The Terrible Symphony

An odd symphony turns into a horrible nightmare come true.

Everything is dark, black, with an alarming read pulsing at the border. The blackness seems deep, hollow, it is not normal, it is empty. The only thing disturbing the darkness are the red waves that were pulsing to the beat of this haunting symphony that reverberated in the hollow black.

The symphony was life, it was pain, it was loss. The horn wailed with a drone long and low, water brought the next layer, trickling along and echoing the slow steady drip falling into it's stream. All of this topped off with a thrumming, rushing, pounding noise that was interrupted by occasional crackling, creaking, and groaning.

This dark symphony almost brought a sense of comfort, almost eased the screaming pain, almost made sense.

A sudden scream broke the symphony in the darkness as Grant forced his eyes open. What had happened? The last he could remember was leaving the park. Why was he at the park? Where was he now? And why in the f**k did he hurt so much? His mind was screaming and in chaos. He knew he needed to calm down and assess the situation. Grant tried to focus, tried to calm his breathing, but the pain and the panic welling up inside him did not make it an easy task.

He closed his eyes again feeling a bit calmer for it.

'OK let's look at this', his mind whined in agony, 'What happened?'

If he couldn't remember what happened maybe he could piece it together, what could he be hear? The long wailing of the off key trumpet, the running and dripping water, the rushing and pounding sound. All of these things difficult to focus on with the pain and that infuriating red pulse lighting up his eyelids.

None of this made any sense. He tried to calm himself, tried to prepare himself to slowly open his eyes again. Hopefully this time he would be able to see something.

A groan of agony slid through Grant's lips as he opened his eyes. He was shocked and his mind reeled at what he saw, now the whole hellish symphony made sense.

The off-key horn was actually the horn of his new convertible, which was triggered when the car finally came to rest wrapped around a tree. The rushing and pounding sound was not a stream, it was the sound of his blood pounding and his ears. The trickle and dripping sounds were caused by his blood as well, only those sounds were external.

His mind reeled in shock as he looked at the bloody mangled mess that was now his car and body. He almost wanted to laugh, it looked like some failed cyborg experiment dragged from the depths of hell by some depraved Frankenstein want-to-be.

A sudden cough wracked his body and the sight of blood bubbling out of a chest wound snapped back to reality. 'It is amazing what goes through your mind at the time like this', he thought.

He wanted to close his eyes again but something was still not right. The creaking and groaning sounds made sense, they were the mangled car, but what was the crackling sound?

He looked around and quickly found the source of the noise, fire. 'Of course', he thought 'why wouldn't this car be on fire? That is why they say a smoldering wreck.'

Grant finally closed his eyes as pain, panic, and despair overwhelmed him.

Why had he bought this damn car? It wasn't him. It was too flashy, too fast, and a waste of money. He knew that when he bought it. He had never been one to need material items to gain self-esteem, but when he got the promotion he had to let his friends talk him into it. He had been so stupid but like his grandma always said what if's and should haves are about as useful as putting horse shoes on the duck.

Another spasm of pain screech through Grant and left him screaming and out of breath. 'D****t, where is any f*****g help?', his mind screamed. 'Why has this happened? What happened?'

The last thing he could remember was it being a sunny day. He wanted to take Riley to the park and show him the new car. He had even bought one of those seatbelt harnesses so that Riley would be safe in the convertible.

Riley didn't like it at first but calmed down quickly, the best dog a man could have.

Coming back from the park Riley had no issues with the harness, he jumped right...

Riley!

Grant looked around in a blind panic as weird whine started rising all around him. Where was Riley? As he searched frantically the whine hit a feveredpitch. Finally he saw a paw, unmoving, sticking out from twisted bit of metal.

Grant screamed in anger, pain, and guilt as he reached out and grabbed the paw. His fingers no sooner closed over the soft fur when the whine peaked and everything went black in a giant fireball.

Author's Note

This story was another twenty minute challenge I gave myself. I wanted to describe something that was a fear of all of ours. Please review and feel free to add me as a friend!