The Road in Red: One Flesh

"My will is at God’s hand, never within man’s teeth..."
-The Devil Wears Prada, Revive

Tears of joy flooded Noah’s eyes.  Relief swelled inside him like a warm bath.  He tucked the cane underneath his arm and put his face in his hands.  He had made it.  He had found his home.  Noah quickly wiped his hot cheeks with his palms and sniffed up the loosened snot from his nose.  No, he still had to go inside, still had to make it to the doors.  He hadn't made it yet.  He wasn't safe until he had passed through the threshold, until he had a solid barrier between him and the dead world outside.  The house was still half a mile away.  Being as sick and injured as Noah was, that half a mile felt like fifty.  The warm bath water relief turned ice cold as the realization that he might not make it came over him.  His heart could give out at any time.  Exhaustion was clawing at him.  Hunger was pulling his stomach into the dirt.  Put his home pulled him forward.

Noah walked as far as he could until the pain in his thigh took him to the ground.  It was as if someone had shoved a hot poker right through his flesh to the bone.  Noah tried not to scream, waited for the wave of pain to cease like it normally did, but it did not alleviate.  Sweat poured from Noah’s body causing the dirt to stick to his chest and stomach.  Noah rolled over on his back and could not hold in the hurt any longer.  The pain was not subsiding, only increasing in intensity.  He screamed out in absolute agony.  More liquid dribbled from the corners of his mouth.  The pain multiplied at an alarming rate and even worse, began to spread.  Noah could actually feel the disease of the bite worm its way down his entire leg and up into his groin, other leg and stomach.  It took hold of his testicles and intestines and squeezed.  It felt like everything was being blending in his body, liquified.  It was as if piranhas were inside of him, eating away at his insides, swimming and scurrying up and down the lower half of his body.

Noah fought the pain and turned over onto his stomach.  He began to crawl.  Guttural screeches of misery filled the clear sky and called the creatures to him.

Noah felt chilled to the bone despite the radiating heat of the sun.  The breeze was gone.  The rain was only a memory.  There was nothing and no one to help him now.  Goosebumps sprung along his body and raised the hair on his arms.  Noah continued to crawl, the dirt and rocks scratching at his nipples, his hair clinging to his forehead like a watery glue.  Noah crawled and crawled and seemed to make no progress at all.  He didn't even know if he was moving or imagining himself inching closer to his home.  Noah’s eyes began to cross and his vision started to blur and go black.  The pain came in waves of terrible to excruciating.  The painful poison spread completely to Noah’s legs and up into his chest.  Noah involuntarily vomited a milky yellow bile.  It heaved up in ropey strands, his stomach contracted so hard a rip of pain sliced through his torso and accompanied the pain that was already there.  The bile bubbled in the dirt.  Small particles were floating in it.  Noah crawled through the substance.

In the distance, he could hear the people coming again.  The dead people.  The things.  Maybe one of them was the lady with the tongue?  Had the wicked witch melted in the rain or was she one of the survivors?  Had he shot her, stomped her with his foot or cane?  He couldn't remember anymore.  Noah craned his neck back and with his limited vision, he could see the group lurching up ahead of him.  He was so close to home but he would never make it.  This was it.  They were all around him in every direction and he could not stand and fight.  He was practically dead.  What was going to get him first?  The existent bite mark or another bite from one of them?  Maybe they only wanted fresh meat?  Ever rational, Noah wondered if maybe they'd look over him as damaged, used up, and would go about their way?  Is it going to hurt when they bite into me? he wondered.  How silly a thought.  He was already in so much pain nothing would make it worse.   

Light me on fire, peel off my skin, pluck out my eyeballs.  It's all nothing compared to...this.  This is how it's going to end, after everything.  After making it so close.  God, why?  Why do you let me suffer so much?  Just let me go home or kill me now.  Take me before they do.  

Where are you?  Whereareyou...

Noah saw something dancing in his peripheral vision.  He looked over and it revealed itself to be a fairy.  The tiny woman's skin was made of silk and her wings of glitter.  She was snow white and naked, her breasts heaving as she flew around him.  The wings buzzed in his ear as she flew around his head.  She caressed his chin and ear and quietly sang to him.  He reached out to touch her and as he did, she dissolved into a million particles.

I'm losing my mind, Noah thought.  The infection was starting to reach his brain.  Could he trust what he was seeing anymore?  Were these people even real or was he imaging them as well?  The moaning from the dead grew in range, twisting itself into a kind of song.  The trees above Noah danced and shook their branches to the morbid music that was going to be the death of him.  Sunlight came down, trickled through the moving branches, and resembled the sweeping points of light from a disco ball.  This was all a production, an elaborate musical number that would accompany his death.  The world was putting on one last show before he bowed out.  Noah turned onto his back again and slid his hand into his left pocket.  He looked up and saw a group of them heading his way.  The sun was shining directly behind them, their heads pitch black against the blinding sun, a halo of radiance setting their skulls aglow.

They looked like angels.

Noah blinked through teary eyes.  Three woman, one man and two that were indistinguishable.  They were fresh.  No missing body parts, no gashes or lacerations.  Some of them still looked human.  Maybe they were.  Maybe they were coming to save him.  But the groans told him different. 

Whereareyouwhereareyouwhereareyou...

Noah reached for the familiar lump and pulled it out of his pocket.  He raised the small box to his eye level.  He opened it and smiled.  The sun shone brightly on the elegant ring that sat safely tucked inside, untarnished.  The sparkle carried his mind off into his memories, the one place the sickness had yet to reach, the only scrap of safety he had left.

The Road in Red: Alone

“Oh, God!” Noah screamed.

Surrounded by dead bodies that were closing in all around him,  Noah realized there was no way to break through their rotted line of flesh.  The man and woman and their followers were closing in behind him and the new group wasn’t too far ahead of him.  Noah only had two bullets left, not even enough to put a dent in either group.  For a second, Noah thought that he should just take his chances and jump into the woods but quickly tore that idea from his temples.  The woods were too dense, too full of hiding places for those people.  They could be behind any tree, ready to grab him by the arm or neck and pull him down and that would be the end.  Noah then thought he could tackle them, break through their line.  The ones ahead looked a lot frailer than the ones behind him.  They had been dead for a long time.  Maybe they’d go down easily.  But what if they didn’t?  He could handle one but if two or three of them grabbed him all at once, he wouldn’t be able to fight them off, especially with the throbbing in his leg that was slowly crippling him. 

