness of nothing. She wonders if she’s dead and if this is what death is like. She tries to remember where she was, and what she had been doing before this moment. A faint wisp of a dream comes and goes as she tries to make out what it was about. Something about a bright light. ‘I’m dreaming, I need to wake myself up.’ she thinks as she calms her mind. She begins to focus on throwing herself back into her physical body, away from this horrible plane of non-existence.

 A deep gasping breath wakes her from her nightmare slumber. The sound of the low hum of the fan fills her ears and she comes to, back in her body, back in her bed, safe and sound. “What? What is it?” her husband Jake says as he sits up, worried. He places a hand on Marlie’s shoulder and she leans over, melting into him. “Nothing. I’m fine. I had a bad dream.” she says as she tries to calm her beating heart. Jake’s alarm begins to chime, making Marlie jump. “That time already?” she asks him.

“Yep.” he says as he pulls on his jeans. Marlie gets out of bed and gets dressed as she waits for the coffee to brew. Then she makes her way through the dark hall to wake her sleeping children. With everyone up and at em, she makes Jake’s lunch and fills his thermos and her cup with coffee. When he says he's got to go, Marlie kisses him goodbye and gathers up the kids to take them to school. Today she will go to her grandparent's house. Marlie's grandfather was sick, with cancer among many other things. She had been taking him to treatments for months, praying that it would work. Her grandfather was her favorite person in the whole world, besides her husband and her kids. There would never be another man like her grandfather. He loved Marlie dearly, and to him, she was his favorite person too. When he became sick, she feared he would die and when the seizures started she quickly took over as nurse, maid, cook, and chauffeur. This day, like many before it they would drive in his truck into the city for one of his treatments. The long ride gave them so many opportunities to talk. And talk they did, about anything and everything, from his childhood to her kids and everything and everyone in between. Despite the destination and the nature of these trips, Marlie always looked forward to the ride with her grandfather. Driving down the road Marlie spots a red Toyota upside down on its roof near the treeline. As they drive past it Marlie says, “Damn! That looks like my car.” 

“Yeah, it does.” her grandfather says as he puts his hand on Marlie's shoulder, craning his neck to get a better view out of the window. Suddenly her grandfather was gone. The truck was gone, the steering wheel no longer in her hands. The road in front of her starts to fade as Marlie finds herself once again in the nothing, alone in the darkness. The bright sunlight of the day is getting smaller and smaller and the blackness engulfs everything around her. ‘What the fuck!” she screams. ‘OK, OK, you’re dreaming again.’ she thinks. ‘Wake yourself up. Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!’ she screams inside her head. Panic races through her mind as she wonders, ‘What if I cant?’

 A deep gasping breath wakes her from her nightmare slumber. The sound of the low hum of the fan fills her ears and she comes to, back in her body, back in her bed, safe and sound again. “What? What is it?” her husband Jake says as he sits up, worried. He places a hand on Marlie’s shoulder and she leans over, melting into him again. “Nothing. I’m fine. I just had a bad dream.” she tells him again as she tries to calm her beating heart. Jake’s alarm begins to chime, making her jump. “That time already?” she asks him before she even knows she said it. “Yep.” he replies. 

‘What the fuck is going on?’ Marlie thinks. ‘I just did all of this.’ She shakes it off thinking it's just one of those weird dreams and gets out of bed and does what she always does each morning. She wakes up the children and then she gets dressed. She makes Jake’s lunch and then kisses him goodbye. She drops the kids off at school then she makes her way to her grandparent's house. Marlie and her grandfather get in his truck and they head out for his doctor's appointment in the city, again. Along the way, they spot a red Toyota upside down on its roof and Marlie says, “I've seen this before. That looks like my car.” Her grandfather puts his hand on her shoulder and cranes his neck to look out the window as he says, “Yeah, it does.” And the blackness once again consumes the day as Marlie is plunged back into the nothing. She struggles to regain consciousness and then again she wakes in her bed, gasping for breath. ‘Am I stuck in a fucking loop?’ she wonders as Jake asks her what's wrong. She tells him it was just a dream and lays her head on his arm. ‘Why do I keep seeing that car? What the hell is going on?’ she thinks as the alarm comes again. This time it didn't make her jump, she knew it was coming. The day goes on to repeat the same as the ones before it and again and again Marlie finds herself coming upon the red car. She doesn’t know how many times she's done it, just that she's convinced herself she's in some form of hell. Again and again, she goes through this day, each time ending and beginning the same way, in the darkness. ‘Today will be different.’ ‘Marlie tells herself as she sips her coffee.‘Today, I won't drive past it.’ 

