By Shadygirl ed4u@hotmail.com Date: 24 July 1998
"Easy, easy."
I felt the rung underneath the ball of my foot. It gave a way a little but felt fairly sturdy. I could see him climbing, just a little below me. I felt safer with him going first, although that was about the most selfish emotion one could have.
My skirt flapped and rose and brushed my legs with the breezes, pleasantly, but it made looking down a little hard to see. I swear I saw a faint reddish glow in the center of the pit each time I blinked, but it was gone and left only blackness in it’s absence. A pit of blackness. I could see clouds, just over the rim of the pit. Blue skies. Open empty fields. Every bone in my body was telling me to climb back out, while the sky was still there, and run and prance through those grassy plains, and listen to my voice singing, inside my head. But his voice was the only one that actually reached my ears.
"How you doin’ up there?"
I looked down and saw his face staring up, questioning my pause, until my skirt blew between his eyes and mine.
"Oh fine," I put a smile into my answer. "Just fine." My fingertips quivered slightly and I wondered if it was really the strain that made them to that. I shrugged and searched for the next rung with my toes.
Found it. Then another with my other foot. Then the other. Soon I had a pretty basic rhythm and I found myself descending rather easily into the darkness. The sky closed a little more each time, with each step. Fewer clouds could squeeze into that blue space, and the red glow seemed to stay a little longer after each blink.
Right foot, left foot. Both hands on each rung. The breeze slowly turned into wind. The wind turned into gusts.
The last words I heard him say below me were "Stay with me" before the moving air filled my ears with harsh whispers.
Right foot, left foot. Right foot, left foot. With each rung the darkness became darker. I became more uncertain. The ladder became less sturdy and the rungs seemed to shift under my feet, and in my hands. My fingers were raw. My skirt became tattered. The rips may have allowed me to see easier if there was more light.
The blue above was nothing more than a pin hole in the darkness. It was noon, I could tell the sun’s brightness. It was as if role’s had been reversed, and the sun was peering at me through a pin hole, like I was an eclipse and harmful to it’s eyes.
A muffled scream found my ears. He’s fallen. I felt the ladder’s loss in the splinters deep under my finger nails. I wrapped my arms around the sides for support and shut my eyes to a safer darkness within. Tears streamed down my face and I couldn’t tell if it was from the wind or from fear. My body shook. (From wind or fear?) His scream faded and I opened my eyes at the renewed silence. The redness below seemed to swell for a moment. A moment too long.
I looked at the sun’s curious eye. "What if...?" I said to it, expecting a hand to lower, to help me, to lead me out of this pit. I thought of the fields again. The clouds. Running. My skirt sitting neatly, windless, at my ankles. Leaping and enjoying the warmth of the sun’s eyes. Both eyes!
His words crept through my mind though. "Stay with me" I heard his voice. First just in my mind, and then his voice in my ears. He was calling me. He was alone at the bottom of the pit.
I’ve got you! My back straightened with new found strength. I lowered my right foot again. Found the rung. Right foot, left foot. Right foot, left foot. Right foot, left foot. The cold nipped at my bare legs, at my nose. My fingers felt the icy rungs, slippery and stinging. I knew what I had to do, but my fingers were frozen in time. My feet had trouble keeping their place until it was mostly my hands doing all of the work.
I lowered each hand, to each rung and wrapped my legs around the cold slippery ladder sides. Pain tore through my skin. Icy splinters bore deep into my thighs. I looked up. The sun had closed its eye. I was alone.
The red glow below seemed nearer, but no more clear or defined than before. Soft smoky wisps of red mist made their way around me, warning me, but not melting my fingers icy grip. It seemed to pull at me. At my skirt. At my hair. It pulled at more than could be seen, I felt my soul give way, and with in a moment my fingers released the rungs and I was falling.
Hot air enveloped my body as I fell with increasing speed. The red wisps surrounded me, trying to cradle me, but I felt claustrophobic and trapped. My limbs tore at the smoky seams, and I fell deeper and deeper to the unknown.
The red glow grew in size at a rate that made me dizzy. I think I was screaming, but I couldn’t hear a thing. And then all of a sudden, blackness. Again. Cold. Sweat. Empty stomach (or stomach emptying).
Hazy warmth brought color to my cheeks, slowly. I became aware of fingertips on my brow, and soft rich smelling earth all around. I could feel hot rays on my face, on my closed eyelids. I rolled over a bit, and his scent reached my nose, my head was in his lap. I buried my face behind his bent knee and moaned, hugging his thigh.
"Welcome back stranger." His voice sang to me. He sounded mysteriously different. Like a new dimension had been added to his words, they were fuller. It must be the remainder of my dream.
A breeze made its way across my face, and it tempted me too much. I opened my eyes. With shock I leapt up, out of his arms, to my feet. My eyes burned in red. He stood up and reached for my arms. Grabbing me with tenderness and understanding. I looked into his face. His eyes were closed. His mouth was wide with a smile. And the red glow, it seemed to be coming from him. From his chest. From his brow. From his hands on my arms. I looked down and it was all over me too. I brushed my limbs, trying to dust it off. Panicking.
"What....what...?" I stuttered.
"I’m here." He took me into his arms and my eyes closed again, and the wonderful scents came back. Fertile. Alive. Warm.
"Where? Where is ‘here’?" I tried to control my voice.
He pulled away, and I reluctantly let him.
"Open your eyes!" I commanded him. He just shook his head lightly. Still smiling.
"I can’t. Neither can you." He took my fingers to my eyelid’s. I saw my finger’s move to where my eyelids would be, and I felt eyelashes, felt the skin of my eyelids. My eyes were closed. Yet I saw all of these movements. I saw my surroundings. I wasn’t seeing through my eyelids though, I was seeing from somewhere on my brow. Even when I covered my forehead, I could see as if my hand was not there. As if it was a mirage that disappeared once it got too close. My knees went weak.
"I...I don’t understand." I looked to the ground.
He placed a finger under my chin, turned my head up, and touched his lips to mine, softer than a breath. "Yes, you do."
Each letter of his words, each sound echoed and hung in the air, like the most vivid and beautiful song. I laid back onto the soft earth. My eye closed. I felt his hands. I felt his words. I realized I felt even more than that. I felt him.
You stayed with me." He said into my cheek.
I let my arms comfort his doubt, and I felt the new sun on us.