Noah stood there, not knowing what to do.  His mind raced but he couldn't think of anything in particular.  In an attempt to come up with a split second solution, he froze as a trillion other things blurred past the eyes of his mind.  Looking down, Noah noticed there were no tree limbs or heavy rocks for him to use, nothing to help him.  The rain began to hit his head harder, fatter drops of water splashing off his nose and hands.  Noah pulled out his gun.  With no more time to organize a surefire strategy, he decided to shoot the ones closest to him and hope they’d go down.  With enough luck, they would create a hole large enough for him to squeeze through.  The odds weren’t good but Noah was battling a sudden onset of exhaustion, fear and tremendous pain that wouldn't allow for a better plan.  The rain spread out and came down harder, drenching Noah and making visibility low.  The groans of the people were drowned out by the falling rain, splashing down on everything, turning the ground into slippery mud and stifling Noah’s concentration. 

One of the men approached, staggered, lunged his red hands at Noah, his mouth open, ready to receive Noah’s flesh. 

"Father, forgive them; forgive me," Noah said and with a flash of light, he shot the man in the face.  The man went down in a wet heap on the ground.  Noah aimed for the next person in line.  It  was a teenage boy not much younger than him, his throat torn open, his Adam's apple dangling onto his chest with every soggy step.  Noah raised his gun to the teenager and as he concentrated on the face of the person he was going to kill, Noah saw that the hair on his head was falling out, being washed away by the hard rain.  Noah’s eyebrows flared up in confusion.  In a matter of moments, the boy's nose fell right off his face.  His lips and cheeks were next, sloughing off his skull like wet tissue paper.  Soaked lumps of rotted meat slid off the teenager, splattering on the ground that was turning into thick mud.  Splat, plop, splash.  His outstretched arm, wet and full of protruding veins broke off at the elbow and fell with another wet thud.  Around him, the other people were also feeling the effects of the falling water.  One severely decomposed man’s head fell completely off his body, sending him to the mud with a sickening plop.

It was the rain.

Suddenly, Noah remembered what his grandmother had told him. 

“The rain is only God’s tears, sugar.  It’s His way of letting us know He’s watching over us.  When the world has become too wicked, the Lord becomes sad and cries.  His tears fall from Heaven and those tears wash away all the bad.  When the rain dries up, man's sin has been cleansed and everything is made good again.”

Wash away all the bad.

One by one, the dead people collapsed and did not get back up.  They tried but the muscles that moved them were disintegrating.  They were becoming skeletal, the hard rain stripping all the flesh from them, the rotting smell of death and fat melting in the mud.  The rain fell intensely and Noah thought he heard a clap of thunder.  Or maybe it was a faraway gunshot.  Out of the estimated fifteen dead people, all but three had fallen, writhing in the mud, bellowing, dying again.  Enough were down to allow for Noah's escape.  He started to run through the mud and quickly slipped.  His legs flew out from underneath him and he fell on his side with a hard thud, right onto the bite wound.  Despite the softening blanket of mud, the ground beneath was still hard and provided no cushion for Noah's fall.  Pain ripped through Noah’s leg like white hot lightning and Noah screamed with abandon.  Rain fell into his open mouth, momentarily choking him. 

After a few moments of cradling himself in the mud, Noah collected himself.  The three dead people were still after him.  He had to get up.  He looked behind him to see the dead slipping and sliding in the mud.  One wasn't wearing shoes.  He couldn't tell if it was a man or a woman.  It also slipped in the mud and upon impact, its left leg fell off at the knee and its left arm fell off at the shoulder.  The others slid clumsily, trying to gain traction while keeping their focus on him.  If the threat of being eaten wasn't so close, Noah might have considered this comical.  If he weren't so exhausted, he might have laughed.  The dead thing on the ground pulled itself through the mud with its one good arm.  The other two were still coming, their faces slowly melting under the merciful rain.  Noah got back up and continued to run.  Their bodies fell out of view but their moaning followed Noah the whole way.

The Road in Red: Splinter Group

The lady with no jaw was coming for Noah.

She looked iridescent and ghostly in the limited light that struggled to break through the clouds.  Noah groped at his pockets.  The gun was in his right, the other item in his left.  He surveyed the ground beneath him.  Spotting a reasonably large tree limb, Noah picked it up and went to meet the woman. 

He found her, her arms outstretched, her tongue lapping at her teeth, her legs struggling to keep up with her urge to feed.  Noah's throat tightened.  His lower lids began to sting with the saline that was trying to crawl through.  His cheeks flushed.  His chest turned to lead.  Pity washed over Noah.  This woman so desperately wanted to eat him.  The one eye she had widened, glistening blue like the ocean, the depth of her hunger unfathomable.  Her tongue wagged at the sight of his skin.  If she had any lips, she might have been smiling. 

Noah had to do this.  This woman, this soccer mom or president of some club, this daughter or wife, this human being needed to be killed for her own peace.  Kill or be killed.  He hated killing them.  He just had to.  He thought about the old man.  He thought about the man before him, the two women, the child.  But with the exception of the old man, they were all sanitized by distance, dispatched by his gun.  He did not have the luxury of a bucketful of bullets anymore.  He had to get his hands dirty again. 

Please, God, forgive me.  Where was Gran?  Where were those cookies?  The woman got closer. 

No, I can't think of this now. 

Noah's mind tried to take him away from the happenings, an instant involuntary self-preservation mechanism.  He would go insane, snap if he had to deal with what he was going to have to do again.  His sanity was on the brink of breaking but he was also within teeth's reach of death.  Noah had to overcome his fear, his reservations, his own mind.  He breathed in the deep, death-filled air in a vain attempt to calm himself for the job at hand, to forget about the wonderful times that once brought him peace.  Those times were done.  Vanished forever in a fog of dead flesh.  Noah readied the tree limb.  He cleared out his mind and focused all thoughts on his swing.

But as the woman approached, Noah heard a shuffling from behind him.

