I had gotten through most of the night fine. In and out of sleep I would drift, changing the position of my body as I eased to the surface of consciousness. I was restless. Trying to think of it I can?t remember how long this has gone on. Restlessness was fine though. Restlessness I can deal with. What was annoying was to wake up shivering, wet and cold, grasping wet sheets tight, trying desperately to ignore the discomfort for just another hour of sleep. Of course tonight this had not happened. Entering into my last wisp of delicate sleep I was actually quite pleased with myself. My dreams hadn?t lead to the usual sweating mess they usually did. Perhaps I was starting to come out of it. Perhaps in another month I could be through this time of year. The period between a point in December to some point after February was always bad. Confidently I grabbed onto the last train of sleep leaving the station and fell asleep. My confidence would soon be shaken again.
* * *
My hands rested on my legs.
(Was that some sort of material on my legs?)
Yes, of course it was. I knew the texture; I would just have to place my fingers on it. Ah yes, I had it now! Jeans! I could feel the small bumps that my hands had grown so accustomed to. That type of texture could only be blue jeans. I rubbed my hands slowly up and down my upper legs stopping at my knees and then back again. The palms of my hands felt almost as if they were being massaged by thousands of miniature washboards.
(You better stop that! You?re going to get in trouble!)
For some reason this needed to be stopped. I knew there was a place my hands were supposed to go. Oh god, can I really not remember where?
(Yes, keep your hands on your knees, much less likely to get in trouble that way.)
Yes, that was right. I needed to keep my hands either on my knees or just above. I slowly moved my hands back into the safe zone and gripped on to those tiny little dots and divots. Perhaps I could relax a little now.
(Was I nervous?)
I guess I would have to be in order to relax.
(Aren?t you forgetting something?)
Oh yes, my back, thank you so much, I almost forgot. Why if they would have seen me slouch! People might have thought I was attempting to ?misbehave? had they seen me slouch. I?m no ?misbehaver? either. I can sit up straight. I can keep my hands on my knees. Really! See look, no more rubbing. I?m a good boy.
(People watching me?)
Yes, they had to be, but who? I started trying to see. From a pinkish haze I began to see colors breath and flow. A rainbow of colors meshed together. Not any sort of a still picture, but a moving breathing palette. The colors would merge, change and split apart as if they were amoeba-like multiplying cells. As the colors became definable they would break off from the breathing mass and become their own objects. These were familiar to me. The different shades of blonde, brunette, black. Each perched upon a thin sliver of skin tone, and a shirt.
(Be careful! Keep your eyes where they?re supposed to be. You don?t want to get in trouble.)
I turned my eyes towards the sound it was important that my attention be centered there. The sound was familiar. The sound seemed to be an almost monotone, nervous low hum of sorts.
(You?ve been here before.)
Yes all this was too familiar. Even that old familiar felling of barely ridged plastic stabbing into my upper hind legs and ass. I did not need to look down. My ass and legs knew those blue plastic chairs as if they were a part of my own body. There had been many times I was sure my ass and hind legs looked as though they were some type of strange topographical map. It would have been a map of a rough and jagged terrain; littered with similar gaps and canyons, a wilderness that if one had the misfortune to wander into, might never find their way out.
A sound, not unlike the flapping of a large bird started near me. Soon this anxious bird was joined by other, and still others. The flapping slowly grew into a loud crescendo, accentuated my snaps, pops, and loud thuds. My vision suddenly snapped into focus. Those colors and shapes rapidly filled into each other, forming what I had tried to see but could not. I was right back in hell, the phasers surrounding me on all sides. A short five to ten foot gap lay at my right and then the girl?s side. There I was again amidst a sea of wildly flapping hands. The girls on my right leaning out into the isle, contorting their bodies and faces hideously, flapping one or both arms franticly, as if they were being raped by some type of invisible molester with a barbed cock. How could I be back here? I had done everything I was supposed to. I had complied with the rules to the best of my ability, and confessed promptly whenever I had not. I had even graduated. They had given me their grade-A stamp of approval. I had achieved the ultimate goal. I was a worthless junkie and knew that in the depths of my pitifully sick and dysfunctional mind. I knew I could never be well. I knew I would be sick for the rest of my life. I knew that I was different then everyone besides the other worthless pieces of shit that I was surrounded by. I knew I couldn?t have kids. I knew that the abused would abuse others. I knew I was just one step away myself from being a child molester. I knew I was just one step away from being dead. I knew I was just one step away from incarceration. I knew I had no control over anything that happened to me. I knew I was wrong and everyone else was right. So why then was I back here? Why the hell was I back here?