When Marlie and her grandfather see the red car, Marlie pulls the truck over to the shoulder and turns off the engine. “What are you doing?” her grandfather asks. “This day just keeps repeating. Over and over we’ve done this. Every time we go past that car I find myself in the darkness and then I wake up at home and I keep repeating this day over and over again.” Her grandfather nods his head in agreement and says, “Why do you think you keep seeing the car? Why do you think it looks so much like yours and why do you keep drifting through the planes and ending back up with me, over and over again?” Marlie ponders his questions and after a minute or two she asks, “Is it my car? Did something happen to me? Am i dead?” Her looks at her sadly and says, “Try to remember what you did yesterday Marlie.” 

She leans her head back against the seat and tries to remember. Flashes of memory run through her mind and she begins to list each one as they come to her. “I got up, got dressed, got the kids dressed. Packed a bag with everyone’s bathing suits and snacks. Took the kids to Mom’s to visit. We ate dinner, the kids played, we all swam in the pool and then we went home. I put the bathing suits and wet towels in the laundry and told the kids goodnight. I put on my pajamas and I went to bed.” Marlie took a breath and opened her eyes.

“No.” her grandfather said, shaking his head.

“What do you mean no? That's what I did yesterday!” Marlie exclaims. He shakes his head and says, “What happened on the ride home?”

Marlie tries to remember as the images of yesterday flitter through her mind. Her mother walked them out to the driveway. Marlie loaded the kids into the car and put their things in the trunk. She kissed her mothers cheek as they said their goodbyes then she got behind the wheel and began the trip home. A bright light swells up into her mind and blinds her. When she opens them she's still in the truck with her grandfather. “What happened?” she asks him. He shrugs at her and says, “You have to remember.”

Suspiciously, Marlie asks, “Are you really here or are you just in my mind?” He grabs her hand and says, “I’m here like you, with you. But we are not really here, nor there really. I’ve come to help you move on from this place. You have to remember before you can.” 

“Move on! So I am dead?” He gives her a pained smile and Marlie scoffs and crosses her arms. 

“Try to remember Marlie. You were driving home from your mother's. What happened next?”

Marlie again sees the bright light that blinds her. It's coming straight at her in her lane. It's so dark and that light is drowning out everything all around her. She jerks the steering wheel away from the oncoming vehicle and the car hits a concrete drain and flips through the air. On the first spin through the air Marlies head smacks into her window hard. There is nothing else from here. Instantly she's in the darkness again. She takes a ragged breath as she opens her eyes and looks over at her grandfather. “What about the kids? Can you tell me about the kids?” Marlie pleads with him.

He smiles and says, “They are a little scratched and bruised but they are fine. They are not like us.” Marlie begins to sob into her hands as she sits behind the wheel of the truck. She is so thankful that her children are OK but the realization that she won't be there for them is hitting her hard. Her grandfather sits silently by her side and lets her cry. When her sobs have quieted down to sniffles he says, “Do you accept your fate?”

“Do I have a choice?” Marlie asks.

“You do. You can stay here in denial, doomed to repeat this day, or accept what happened and leave this place with me.”

“With you? If you're here with me and you're like me…“, Marlie choked out a sob, “does that mean that you're dead too?” Fresh tears well up in her eyes when he says, “Yes. I’m dead too.”

“Why? What happened to you?” Marlie asks.

“Well,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. “When we learned the news I just couldn’t take it. I was so sad my heart gave out right then and there. I drifted down into a place of shimmering water. Like milky memories on screens all around me. I saw you there in the darkness and I came to get you. I had to make sure you would go to the right place. You need to accept your fate to go to the right place. God knew I was the only one who could reach you.”

“So if we leave this place, whatever this is” Marlie gestured around them, “You’ll be with me. Wherever we go?” 

“Yes, we will be together. We’ll go to a place that is bright and lovely. No darkness, no loneliness. We will be at peace. It will be the right place for us both.” he says.

“You have always been my safe place. I’m so sorry that we're both dead. I’m glad it was you who came to help me. You’ve always been there to help me my whole life. I accept my fate and I'll gladly leave this place with you, but how do we get there?” Marlie asks him.

“Just close your eyes and take my hand.”