The Road in Red: Sympathy for the Devil

A few yards ahead, Noah spotted one of them.  It was a woman.  Her back was facing him.  She was shuffling along the edge of the road among the opening of the trees.  Noah took in a deep breath and fixed his eyes to the back of her head.  He grabbed his gun from his pants and ran his hand along his left front pocket.  Still there.  It was comforting, reassuring, motivating him to continue forward to reach the end of this journey, of all this madness.  Noah slowed his pace, picking up each foot high off the ground so as not to shuffle and cause noise.  He inspected the ground before stepping to avoid any rocks or twigs.  His eyes took hold of the woman’s head as he slowly inched his way toward her.  Stepping carefully.  Slowly.  Methodically.  The woman just stood there, sometimes leaning one way or the other but mostly just standing still.  Noah had wished she’d walk around, at least for a bit, so that the crunching of her feet in the grass would somehow mask the sound of his own footsteps.  God, what was in front of that tangled mess of hair?  He tried to subdue his imagination, to stop the possible images of the woman's torn face from flooding the front of his mind.  He had seen some terrible things in the past few days...or was it weeks...but he still hadn't gotten used to the human carnage that still churned his stomach.  He had his gun and he could just shoot her easily but he didn’t want to waste bullets if he didn’t have to.  He only had four in the chamber and no more.  What if he needed them when he found himself in a more desperate situation?  What if the bullet he used on this woman could be used for when one of those people was right on top of him?  And there was no telling how much longer he would have to walk.  How many times had he driven down this desolate dirt road and never paid attention to the length of the drive, to the road signs, to the landmarks?  He had no idea how far away he was from safety and he cursed his careless ways.  He had never paid attention before but now he was making up for it, focusing all of his energy and concentration on his surroundings.  He couldn’t let another person sneak up on him like that old man.  He felt blessed to survive one close contact encounter.  He wasn't sure he'd survive another. 

Noah inched his way beside the woman.  Several feet of dirt separated them.  The closer Noah got, the more he could hear the woman.  She was moaning.  Was she is pain?  Was she tired?  The moaning became louder, more unsettling as he passed.  There was a wetness to the noise, as if she was gargling mud.  Moist.  Drowning in her own fluid.  Yet, alive.  A part of him wanted to shoot this woman, to put her out of her misery, to relieve her of the burden of her hunger.  He contemplated the woman just like he began to contemplate the old man.  Then, he stopped himself.  No, he had no time.  He couldn’t lose focus.  Besides, he didn’t want to kill anyone if he didn’t have to.  It felt filthy, sinful.  Noah stopped momentarily, lost in the wave of thoughts that seized his body and locked it into place.  These people had to be dead, right?  Shooting them would not be sinful.  I am not committing murder, he tried to rationalize.  But, there was no rationalization left.  Nothing made sense anymore.  The very nature of life and death was done, no more.  None of the rules of humanity or morality existed once the first dead body woke up.  Now, there was just survival.  There was just making it to the end alive.  Noah stared at the back of the woman's head, not looking at her but through her, allowing his mind to take him out of the dirt road and into some semblance of balance, into something that he could wrap himself in, a blanket of sanity, security. 

And then she shifted.

The Road in Red: Of Rain and Rapture

A work of fiction presented in five parts.

“Now this will be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the peoples who have gone to war against Jerusalem; their flesh will rot while they stand on their feet, and their eyes will rot in their sockets, and their tongues will rot in their mouth.  On that day a large-scale panic from the Lord will spread among them. One person will grab the hand of another, and one will attack the other.”
- Zechariah 14:12

Noah felt the pain of the old man’s bite rip through his thigh, as if someone had injected boiling water into the veins of his leg.  The filthy old man managed to break Noah’s skin despite the thick denim material of his jeans.  Noah howled in pain, which only seemed to make the old man sink his teeth harder, deeper, into Noah’s thigh.  His withering arms flailed at Noah, tearing at his shirt and jeans.  Noah reciprocated, jerking his body and kicking up his legs the best he could, fighting the dead weight of the old man.  Noah hit the man in the head with his fists, clawed up clumps of dirt and threw them in the man’s eyes but it didn’t stop him.  The man held his grip on Noah’s thigh.  Noah managed to inch himself closer to the gun that was bucked out of his hand when the man tackled him.  He kicked and clawed and screamed his way to the gun, wrapped his finger around the trigger and then aimed it at the hungry old man’s face.  He started to squeeze the trigger but thought better of it.  He didn’t want to waste any bullets if he didn’t need to.  Instead, he took the end of the gun and jammed it into the old man’s ear.  The old man immediately let go of Noah’s thigh, a ropey string of slime and saliva coming off the bite.  The old man, too, howled in pain, an inhumanly low gust of agony that escaped his bloodied lips.  Noah repeatedly struck the old man in the ear and face.  His skull didn’t give as easily as Noah had hoped.  He was a fresh one.  Noah freed his good leg from under the old man and kicked him in the chest with all of his might.  The old man fell back and Noah took advantage of the man's temporary disorientation and pounced on him, straddling him to keep him pinned to the ground.  Noah raised the gun in the air and slammed it down onto the old man’s face, crushing his nose and releasing a spray of coagulated blood and cartilage.  The gun came down again and again, slowly caving in the old man’s face until it was nothing more than fragile bone covered in a thick mass of blackened blood and disassembled brain matter.  His arms and legs fell to the ground.  Shaking.  Twitching.  Still.  Noah’s chest heaved in a rush of adrenaline and exhaustion.  Noah stayed on top of the man for a few minutes, allowing his breath and heart beat to slow before using the old man's shirt to clean the mess off of his gun.

Noah got off the old man and stumbled to his feet.  He wiped the sweat from his face with his forearm.  Looking down, Noah contemplated the bloody mess that once used to be a man.  No, he didn’t have time for that.  Noah felt a rush of nausea hit his stomach but he willed it away.  He pulled his pants down to his knees and inspected the damage.  Jagged red marks formed an ellipse right between Noah’s kneecap and groin.  The old man hadn’t bitten too deep or managed to tear away any flesh but it still stung like hell.  Small scratches from the old man's fingernails were scattered about Noah's arms.  Most of them weren't deep, just superficial and slightly raised.  His stomach was sore on the outside and nauseated inward.  No time to be concerned.  Noah had to get back to his destination.  He’d be okay if he could just make it there.

