DEATH TO THE HOUSE OF NOTHINGNESS

              'From the depths they come
               Writhing and creeping in shadows
               Tainting all they touch'

That they did.  They came!  The deepest, darkest thoughts; painful and insidious. 

They came during quiet contemplation.  They came during spiritual prayer.  They came in my dreams and fantasies.  They pierced my mind and blackened my soul.

 

At times they were my friends.  "Should I kill my boss today?"  At times they were the enemy.  "Will you please just go away?"

They pressed me so hard sometimes I could feel them chilling my blood.

 

I decided to seek professional help, for these dark entities would not desist.  I had hoped even for a gradual, quiet dissipation, but there was nothing, no relief.  They pushed and pulled at my heart until the love that once poured through my veins was nothing but blackened sludge.  A tasty treat for the creeping little shadow dancers that assailed me.

 

To say they tainted all they touched, was understating the darkness that permeated my weakened mind.  Insanity became a pleasant respite, but lucidity always prevailed.

 

Whence they came I shall never be privy.  Was it childhood trauma?  Possibly.  PTSD or schizophrenia?  I don't know.   I would love nothing but to send these bastards back to those depths, but, I fear these thoughts will reside with me for the entirety. 

 

There were times in that briefness, those moments, sans lucidity, those moments when true insanity was beckoning me, that I felt at peace.  My father used to say, "when you're crazier than the crap going on around you, you need not fear".  I had moments so dark that darkness feared me.

I would look in the mirror and see a lovely man, muscular, handsome and brilliant.  I would plan moments, dates, outings only to cancel, for the shadows had moved and those darkened little babies would come nest in my brain, feed on my beautiful thoughts and gorge themselves on the love and laughter therein, spawning it, changing it into something darker.

 

My friends did eventually abandon me, as I probably would have them.  The pain of that loss only fed the beast.  
 
I plotted revenge on every former friend that I supposed had harmed me.  All I needed were my thoughts.  My buddies in blackness.  My brothers of benevolent intent.  I would take what had crawled from those shadows and make them the envy of all mankind.  They will have their moment in the sun.  They will be heard.  They will be known!

 

Fueled by my dark thoughts, my new friends and I purchased a five gallon gas can and filled it to the rim.  I then drove to the church of my childhood.  The pains and embarrassment suffered there were floating closely to the surface of my mind.  I had found the culprit.  The memories of the events of that life had begun to dominate my thought altogether and I was dead set on silencing them with whatever means I could. 

 

I broke through a secluded side door and began to douse the pulpit and pews with the gasoline.  I could feel my adrenaline spiking and the emotions cascading over my soul. I will burn this house of nothingness to the ground and send my soul to the shadows.  "It ends tonight.  Thank you my friends."

 

I reached into my jacket pocket to retrieve the lighter I thought I had placed there only to find it missing.  "Are you fucking kidding me?"

 

"No he's not kidding you", said a tall, dark man who had stepped from the shadows in the corner of the church.  "You shouldn't be here Eean."  

 

I recognized the man immediately.  He was Pastor John Marshall, my boyhood pastor.  The man who played catch with my brother and me every Sunday after church.  He was the man who caught me with Elisabeth Combs making out in the rectory.  He was the man who led me to the lord shortly there after.  But the most important thing I remember is that he was the man who died pulling me and my brother from our burning church in June of 1987.  He could not be here, but he was.

 

"You're not real pastor."  I explored every pocket and eventually found the lighter that would be the instrument of my revenge.  "I saw you burned alive."
 
I struck the lighter and moved the fire towards one of the gas soaked pews.  
 
Pastor Marshall waved his hand and the fire went out.  "Go home Eean."  The pastors voice had taken on an angelical quality and his eyes burned of a fire much hotter than anything I had ever known.

 

"I have no home pastor.  I burned it down, remember?"  

 

"It was an accident Eean.  You know this."  Pastor Marshall no longer resembled the man I had grown up with.  He radiated of a light so bright I couldn't look at him.

 

"We couldn't get her out pastor.  Mikey and me, we tried.  The fire spread too fast.  I-."  I fell to the floor and began to cry.

 

"You have to forgive yourself Eean.  It ends tonight Eean, but not the way you wanted."  

 

"I want to join you and mom and Mikey.  I just wanna go home."

 

"You will Eean, in time, but not now." The pastors voice had been joined by a beautiful choir of angels.  "This church has been rebuilt, but THE church will never fall. Go find your home."

 

The pastors figure moved toward me.  He placed a glowing hand upon my shoulder and I could feel my dark friends leaving my body.    I saw them scurrying away, back into the shadows.  My mind began to clear.  My heart began to beat with a resounding thud.  My veins coursed with a new life giving blood.  The darkness was gone.  So was Pastor Marshall.

 

I left the church and drove to my tiny apartment and gathered a few things.  

 

Back in my car I struggled for a direction.  Not a life's direction, for the Pastor had imparted to me more than just ideas, he gave me possibilities.  The only direction I now struggled with was left or right, what city to start life anew?  I WAS FREE!