Words, Feelings, Stories

wow the drive home was almost as strange as the drive in. There was so much water on the road, everything was mirrored, almost perfectly. You could read the letters on the road signs reflected in the roads.It was eerie, driving exactly between up-right world and upside-down world. That Stephen King fog ate away the barriers between worlds.

The man was sweating lightly, feeling trembly. He remembered. He remembered.        He had been walking from the shop to the farm, where his son was to bring him his lunch. His wife always wanted him to have something fresh, and since he liked her cooking, that was fine. He never knew what combination of his children would show up, and he usually made bets with himself on who and how many it would be. Since school was back in session, it was usually just one or two of the older boys. He had stopped to check out the balsams – something wasn’t looking right about the three year olds. He didn’t see anything – no insects or growths, and he made a note to have Jamie or Jon to check the soil. They may have been placed too closely, now that they had grown and spread out. They didn’t look crowded, but you couldn’t a;ways tell by looks. Ne bent a needle, and put it to his nose, then grimaced at the sharpness the scent sent through him. Oh well. He’d best get to the office at ...

“I am always with you. Why don’t you understand that?” The man answered slowly, thinking out loud as he had so often done with his friend. “The memory of you is always with me. But a memory isn’t you.” “Who is it then?” “It’s an it, not a who.” “Whos aren’t its? What are they then?” "Whos are whos. Persons. Its are things.” “Well I like to think I’m some thing. Some kind of a thing.” “I like to think you’re a person. Even when you aren’t anymore.” “Yet here I am.” “Here you are.” They fell silent. They waited, together, in a place that didn’t (shouldn’t) exist, where their presence together was as tangible as the strong friendship (love) between them. Both bodies and spirits seemed made whole out of the fog, by the fog, and they rested as part of the fog. The fog itself swirled and rippled around them, lightening and darkening, and in general deepening and entwining until there was nothing to be seen but the glimmering light and the embracing cloud.

He was back in the fog, back at the rock, back with his friend Mark, who was chipping at the rock with his knife. Who was being a bit unfriendly. “You know you should go back, they still need you.” “I don’t have to hurry, I can be with you a while.” “You are, always.” “You don’t need to sound so happy about it.” “I don’t want you here. I want you there. With them. Alive. Having tomorrows.” He gestured at the fog. “Not this.” “Yeah, I prefer sunshine, myself. But you aren’t there. “ “I am. Always.” “I never see you there.” “Liar. You see me every time you look into my sons’ faces, or watch them walk into or out of a room.” He thought that over for a long moment. “No.” “No?” “I see parts of you in parts of them. But they aren’t you and you aren’t them. I want you.” “I’m telling you, I’m there. As there as I can be.” “Then how come I never see you?” “Because you look with your eyes closed.” “That’s us’ly the best way to see things that don’t exist.” “I exist. I’m here, am I not?” “I don’...

He put out a hand and leaned it against a tree trunk, while he gasped. He had been running, and he was sweaty and breathless. He had run and run, and finally ran into a fog bank, and after that he was finally able to stop to catch his breath. He couldn’t remember why he was running. Was he running to, or running from? He thought it was probably from, because he had run into the White for safety and reprieve.  But who or what was he running from, and why? Was he a child, running from punishment?  Was he a man running from some natural disaster? Was he running from a person or a thing? Or maybe even just a thought, or a fear? Why didn’t he know the answers? And where was he? While he had been running, his feet had known where they were going, so he was on home territory, but oddly enough, he couldn’t remember where home was, other than where he was.  Maybe he was dreaming?  Maybe it was the fog? Fog could do weird things, not just to sight, but also to sound, to ...