4. Chrissy's Dark Journey

Chrissy tries to find her way back from her encounter with Death.

There was no way for Chrissy to tell how long she had been walking. It seemed like hours! She had long ago given up trying to figure out where she was or how she had gotten there. The only thing she knew to do was to continiue walking. She didn't even know how she knew which direction to go. She just did!

As she walked, she came across more 'debris' like the piece of lumber she had tripped over while running. At first it was just more boards lying on the ground. But she soon began to encounter pieces of twisted metal and chunks of broken concrete, too. The farther she walked, the more debris she encountered. Eventually, she had to start walking around or climbing over small piles of it. It looked as if a giant flood had deposited it all there. She didn't really spend time wondering about it. Nothing was making any sense anymore, so why should all the debris?

She was becoming exhausted. She was getting cut and scratched from climbing over the piles. While climbing over a particularly large one, she slipped and cracked her shin against a large chunk of broken concrete. She sat and held her leg while grimacing with pain for several minutes, her eyes watering. Once she could bear the pain, she looked ahead in the direction she was going. It was hard to tell, but it looked like it was darker ahead, as if there was a large wall in front of her.

Then her heart skipped! She saw a faint glow of light in front of her. She stood up and began limping toward the source of the light.

She had been right. There was a large wall in front of her! In the darkness it was impossible to tell how tall or wide it was. More debris was piled around and against it. The source of the light seemed to be some sort of a window in the wall. There was a shade pulled down over the window that was made out of wooden tambor, like the covering on a roll-top desk. The tambor was set into tracks along each side of the window with a handle near the bottom and was apparently supposed to slide up and down to cover or uncover the window. Light leaked out from around the sides.

Chrissy grabbed the handle and tried to raise the shade, but it was stuck fast. She grabbed it with both hands and gave it a good yank and the shade slid up about three inches before it stopped again. She yanked some more, but it wouldn't budge.

She bent down to look through the opening. Even the dim light that came through made her blink for several moments as her eyes adjusted. There was filthy glass on the other side of the shade, so filthy that she couldn't see through it. She wiped at the glass with her sweaty palm and smeared some of the dirt away. She looked through the glass and froze in shock at what she saw.

It was Ian! He was sitting in a chair next to a bed holding someone's hand! His head was lying on the edge of the bed as if he was asleep. What the hell was going on?!!

“Ian!!” she called out. There was no response. She tried to rap on the window but was unable to get her fist through the tiny opening in the shade. The best she could do was tap feebly. She raised up and pulled on the handle again. She pulled as hard as she could! The shade slid upward another two inches and stopped. No matter how hard she pulled it wouldn't move anymore. She lowered herself down again and looked through the larger opening. She banged on the window so hard she couldn't believe it didn't break. “Ian!” she called again. No response. It looked like it might be a hospital room. She couldn't see whose hand he was holding. She spat on the window and smeared more of the filth away to get a wider view. She still couldn't see who was in the bed, but she finally saw the person's arm, including all the tattoos on it. She froze in absolute disbelief! It was HER arm!!

How could that be?! What the hell was going on?! How could she be lying in a hospital bed on the other side of the window when she was right here?! She was growing more and more frantic by the second. She grabbed the handle of the shade again and pulled up with every bit of strength she had. She strained and yanked. It wouldn't budge. With a vicious snarl she gave it one final, all out yank. The shade broke free and slid the rest of the way up, flooding Chrissy with bright light that blinded her.

Author's Note

I am a surrealist at heart, so I had a lot of fun writing this chapter. In fact, I even had to tone down the weirdness of it a little.

As always, suggestions and criticisms are welcome.

Reviews

[Tina Kline]

I like the chapter. It seemed in some other realm where ever we go Chrissy was struggling over debris that represented her struggle in the 'real world'. Her powerful and all consuming desire to be back with Ian will bring her back to him in the 'real world. Great reading.

[Craig2591]

I like your interpretation. I really don't know what it all means myself. It was just automatic writing without much thought behind it, something that I love to do! It will be interesting to see what others get from it.

Thanks for the review.

[Tina Kline]

Yes, I agree. I is fun sometimes.

[E]

There's a neil gaiman vibe going on here, and i like it! I thought this was an added chapter to the other book, Darn it now I read 3 chapters ahead! hehe, good stuff as always!

[Craig2591]

Yeah, I'm confusing people by uploading two books at a time and not uploading the chapters in their right order. I need to quit doing that.

[E]

Nah, we are the ones not paying close neough attention to the title of the book, keep on uploading, keep on writing. do not let us stop you! :)

[Craig2591]

Well, in that case, the next chapter to this one is up. Enjoy.