Page 33 of Mortala
It’s a dream, it’s a dream, it’s a dream.
Wet earth, death, and scorched leaves swath into my nose eating through the oxygen; drying the mucus membranes as the invisible force wins and yanks me up.My toes, raw and caked with soot, scrape through dirt and debris where I hang.I’ve returned to where I broke the most: the forest.
Open your eyes.
A voice I’ve never heard before seeps into my ear canals, trying to bewitch me.
No, I can’t.I won’t survive the forest again.Not the lake, not the cabin, the trees glowing with the reds and oranges of hell emerging from the ground's underbelly.If I keep them closed, I won’t wake up to blood-soaked hands and a man’s life fading under the sharp glide of a forgotten kitchen cleaver.He won’t be at my back, warm and steady, forcing my hand through human joints to dismember an innocent.My demons won’t be there winning—destroying me.
I know it’s scary, but you’re safe now.
The unfamiliar voice speaks again—cool and soothing, easing the singe of being crucified and burned alive.
“Sadie, sugar, open your eyes.It’s Mom, come on, just Mom!”
Marble weights lift from my clumpy eyelashes.The delicate hairs fly open to a dull light spilling inside—the floor of my closet having swallowed hell once more.My mom’s crouched a few feet away, mountains of concern written across her face as if she poured honey on it and stuck pages of the Bible directly to the gooey sweetness.Verse after verse of Revelations following the contours while she looks at me with pity—and it makes my heart skip one too many beats.
There aren’t many emotions I fully understand, but pity is the worst.Looking at me like I’m broken…it makes me feel like a cast aside toy, no longer valuable enough to keep around.
I see the rifts splitting away from my brain and down to my body—my invisible illness manifesting in cracks along my porcelain skin.She has it all: a husband, a baby on the way, and a broken daughter.Every box checked off on the list of complaints you’d submit to your therapist at intake—and I’m the worst, there’s no fixing me.Unless you lop the head off the snake, my poison will ruin her life.
“There you are,” she murmurs, reaching to brush a wild chunk of sweat-slicked hair behind my ear.Embarrassed—she shouldn’t have to see me like this, no one should—I glance away.Clothes and shoes are strung everywhere, most of them piled around me, broken hangers stabbed into the wall with red smudges smeared across the paint.
I fucked up, I’m fucked up.
“It’s okay, sugar.Come back to me.Whatever happened, it’s alright.”
No, it’s not.I’ve burrowed myself into a nest in the corner of my closet—cut myself away from the world for however many days and lost my fucking mind.
“I’m going to help you up, okay?You need to shower before you see yourself in the mirror.”
I weakly shove her hands away, but the years of being a CO and prisoner have given her strength I do not possess.Her hands cuff mine, covering where my mind’s still sensing the rope of agony cinched around them, then she pulls me up.I’m thankful when she doesn’t look anywhere but my face—she had plenty of time to check me over when I was lost.
Leading me out, her rounded stomach glares at me with the perfect little human inside of her—all of the damage he’d ever experience in life has been given to me.I’ve sustained the torment and mental load for more than a handful of people through the worst parts of their lives and it’s suffocating.I want it all to disappear; for the demons to suffer as they have made me, for silence to lift me away.
Supporting me, she opens the glass door to my shower with a distinct pop and spins the faucet knob inside for the water to spray.Next, she’s pulling at my clothes, but this time I don’t fight.My shirt’s up and tossed into a pile somewhere behind me, my shorts come next before she directs me inside.
“I’ll be right back with your clothes.”
Privacy washes over me, unlike the water that soaks my hair while I stand like the gargoyle statues at school.If I scrub hard enough, I wonder if I’ll reach Kate as if she’s a layer I can dig to—hurt her as she has done me.Or maybe boil Liz out of my heart.An exorcism for Naamah, since her claws are so deep it requires spiritual help.
“Here you go, sugar.Where are your pills?”
I jump with a start, forgetting she was here, unsure of how long I’ve been in the water.Peeking at my fingers and toes, they’re pruny which tells me somewhere between stepping in, and now, I’ve lost ten minutes.
“I…I need to refill them.”
“How long have you been out?”
“Don’t know.”
“I thought you told me you had everything you needed before we went on our trip?”
Fuck.That was over a week ago.Grabbing a washcloth and shower gel, I go through the motions of showering—hoping the noise drowns out her questioning.
“Right.Well, it’s seven in the morning, your graduation’s in three hours.Do you want to go?I know you can’t get an early refill, so the best we can do is stay on track with your milestones.”
Not bothering to rinse off, I move into scrubbing my hair then face.