Playing by their numerous, unwritten, orally recited rules had caused me to ascend from their man-made purgatory even slower then I should have the first time. This time it was going to be different. This time I would shed blood. This time I would kill. This time they would see the beast. I knew just who to start on as well.
I stood up and faced Tom one of the prime abusers and instigators of abuse.
?Tom,? I yelled out, ?Hey Tom! Fuck you Tom,? and defiantly saluted him with stiff arm, closed fist and upturned middle finger.
His dopey sunken eyes seemed to open more than usual at my abrupt shout and militant salute. I had caught him right in the middle of a suck on his misplaced and malformed front tooth. It was time for this redneck son of a bitch to take care of his debt, and I was only going to accept payment in full and all at one time.
(Didn?t I tell you that you were forgetting something? You just crossed the line my man, and there?s no coming back from that.)
My body which had been invigorated with a feeling of power and determination suddenly went empty and cold. There was something that I had forgotten. I had forgotten all the other worthless individuals around me that I thought were friends would not tolerate this. I remembered the tackles, and the restraints. I remember the screams of the kids as their heads were forced down to touch their knees, or for the unlucky ones, the floor in-between their legs. After they were tackled to the hard ground one or two old-comers would hold their legs straight and flat on the ground, another one or two would hold their arms out straight and perpendicular to their backs, and the last would lean their body weight on the misbehaver?s upper back and shoulders until their noses touched their knees (or lower) and their arms were perpendicular to the floor. I can only image how those restraints must have felt. I had to work long and hard in wrestling practice and football practice in order to bring my nose within an inch of my knees, let alone below. So although I had never experienced a restraint I knew those that were must have experienced an almost blinding ripping pain just below their buttocks as their muscles pulled and ripped, their arms would have felt as if they were being torn from their sockets, and they would not have been able to breath without exercising a great amount of energy to expand their chests into the soft tissue of their legs.
I braced myself for impact and readied myself to make sure that at least the first few in would regret it.
(No fear, no blinking, move forward, make sure they crumble and when they do be in advantage. Use your leverage, you don?t have strength, but you have leverage, use it. Use their power against them, fight in circles or eights, if it goes to the ground get in guard, stay close, don?t let them ground ?n pound, try to stay standing, throw the enemy in the way of the other enemy, use your enemy as a shield, the enemy will be afraid to strike their partner, use that?)
In a moment all my mental recordings of defense training would wash over as I gritted my teeth and protected my tongue. I crouched, feet parallel to each other, back straight, and knees bent. The attack did not come.
?sntheeeeee-thup,? smacked his tongue as it pulled from his gimp tooth, like a starving dog trying to suck marrow out of a sun-dried piece of bone. The dull slightly open and decayed mouth which announced ?caution - slow? to all without speaking, slowly used it?s muscles to form corners at the edge of his mouth and made a sarcastic little grin. The hunt was on.
(Couldn?t the hunt only take place in one location though?)
Somehow, I had reached the eye of the storm. The phasers had not tackled me, they could not restrain me. Of course Tom had escaped as well. Not to hide. Not Tom. He would be hunting too, only without his favorite weapons. Since his phasers no longer had power over me he would be limited to fighting me as the weasel he was. For only a coward and weakling could use children as a weapon right?
(?)
For the truly important decisions and self-introspections there usually seemed to be a strange silence and peace within me. Time would slow for me to contemplate my options. No voice would be there to guide me or interfere with my decisions. I would make my decisions alone, always trying to assume the worst that could happen and the best possible outcome. I would place the probable somewhere between those two.
No voice was here now, but I was not alone. The prevailing color in the background was no longer pink but an off white or a stained yellow. Cold block walls. Although safer, this place was by no means safe. This was Marietta High School. The low almost monotone hum continued, it had kept a steady rhythm which carried me through the transitional phase of my dream.
(A voice. Yes, this was a voice that was soothing and calming. It said tremendous and unbelievable things unflinchingly and sure-footedly.)