The dirt road seemed to stretch into oblivion, when in reality it was just a few more miles.  Noah was flanked on both sides by the density of trees, their trunks and branches and twigs intermingling and creating a web of cover that was both a good and a bad thing.  They provided good cover and protection for him but also for them.  Noah could see nothing but straight ahead, which didn’t bother him in the slightest.  It made his destination easier knowing he wouldn’t have any detours or distractions.  It also made it more dangerous.  Those people could be hiding behind any tree, lumbering around in the tall grass and he would never know until they were upon him.  That was the case with the old man whose skull he had just bashed in.  Noah lost his concentration for only a few minutes.  He wasn’t paying attention, got to close to the trees and the man lept at him.  Noah silently swore at himself for being so careless, for not being alert enough.  He ran his hand over the lump in his front left pocket.  It hadn’t fallen out during the fall.  Good.

The light from the sun that was illuminating his path was becoming dimmer.  The sky was graying.  Clouds were filling in the blank spaces in the sky, meshing the red dirt with the gray sky into a muddled brown.  The air was dusky and dark.  This was good.  He had heard they didn’t have good eyesight.  Unfortunately, neither did he.  Noah had been walking for so long.  How long, he didn't know.  The days were flowing into one another with the same monotonous activities of walking and evading, sometimes running and defending against those people.  Monday, Tuesday, Deadday, Rotday, one giant day of the week, one giant week of the month, one giant lifetime of oblivion.  It would have been nice to sit somewhere but to sit in the road would have been stupid.  There was no shelter.  He had to move quickly through the darkening sky.  It looked like it was about to rain. 

“Fantastic,” Noah said out loud, right before putting his hand over his mouth.  His eyes widened in fright. 

No sounds! he reminded himself.  It was bad enough that he had to walk the dirt road filled with crunchy leaves and twigs.  He didn’t need to bring any more attention to himself by speaking.  Those people could hear him and would for him.  They were attracted to noise and movement.  Noah calmed himself down and continued to walk the path as it continued to blur in front of him.  Rain was definitely coming.  Just how soon?  Noah felt an unease come over his skin, sinking into his stomach and coming up through his throat, thickening his tongue and closing off the air in his lungs.  He shuddered.

Distractions

"I only make jokes to distract myself
from the truth..."
-Sia, Distractions

You'll often find me distracted.  Physically, all the teeth and fat is accounted for but my mind has long since melted away.  I am not with you.  I did not hear what you just said.  I take nothing in but the swelling emptiness.  The brain is capable of only so much information.  Mine is filled to capacity with clutter.  There is the worry and the fear and the shame.  There is no room for creativity or connection.  I cannot be interested in anyone else because my mind is too far away to take in anything that was said or shown.  People talk to me.  At work, my manager gives me instructions.  And I stand there and I hear what acquaintances, family and coworkers say but it doesn't absorb.  I don't understand it.  I don't follow it.  And sometimes I just don't realize they've said anything at all. 

This is why I've gotten dumber over the years.  I've never had common sense but I was sort of book smart.  After I was done with school, the book smarts went away while the common sense continued to deteriorate.  As far as learning and growing as a person?  Well, that has regressed as well.  

I think this is why I've gotten dumber over the years.  I've been unable to absorb any new information and the old has been pushed aside by the all enveloping dark.  When I tried to go back to school, I was honestly fearful of the material.  I hadn't had to use that part of my brain in years and I was worried I wouldn't be able to understand what was being taught.  When I went back to my old job, I was worried I wouldn't pick up on anything.  Although I had been there before, they had introduced new policies, as well as new registers.  It didn't take very long for me to get back into the swing of things but it took longer than it should have.  And that worried me, disturbed me more than it should have.

I'll admit that I'm drowning in my own misery.  I'm that guy, the one who wallows in his own pain, the one who feels sorry for himself.  And how can I not?  I think sadness comes in the form of walls, planted in between where you are and where you want to be, who you want to be.  And I'm confronted with walls every day.  When I walk into my job, I'm walking into a wall.  When I talk to people, I'm talking to a wall.  When I look in the mirror, I'm looking at a wall.  These walls keep me from hearing everyone else.  These walls keep me from feeling anyone else.  It's all around me, inescapable, so naturally that's all I'll see, that's all I can focus on.  Even when I try to break down the walls, it only leads to another wall.  And at times I think I can see pinpricks of light shining through the cracks in the walls, a shining swelling that gives me small hopes for something better.  Yet, it feels like a thousand miles away.  There's walls to climb and distance to tread.  And there's just no guarantee that it's worth it in the end.  But, everyone's quick to say that happiness is worth that risk.  Is it, really?  What about the bitter disappointment when we realize that happiness is not at the end of the journey, that the steps we took, the rules we followed to get to that happiness only led to a dead end?  Another wall.

I am so inside my head, always distracted to get myself out of my situation.  I can't think about work while I'm at work because if I do, I'll blow up at someone.  I can't think about home.  I can't sit too long with too much quiet or the walls close in.  That's why I've been watching so many television shows and reading so many books.  That's why I always have the television on or music playing while I drive.  Distractions.  Glittery diversions that keep my simple mind occupied so I don't think about the bad stuff.  Instead, I try to think about the good.  I think about stories I want to write or the good future I'll have when the stories are written, published and sold.  I think about creating my own cartoon series, very underground, very gritty and homemade but with a story that forgives any flaws in technical shortcomings.  And I wonder how that might lead into other directions, how maybe one day someone will see me and recognize potential and take me away from all of this.  I just think I have to keep putting myself out there, have to keep trying.  If I'm not trying, I'm sinking, swallowed, overwhelmed.

I think about leaving everything.  When I get enough money, I'm out of here I say to myself.  Running away just like I did with college.  But, look how college turned out.  It very well killed me.  Maybe it'll be better next time.  I'll have the control.  I'll choose who I surround myself with, who I'll invite into my realm of existence.  I always think about reinventing myself.  I've been thinking about it for years now.  I always say I'll go away and come back better, thinner, more talented.  But, how does that happen?  Is there a way to get away from the world, if only for a while, to get myself reorganized and in touch with myself and my creativity?  Is there any way to boost creativity?  I always imagine starting over, realizing that I keep making messes of my lives, that I messed up high school, college and now times after college.  How do I stop messing up?  What is so wrong with me that I destroy opportunity, pilfer possibility and ignore chance after chance? 

