Priorities

I don't know whose child this is.

Probably somebody will come looking for him. Maybe. In a minute some frantic mother will come screaming his name desperately, and she will be so relieved to find him hanging out with me, unharmed, laughing, and I'll just hand him right over, because I really have more important things to do than keep up with anybody else's kid.

Papers to write, team members to review, surveys to read, oil to change...

It's not like I can go anywhere anyway, because the floor actually is made of lava, and this little booger-eater has stolen my lava-proof flip-flops and is strutting around all pleased with himself. He thinks he's cute, but those are my favorite flip-flops.

Where is your mother, kid?

Okay, I guess you can sit with me. We'll cozy up together until whoever misplaced you comes to find you. We'll point at passersby and pretend we're on a spaceship, and if we're good, really really good, we'll find some ice cream.

What else have I got to do?

I know what's mine.

I remember freedom now.

I had forgotten about it somehow. Perhaps it's because I'm the only one left in this place who's ever seen it. I put it out of my mind, having lost hope to retrieve it. Perhaps it was because I knew I could ignore captivity if I didn't have anything to compare it to. If there's no such thing as the Light, how can there be a Darkness? and if there's no such thing as Darkness, then how can I be in it?

So I forgot about it. It was the only way to survive the madness we have here.

But here it is. Freedom is on the other side of this thick wall of glass. I was never meant to be here. I was never meant to see this. I was never meant to know that the world had gone on just as usual all those years before we'd been corralled and stuffed into this controlled existence.

I can see it going on still, but I can't touch it. 

I watch it like a surreal television show. (I remember television, too; that's how old I am.) I watch the people and the cars moving about on their own. Nobody's telling them how to line up. Nobody's telling them where to go or what to do. Nobody's stopping them from doing it. I watch it like I used to watch war documentaries. It was something that didn't affect me. I didn't have to participate back then, so I never let it bother me.

But it bothers me now. The memories ignite and explode inside me like fireworks lighting my way. I want to be free again. I want to be out there, on the other side of the glass with my face to the stars and feel the night breeze chill my skin, and I want to have goosebumps. 

I want to be afraid of my own decisions, and I want to feel the courage of making them anyway.

I don't know how I'll do it, but I'm about to start a war, and it will affect everybody in this place..

It's only business.

This place has a lot of beds and no windows.

I can hear The Others outside the door, down the hall, laughing it up like everything's going to work out, and I guess it is. Everybody seems so happy.

There's a pizza place down the road. We saw it on the way in, and everybody seemed in agreement that it was the next stop after this stop. Just needed to do a little bit of business first. The proprietor in this place pays big bucks for quality merchandise.

Somehow I know I'll never set foot in that pizza place.

I'm being left behind with no last meal.

And no windows.

We Let the Damned Thing In

     We’d thought the floods were bad, but they were just the beginning. We traipsed through the mud for days, pulling out random objects as we came upon them. The mud pulled back, and, depending who was stronger, or perhaps who wanted it more, our precious belongings were released with a loud sucking smack, back into our possession. We gathered, and we thought about rebuilding, but…

     Who’s in charge here?

     I am.

     Is there anyone better?

     That rubs me the wrong way. He doesn’t know me. He doesn’t know what I’m capable of accomplishing. What’s the point of asking for somebody better? To insult me? To doubt me? To anger me?

     I’m all you got.

     I would have shrugged and left it at that if not for the scene behind his silhouette. Four black spires twisting on the horizon, connecting cloud to earth.

     Into the house we race. The big ones are carrying the little ones when they trip and fall. Some are shouting, some are crying, and all are hoping the wickedness lifts itself up and passes us by without a glance. Of course, none of us believes that will happen. We know all too well we are not immune to tragedy. So into the house we go, and as far down as we can get to escape the curling, creeping fingers of destruction. 

     Destruction comes in many forms, though, and he stands silently in the corner while we pray for safety. He lurks in the darkness of a dank and dirty basement and leers at the unsuspecting children, counting potential corpses.

The plumbing never works in those old houses.

That old, condemned house again.

I don't like the looks of the left leg, so I think I'll trim it down a little.

It's easy, see, just a little pressure right there, and a slice.
The problem there is that it's lopsided now, so I'll take a little from the right leg.

Hold these bones, sister, while I try to get this just perfect.

I'll have to do this side right-handed. The left hand won't reach around.

Dammit.

Guess I'll just have to do away with both legs below the knee, for balance. And a little off each thigh. The thighs have always been too thick.

I have no idea who clogged the bath tub.