This voice seemed to be coming from my History teacher. The voice was not hers however. She was a beautiful, matured, well-mannered, Georgia cracker which spoke fluently and eloquently. Her voice had not been monotonous, but the things she spoke were unbelievable. I often tried to picture what role she would have played if she had lived before and during the Civil War. I imagine that she would have been mouthy and embarrassingly beautiful. She would have spoken up about the tyranny of the North and rights for all in the same breath. Perhaps she even educated and liberated those she could. Of course it was not her spirit that was speaking in that low soothing almost monotone voice. Perhaps it was my history that she read, the class drowsily looking around either oblivious or shocked frozen and speechless. Constantly droning on, soothing me and upsetting me with the content at the same time. Everything had to be sorted. Everything had to be examined. The students would do nothing. They could not or would not interfere with this last game. It would be useless to try and bring them to awareness.
Tom could not get me here inside the class-room. Of course I would not be able to get him either. I got up from my desk, walking past the non-attentive and the overly inquisitive. I glided past them without touching, and without them assisting or trying to stop me. Perhaps even those that seemed to scrutinize me did not even really see me. Perhaps a faint shade or a ghost is what they saw. Like Tom?s gimp tooth, perhaps the soul of my life had been sucked from me and left only this shadow in it?s place. I walked the hall, drawn to where I needed to go. Perhaps I made stops, peering into the rooms. Trying to see if one of these rooms was where Tom had decided to hide. In every room the constant yet lightly emphasized stream of thought continued.
I don?t know how long I wandered the halls looking. Anxious to begin, yet frightened of the worst possible result.
(Which was what? Failure? Success? Or was it something else? What would come of this? Where would I end up?)
I could see light beaming out across the dark floor in the main lobby of the school. This is where I needed to go. But there was one stop I had to make. Mr. Fuller?s room. He had always been so kind to me. I loved the truth of math that he showed me. It was exciting and compelling to be presented with a problem and to solve it. With math there were base truths and laws to build upon, and an order to things. Even in this order there were still unknowns, things which were unexplained, things still undefined by the language of truth, waiting to be defined. He also taught the kids basic self defense, and gave me several pointers that I use to this day as preventive measures, and precautionary measures.
(Confuse your opponent with your appearance. Strike so fast and viciously that it not only harms but shocks into brief hesitation. Use common tools and items accessible to you as weapons.)
?It?s time,? he said. I knew it was as well. I could see Tom?s outline in the main lobby of the school. He stood in stark and direct contrast to the reflection of light on the darkened floor.
?sntheeeeee-thup,? smacked his tongue in response.
?Not in here Tom. Not in the school. While you?re here Tom I?m going to let you in on something. This kid knows a little something. He?s also about to teach you something. A little knowledge can compensate for a lot of strength.?
Perhaps this was not only Mr. Fuller but my wrestling coach as well. It had the same smirky feel of confidence and inspiration stamped on it. Like they saw heights I could reach and things I could accomplish. As if they saw something inside of me much greater and grander than I could ever allow myself to see. I hoped in this battle I would not disappoint them, for I am sure the consequences would be of some vital significance.
(It was time.)
I found myself outside the front of the school, over the campus lawn, and across the road. Here there was a field. The sides of the field sloped steeply to the sidewalk adjacent it. Rough brush and barren briars surround the field, not so much as to barricade, but just enough to impede.
(But it?s not just a field is it? There?s something else that was here or will be here)
I looked up into the eye of the storm. Noticing the gurgling, crashing, waves of cloud collide back onto themselves at the perimeter of the eye. Soon it would begin to rain. Soon the low monotonous hum of introspection would be rising in volume as the distance lessened. As a matter of fact the rain had started. A cold wet mist at first, and the hum became louder and no longer rhythmical speech, but random and earth-shaking thunder.
(What?s wrong with shaking the ground here? Is there something you?ve forgotten?) Cold, large drops of rain began to fall. Soaking my cloths and softening the ground.
* * *
Shaking and freezing I wake up. No point in trying to sleep anymore now. Time to peel open the covers and let the sweat evaporate. My fiancé spoons behind me to try and help warm me up. Talks to me softly and rubs my head.
?This is just a bad time of year for you.?
(Stroke)
?You are the strongest person I?ve ever known.?
(Stroke)
?I don?t know how you made it through there.?
(Stroke)
?I won?t let them take you away again.?
(Stroke)
?You?re the smartest person I?ve ever known.?
(Stroke)
?If you want to you will get through this.?
(Stroke)
?One day these struggles will just be a memory.?
I would realize later that the field was not just a field. A grave-yard had sat across the school in the spot I had looked into the eye of the storm at.