Concrete goals have now turned into abstract dreams.  The objectives I've laid out for myself have turned from realistic  achievements to idealistic fantasies.  Happiness is no longer true or tangible.  It is still a hope, yes, but not an ambition.  Most people strive toward happiness in their lives and most know it to be attainable and some do manage to achieve it.  For me, I place happiness in the more childlike fantasies, like flying or becoming an astronaut.  The truth is, I'm withering, truly, honestly withering.  I'm trying to keep my mind off of it.  But I don't know how much longer it will last.    

Not for Me

The other day, I geeked out because I found some animation software online for super cheap.  I was getting ready to sell my blood, sperm and a kidney to be able to pay for everything I would need to start animating again.  I'm talking thousands of dollars here.  So, when I found this software for a couple of hundred dollars, I made a sperm deposit right then and there.  The website looked pretty legitimate but I tried not to get too excited.  I Facebooked my roommates from college and asked if they thought it sounded like the real deal.  They know more about that stuff than I do.  If it was legit, that would have helped me out so much.  I'm already spending so much on a Cintiq, saving up all these months to be able to purchase one and it would feel deflating to have to then start all the way over to get some programs so I can actually use the Cintiq.

Because I haven't animated in over a year, I'm basically going to have to start from scratch, which I don't mind so much.  Obviously, I won't be putting together any good material and getting a real job any time soon but at least I can get back into the swing of things and hopefully improve over the little bit of material I do have.  It feels so weird.  Not only have I not animated anything in a year but I haven't even drawn a picture in a year.  I've never got that long without drawing.  I think I was just so burned out after school and needed a break.  Plus, I wanted to "focus" on my writing.  I'm always worried that the cliche about losing it if not using it is actually true.  Heck, I worried about losing it even while I was using it.  It's also weird because I had an acquaintance from high school ask me to help her out with an art project and I had to delicately decline her offer.  I told her I had temporarily retired from art.  In actuality, I was so rusty I was worried I wouldn't do a good job and she'd be disappointed in my work.  I just hope that I can get back into art and become confident enough to take on offers from people.  It would be great if I could supplement my menial income.

Couple of days later, I heard back from my roommates.  Turns out, the cheap animation software I discovered is sketchy.  I'm not sure it's a total rip off but it's not an authorized reseller and they only send discs and an activation key.  There's no support or help if things go wonky.  I'm not entirely surprised but I am still a little deflated.  It's okay, though, because I'm just going to keep working and saving up and I'll feel better knowing I obtained the stuff through legitimate means and I can feel good about getting any kind of support in case things mess up.

With that being said, I tried to order the Cintiq last week.  It's back ordered.  I also tried to order a nice desk to draw/write on but it too was back ordered.  Both won't be available for several weeks.  If it's not a lack of money getting in my way, it's a lack of availability.  When will I catch a break?

I've been doing a lot of stuff.  I've been watching DVDs, reading and working on my book.  I'm keeping myself busy.  It's a good thing because I'm still struggling with everything, with finances and feelings and I'm always so exhausted because it takes every ounce of strength I have just to make it through the day.  I keep reaching for goals, keep thinking ahead not only to avoid thinking about the present but also so I have something to look forward to, something to give me the strength to make it through hard days.  I have a vision of what I'd like to happen, how I'd like things to work out and I'm depending entirely on myself to make it happen.  This is dangerous.  If it doesn't work out, I'll only be reinforcing the hatred I have for myself.  If it does work, then hopefully it will lift me out of my darkness, even if slightly.

You know, I never really did figure out if I was alive or not.  I sort of just let it hang there, a non existent answer to a baffling dilemma.  But I know I'm not living.  I know there's no life within me.  If there's death, I don't know.  But there's no light, no love and nothing holding me back from the brink of breaking.  It's a tad worrisome.  So, I just don't think about it.  I'm just trying to think about the next paycheck, the next week, the next month ahead when I'll hopefully have all my stuff together so I can start drawing and animating and creating new worlds with lines and colors and my hands, a world I can escape into where I can say I have control.  'Cause I realized a long time ago that this world is not for me.  I'm just afraid my creativity is just as broken as I am.

I pray that I'm mistaken, that I at least have that left.

I feel a bit weird doing this but I'm going to put a donate button on the right side of my page.  I don't expect anything from anyone.  Times are still tough and people can't just be handing their hard-earned money on jerks like me.  But, if anyone feels like donating a little something something, that would be fantastic.  Who knows, maybe a billionaire will stumble across my blog, see that I'm struggling, and drop a several hundred thousand dollars to help a brother out.  Oprah?  Oprah?   

Concrete

So, we all know there will always be people more attractive than us and people less attractive than us. Despite this knowledge, we can’t be satisfied with ourselves. We always strive to look like the more attractive people. We think if we can only have “his stomach” or “her boobs” then we’ll feel better about ourselves. Yet, when we do get there, we realize it’s not enough, that it doesn’t make us feel better about ourselves at all because there is still something, someone more beautiful out there to strive for. If only we can have “her teeth” or “his hair” then we’ll finally feel better about ourselves. It’s like climbing a ladder that leads to nowhere.

Why do we do this to ourselves? Beauty isn’t the way to satisfaction because beauty is fluid and constantly changing and consequently we are always searching and failing. Thin is in and so we lose weight and by the time we are skin and bones, curves are all the rage.  We dunk those donuts and by the time we've fleshed out, straight hair is what's happening.  Then curly.  Then grungy clothes.  Then prep and polish.  Big noses.  Little hands.  Change your wardrobe.  Put your plastic surgeon on speed dial.  Follow every trend to the letter.  Beauty is not concrete. The only thing concrete is confidence. Until we can relinquish everyone else's idea of beauty and start embracing our own, we will never be satisfied. We all have our own beautiful qualities and unique features that we should focus on instead of the features we think we should have or would need to feel good about ourselves. Everything we need to feel good about ourselves is already there, hidden under the fear, inadequacy and shame.

I know this.

But I just don't believe it.

Blood: Love Leaks From Her Neck

Although I was convinced vampires have no capacity to feel true love, something was definitely happening with this girl. I was wanting her, desiring her in a different way than all the rest. For some reason unbeknownst to me, I was the one spilling my guts.  I wasn't used to being on the other end of the unfurling.  Was it possible that I was simply unloading on this dumb girl, that I had held in all these feelings for so long that I had to dump them on someone, anyone?  Or was she special?  Was she somehow bringing this out in me?  Was this really happening? Was there a different kind of lust present, not just a blood lust, but a lust for love? I knew she was into me but I just couldn't figure out if that feeling was being reciprocated. It had been so long since I had felt a genuine human emotion that didn't involve negative energy. And despite my efforts to warn this girl against my kind, I hadn't managed to scare her away. Dare I say, I admired that?  Maybe she was too far gone, too far pathetic for me to get inside of her brain. No matter, that wasn't the part I was interested in getting inside, anyway. This girl had affected me in a way no other human had before in my entire existence as a vampire. And the longer I let her live, the longer I talked, confided in her, the more she intrigued me. It was almost as if she could look into my empty eyes and feel the hurt I endure daily. Although it is impossible for her to know such pain, she seemed to think she did. And that was almost comforting. I had felt as if my emotions were on the brink of...humanity. Although I strike fear into the hearts of humans, I was actually the scared one in this situation. All these new feelings and emotions were trying so hard to tear themselves out of my cold corpse. Was I becoming the impossible, a vampire capable of loving a human, of loving at all? I was going to try one final time to convince this girl that being a vampire wasn't the way to go. The fact that I even cared to tell her threw me off balance. Why should this even matter to her or anyone else? She was nothing but nourishment, yet I couldn't help but to try to warn her, couldn't help but to want to make her run away, to somehow free her from my unwilling hold over her heart.  I think I was wanting to save her.  Lesson three:

In the most basic sense, vampires are drawn to blood because blood is life. It's a drug, yes.  It's a substitute for love, sure.   But most of all, it's the representation of life that runs through the veins. We vampires are without life and so we crave it just like we crave blood. Even in death, we crave to crawl back into skin that is warm and alive. With each neck we nurse, we gain a little bit of life back. Just as you humans cannot escape death, we cannot either. We do all we can to stop it. And even when we lose to death we cannot accept it. We are greedy for life. Vampires are always in a frenzy to be free from the shackles of our shells. Becoming a vampire is the equivalent of being locked in a coffin while you are still alive. It's claustrophobic in this skin. When you're human, you want to die, but when you become a vampire, you just want to live. It's the ultimate irony. There are so many untapped desires the living have yet to explore and the dead aren’t ready to give that up just yet.

Vampires are still human in some respects. We walk and talk and put on the appearances of normality. The frustration is that we can cover up our curse as much as we'd like, but we can never be who we were. We can pass for human, yet we never will be. We don't breathe, so our chests don't ebb and flow in our sleep. We don't cast a reflection. I don't even remember what I look like anymore. I was turned before cameras were invented, so I don't even have a picture to remind me of my features. I don't know what color my hair is, what my lips looks like, even the hue of my eyes. Although vampires gain sustenance from blood, we can eat, yet eating isn’t necessarily recommended. Since our bodies cease to function upon death, the food isn’t digested and it just sits in our stomachs until we throw it back up. And perhaps the biggest disappointment, the thing I miss the most about being human, is the fact that vampires cannot participate in sex. Sex is destroyed in death. We have been compensated in other ways, although they pale in comparison to climaxing. We are granted new eyes, eyes that can see everything. Our eyes can pierce souls, can hypnotize and paralyze, eyes that draw the living to us. Upon our death, time dies as well. We are preserved in tight, youthful skin that holds our attractiveness. We are forever young and forever beautiful. We are given an insatiable lust, a lust that lingers on the flesh of our victims, an intoxication that dizzies and leaves them vulnerable. We smell of sex and seduction. It seeps from our skin. Our lips are full of flavor.  Yet, what's it all good for if we can't indulge in our own attractiveness, if we can't use it for sexual gain?  Yes, it gets us the blood but what about the other parts?  Oh, how I miss those other parts.

As I spoke, I became fixated on the tightness of her body, the tightness of her dress and realized this would be the point where my pants would become tight, if only my organ was functional. Just because I cannot become physically aroused anymore does not mean I don't get hot in other ways. My hard on comes from my head. It's a mental stimulation, a memory of what once was. And I could tell as I spoke of sex, she became hot as well. She crossed her legs and I noticed she wasn't wearing any panties.  She licked her already wet lips. The leather let out a dull squeak as she inched closer to me, as she looked into my eyes. Although I was the vampire, it seemed as if she was hypnotizing me. She reached out and touched my jaw, her warm fingers running down my face, a warmth I haven't felt in so long. I'm always cold, so cold, and her fingers were like fire. She pressed to continue, to go on with all the ways in which I could make up for my vampiric impotence.

Oh, and to bite someone is to make love to them. It’s almost as good as the real thing. There are so many similarities between sucking necks and having intercourse. The neck is smooth and warm, the blood just under the surface of the skin provides the heat to initiate action . The neck throbs in ecstasy. It’s wet and delicious. And when we reach the point of penetration, after our teeth elongate and become firm, we sink into a state that is solidly sublime. Once I’m inside of her, our bodies are joined.

She began to get really turned on, her chest heaving out, close enough so that her breasts brushed against my chest. Both of her hands were on my face as she pulled me in for another kiss. This one felt so different, so much warmer, so much more tender. My lips tingled as our mouths mingled. She tore off my shirt and I ripped her dress off in one quick motion. We stood there, both topless, my stomach rock hard and her breasts like two perfect planets orbiting her torso.  Our hands attacked each others bodies in a throbbing fever. I continued to talk in between kisses.

And for as long as I’m sucking the sweet sustenance from her, our veins pulse at the same time. She breathes life and love into my body and I finally feel I am alive once again. And I am human again for as long as I'm sucking, for as long as we both share this blood, this crimson creator of life. We are as one, hovering over a perfect harmony of pleasure and pain.  God, don't you want to feel it?  Don't you want to climax from the inside out, to feel the millions of nerves being tingled, to shudder from such ecstasy, to feel it flowing in and out of you, to feel me touching you from inside your skin? 

Holding her body in my arms, something came over me, something so strong I was compelled to complete the task my body had ordered upon me. It was stronger than a sexual drive, more intense than any arousal I had ever felt. My lips made their way from her mouth to her neck. And she was lost in my arms again, just like all those hours ago on my couch. I ran my hand through the softness of her hair and gently pushed her head to one side. A line of translucent blue emerged from her satin skin. My canines carved themselves into points again and I lowered my sights onto that blue. In an instant, I had pierced her soft neck, my teeth passing the skin and flesh and landing in that line of blood. A small whimper passed her puckered lips and then an undecipherable moan filled my apartment. I couldn't tell if it was from the pleasure or the pain. Where was she on this journey? Where was I?  My teeth retracted as the punctured vein produced that sweet substance from her neck. It bubbled up like oil, thick and dark and revolting yet irresistible.  The coppery crimson liquid flowed like a waterfall from her body and I sucked it down in satisfaction.

"Yes, yes," she said. "You're doing it. You're turning me. And we'll be together forever." 

I could feel the smile on her face injected into those disgusting words. Yes, I was going to change her, to keep her with me, explore her further.  I was going to tear her apart and piece her back together, make her follow me, make her lick my feet and wash my hair.  Oh, God, the blood was going to my head.  Sweet, delicious, disgusting blood.  My eyes rolled back from behind closed lids.  It was all happening so fast, my brain buoyant in the red stuff.  I was getting close, coming to the brink of her burning.  I had to stop.  Wet, sloppy noises took over her moaning.  She grew silent, her breath easy and fluid.  

"I love you," she whispered in an exhalation of breath. 

My blue or brown or black eyes shot open.  My tongue ran over the puncture wounds like a vacuum.  This girl had done something to me, something I wanted to learn more about. But, her words reminded me of her incessant ignorance and her vapid shallowness. If only she would have kept her mouth shut, just like most girls should. It seems every time they open their lips for anything other than insertion, they ruin everything.  I continued sucking, let the moment overtake me as I was overtaking her. I would not turn her. I would not let her survive. I was reaching nirvana with every drop.  And as the blood slowly drained from her body, the pain and the emptiness set in. And she knew it. She screamed but I muffled her mouth with my perfectly manicured hand. She bit my fingers in desperation, but the pain was insignificant and not enough to let me go. I was no where near hurting as much as she was.  I began to bleed from her bite, my blood smearing all over her mouth.  Choking.  Wheezing.  Muffled excruciation.

"How's it taste?" I asked her. 

When I first bit into this idiot child, I was reminded of the time I was the one on the receiving end of the puncture. And I realized I was just repeating history, doing the exact same thing that was done to me. This girl had fallen in love with me and I had strung her along, having made up my mind from the start that I would kill her. But, to my credit, some reservations did manage to seep into my thoughts.  I played with the idea of turning her.  I guess I forgot to tell her vampires are fickle as hell.  She should have known it was coming.  After explaining all that blood does, all that it means to us, how could she not understand our insane lust over the flow of red? And I knew that I would no longer string her along. I knew I could not turn her and then abandon her like was done to me. No, this girl was too pathetic. She only deserved to die. I felt a responsibility to end her sick sadness. I was doing her a favor.  Letting her down not so gently.  Community service.

I realized there was a lesson to be learned from my exchange with this empty, lonely girl. There was a clarity in the crimson. I had tried to change, had tried to love this bag of blood, but my carnal cravings had conquered this crush I had developed for her. I learned that you are who you are and there is nothing that can do to rearrange or interrupt the natural cycle of your existence. It is the blood, not love, that keeps me going, that preserves my pale skin, that maintains my sexual magnetism. I learned that love is found in a heart that beats and not a vampire that eats. I granted her a gift alright, just not the gift she wanted, not the gift that only I can give. I did not grant her the gift of eternal life, but that of death, a gift anyone could have granted her. It’s unfortunate she sought me out. Her mission for immortality was wasted. And so was her time. But, not mine. I benefited from our erotic encounter.

When her body was fully drained, before her last breath, she let out a scream reminiscent of ecstasy.  Her body shuddered and I savored her death throes. And I realized that this was better than sex any day. To have a belly full of blood and a girl's life climaxing in my arms is more enjoyable than any orgasm I've ever had in humanity. I wondered if it was as good for her as it was for me.  I allowed her emptied and lifeless body to slip from my well defined arms and fall to the floor in a crumpled heap, her warm, wet juices dripping down my chin. And I thought of how it reminded me of old times...

I thought I had loved her but I realized I had mistaken love for hunger pains.

The End.

Blood: I Only Love You For Your Body

This tender and all too trusting young girl still wasn’t convinced. Yet, I was completely convinced of her utter incompetence.  Sitting there, nothing more than a doggy bag of blood to me.  Perky breasts.  Glitter in her eyes.  Wonder.  Amazement.  Idiocy.  I guess my monologue on my mammoth obsession for blood wasn’t enough to turn her away from being turned. There she was, gripping the couch, her lacquered fingernails pressing hard into the leather.  She was licking her lips, hanging on every word I said.  My talk of addiction didn't sway her, send her screaming for the door that she wouldn't be able to escape.  I suppose she has an addictive personality. Perhaps I had only reinforced her idea of being undead. Perhaps I only stoked the fire for her hopes of fangs. Perhaps her stupidity was only out-shined by her curiosity, a curiosity that fought against logic and fear. This girl had balls. I was a vampire who had brought her back to my place solely to suck on her neck yet she showed no signs of fear on her feather light features. And she was interested in me, in my lifestyle. And I couldn’t help but to feel something among all of this madness. Among this shroud of sheer absurdity over this situation, I saw something shining in her eyes. My powerful perception told me it was more than a curiosity. It was more than a yearning to be something else. It was an interest in the man behind the pale skin and seductive stare. And what was even more bizarre was the fact that I might have been feeling the same way about her. I wanted to know more about this girl, this empty headed and entirely fake girl. I wanted to see what was beyond all the plasticine and perfume. I wanted to see the girl’s insides. And for the first time in a long time, I meant it metaphorically. I was drowning out her droning on about becoming one of my kind, when I heard the word "love" bubble up from her plumped lips. My attention snapped back and I asked her to repeat herself. She said she would absolutely love to become a vampire. I told her that would be the last thing she'd ever love.  Lesson two:

The problem with love is that vampires can't. We are simply incapable of doing so. When the body dies, love is left to rot. The body is preserved, but the heart decays. You claim my condition is a gift you want me to give you. In fact, it’s no gift at all. It’s a curse. This curse of the vampire is that we are removed from love. Love originates from the heart and since our hearts don’t work anymore, neither does our capacity to care. I have feelings that are limited to anger and frustration. I've never felt warmth since turning. I have never felt happiness on my own, only that empty kind of happiness that seeps from strangers, the kind I lavishly lap up.  Ultimately, though, it's unsatisfying, like drinking chalk.

Although I am no longer human, I still carry some human attributes. Mainly, all the negative ones. It seems as if my emotions have been filtered, only leaving the offensive ones behind, bitterness being the biggest one. I'm bitter that I'm not alive, yet I'm not dead. I'm trapped.  It's like being stuck upside down in a hole.  Your spine cramps and the bulk of your body weighs down your lungs.  Breathing becomes labored.  Your existence becomes miserable.  I'm bitter that I have to hunt my food like an animal. I'm bitter that I have become something more, something powerful and wise, something superior to you humans yet I have to hide away like a lower class creature.  It's like discovering you can fly but you have to keep your feet glued to the ground.  I'm bitter that I can feel what everyone else feels but I have no genuine feelings of my own, except those of rage and regret.

We seek out love but it is impossible. You see, love leaks into the veins. It’s pumped throughout the body by the heart. And for vampires to find love, we must seek it through sucking. Not to tarnish my image or display my weaknesses to you but we vampires are lonely creatures, too. This is another one of our human-like characteristics. What humans don’t understand is that death does not diminish the need to connect. We seek out victims, not with malicious intent, but with the need to feel close to someone. We are always so cold, always so ice cold. We can’t feel the sun and we can’t feel the skin of the living, not unless we are tearing it off.  The only way to feel warm is to smear that blood on ourselves, to ingest it and feel that sickening syrup slowly slide through our bodies.  God, doesn't that sound pathetic? Another reason I hate myself.  There's this inner conflict, this tangle of superiority and human-like weakness that spins inside me like nails in a blender. 

As much as I believe otherwise, vampires are viewed by the majority of you humans as a subspecies.  I guess there are those like you who realize we are exceptional but by most we are unneeded and unwanted. No one would ever choose to love a vampire. And even if they did, we can’t love back. Since they don’t choose us, present company excluded, we must choose them, love them against their will, and force a love out of them that is empty and unsatisfying. It seems cruel but it is a means for survival. It's no different from you humans. When I'm at that club, I see men stalking their prey just like I do. And at the end of the night, you are used up in very much the same way, just used for sex instead of blood.  Except, with them, you live to tell about it. But, really, am I all that different? We are forced to feed on blood, not only for nourishment, but a little connection.  Isn't that all you men and women are looking for, a little connection, a little contact to make you feel less alone in this great red world?  Without that connection, we are loveless. And without love, we are nothing.  And nobody wants to be nothing, not the highest ranking creatures or the scum of the earth.  Love, all consuming, all negating love is still at the center of everything.  As much as I hate it, love does transcend death.  Love still matters to every living, dying and dead thing.  Although vampires have been ushered into the underworld, we still retain the knowledge of what is important in life, a life that has been robbed of us, a life we still yearn for. Although we cannot obtain love, it is still a goal of ours. We still want it just as much as we did when we were alive. And perhaps that is our ultimate punishment. Not only are we locked away from the light, but from love as well. And we seek that love, very much in vain, through the veins. But, don't get so uppity. You humans do it, too. You all look for love in all the wrong places. Usually the wet ones.

I fell in love only once before I became a vampire. It was with the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Even after all these hundreds of years, I have never met anyone as beautiful as her. You don't even come close. I was immediately smitten with this beauty. It wasn't only her face, or her breasts, but it was her grace, her charm, her love that pulled me in to her. Unfortunately, the joke was on me. Turns out, she was a just another vampire and all those qualities of her character were a facade. She reeled me in just like I did to you.  Do you get it yet?  Are you paying attention, you twit?  Don't think I am interested in you.  Don't think my eyes shine for you.  For as I said, vampires just don't exhibit those kind of warm characteristics. It was just the mechanics of a vampire, those fake feelings that force unsuspecting victims to fall into their fangs. I wanted to give her my heart, but all she wanted was my blood. She strung me along for a few weeks before she bit me. Sometimes, I feel the greatest pain she plunged into me was not her teeth, but the hopes for some great love, a promise of something more than myself. She kept me around just long enough for me to fall in love with her. She had fooled me, had betrayed me into thinking I had found something real for the first time in my existence. I suppose my only consolation was the fact that she turned me and didn't just kill me. Hm, some consolation.  She even kept me around for a little while after I became a vampire. But, it was only long enough to teach me how to survive being a blood sucker. She soon left me and I was left so bitter. For the longest time I questioned her motives for turning me into a vampire. At first, I thought she was doing it so we'd be together forever. Then, I thought maybe she did it out of pity, that the time we had spent together maybe actually meant something to her and she didn't have the..."heart" to just kill me. I'll never know her true intentions. But, it couldn't have been love. I am convinced of that.  Love does not hurt.  Love does not transform.  Love does not kill.

But, it doesn't stop me from seeking it. And the closest thing I've come to feeling love is feeding on lovers. I like to search out the most vulnerable, most desperate girls I can find. Those are the tastiest. They have so much love within them and no one to give it to. Their blood is spiked with it.  So, I gladly take it. All that blood infused with so much love just tastes so sweet. It's just like red sugar. And that drug effect takes place once again, lined with love. That bitterness inside, the remnants of humanity, dissipates for as long as the blood coats my cuspids. You see, I don't just crave blood for the numbing properties, but for the bits of love that linger in the lining of the veins. It retards my regression into madness. Without that love located in the blood, I would disappear into the darkness.

To be continued...