Purgatorium (12 page)

Michael
walks across the wet floors, carefully tiptoeing around the fallen reapers who appear to be melting. “I would try not to touch a reaper’s remains in any kind of way. Unless you feel like
sticking
around.”

I look at the watered down remains of the reapers and see my handbook being soaked from where I dropped it. I quickly take up the soaked book and place it on the piano. I then follow Michael, trying not to touch the hazardous water either.

“Today we purge,” he says with a grim look on his face.

Michael walks out my front door and into the hallway. I look down to make sure I avoid the water. When I look up, Michael is gone. My watch beeps.

10 Minutes

I am late! I look down and see the candy by my door again. I glance up to see if my neighbor, the waitress, is there. Sadly she is not. I bet she got frightened from all the noise that was happening. Hopefully the reapers didn’t come after her too.

I look at my watch, suddenly panicked by my lateness. I run down the hallway to the open elevator and jump in.

Suddenly, I feel a hard impact on my throat. Michael’s hand moves out of my view. I gasp and fall down onto the floor, holding my throat.
Why did Michael hit me?
I think, trying to get my bearings. I fall to the floor trying to catch my breath.

The elevator quickly ascends to the rooftop.
Why are we going up? That’s the wrong way!
I think to myself as I look behind me at the painting stealing away any other thought I once had.

Above me, Michael stares in deep thought at the painting for a few seconds. He snaps out of it and looks back down.

“You need to learn to defend yourself,” Michael taunts. “You acted like a child in there. I can’t keep saving you forever. You need to learn how to save yourself.”

Michael helps me back up. “Punch me.”

I am shocked by the blow to my throat as I look up at Michael, quizzically. I shake my head no, and turn my eyes back to the elevator doors as they open. I see the rooftop and know I shouldn’t be here right now. I try to push the lobby button but Michael kicks me out.

I curl up, trying to get enough of a barrier so I can find an opening and defend myself.

“You see, that’s what’s wrong with you right there. Before we go any further on your surviving skills, you have to stop being afraid of everything. I know that I am particularly to blame for your emotional handicap but that doesn’t mean you can’t grow from it.”

I look at him not understanding what he is trying to tell me. Michael goes and picks up a chair, breaking it repeatedly up against the elevator door. Once the chair is unrecognizable, he calms himself back down.

“It’s like teaching a robot how to express feelings,” Michael says to himself. “Now why did I do that?”

He looks over to me as if he were thinking I was actually going to say something.

“My mistake. Still getting use to you not being able to talk. As I was saying, emotions come from different levels. What I just did was anger. Anger is a very high level of emotion with fear being the highest. Anger is the one emotion that can break off to many different other emotions. My other prime objective today is to get you angry. I bet you are wondering to yourself why I would want that from you? Right?”

I lie there, nodding my head in agreement.

Michael goes and grabs a brick off the ledge. “Think of this brick as anger and that window being an emotional barrier.” He chunks the brick off to another building’s window. It breaks straight through, shattering the glass.

I freak out thinking the reapers may have heard the loud noise too.

“All those pieces of broken glass over there are the cause and affect of anger. Pieces making up of a bit of sadness, remorse, courage, hope, and without a doubt love. Many emotions spawn from angers wreckage. The person that said love is the most powerful feeling in the world is a liar. Love is like a two-sided coin. It only works when both sides are the same. It only feels half the heart while anger can feel it up to the brim. It’s like that moment when you go all in at a poker game. Your actions are your own personal decisions. So where I am getting at with this is if you don’t feel anything but fear, then how will you ever survive? Emotions are said to keep people weak but without caring for something. The mentality of any kind of progression has no overall purpose. But one does not just feel anger for the sake of feeling angry. There is something linking between fear and anger that you will have to acknowledge first. You must fight fear with pain and with pain comes anger which soon after will bring back your humanity. So are you ready to learn some some Pain 101?”

I panic and quickly try to drag myself away from Michael, desperate to get someplace safe.

I just need a minute.

I struggle to the edge and look down, remembering being pushed off the very same ledge and surviving the fall. I glance at Michael to make sure he’s not about to hit me.

My watch beeps.

15 Minutes

I watch Michael’s poncho begin to flap from an unexpected breeze passing through on the right side. He tosses it over his neck as the wind picks up, then gazes out towards the severe climate change. His poncho acts almost like a cape as it flaps uncontrollably from the high winds. A chill soon engulfs me. I look back down to see my car.

Looks like an ant from up here.

Snow begins to fall.

I should already be at the coffee shop by now. I am screwed!

Michael looks over the ledge along with me.“Well there is your beautiful car. I guess it’s about time you go get in it now.” I look back to Michael and suddenly see a fist colliding with my face. I fly over the edge as I see Michael cracking his knuckles while looking down at me. “Was that too much?! Oh well.”

As I am falling, I look up to see Michael
turning toward a reaper that has appeared behind him. He throws his arm around the reaper’s neck and forces them both off the ledge.

The reaper forms a frozen grid from under his cowl. Michael takes his knife and stabs the reapers skull. “Not enough to kill it, but enough to control it,” he says, steering the reaper towards me.

Michael smiles as he passes me from above. I notice the frozen horizontal grid as he gets between me and the streets below. I see him use the reaper to make a frozen slide for me to fall onto. I land right on it, as Michael acts like he just caught the winning homerun ball. The frozen grid breaks from my impact, sending me hurtling toward the ground again.

Michael hurries and swoops past me so I can fall onto another frozen grid. This time the grid doesn’t break as I start to slide on it. Michael dodges another reaper in front of him. I soon can only see his poncho as his and the reaper’s speeds have increased.

As my feet tread across the ice, I feel the spikes ejecting out from under my shoes, letting me know that the auto cooling sensor must have kicked in.

I try to use my cleats to dig into the icy structure but fail as I reach the end of the frozen grid. Suddenly, the other reaper forms its own grid and it just misses Michael. I fall and land on the other reaper’s grid. This time, I have a good hold until the reaper notices it has a hitchhiker on its frozen tail.

It quickly makes its way straight up as I fall back down, trying to use my cleats to grab hold of anything from its vertical icy grid. At the last second, I stomp my foot down, burying my cleat right into the ice of the grid. I take my other foot and bear it down, making another strong hold.

I begin to climb up the frozen grid as the reaper looks down to see that I am still on it. It screeches and heads straight toward me. I see the grid start to fracture as the reaper gets closer to me. The grid breaks from the top and I immediately jump off. The reaper holds out its skeletal hand towards me as I make my way down. Its finger is only inches away from my head when Michael tackles the reaper.

Still in control of the other reaper, he has managed to form a grid under me once again. The reaper after me flies back and lands on the same grid that I am on. I see Michael is steering straight so the grid wouldn’t be as shaky. I dig my cleats inside the icy slide and look at the reaper with fear. The reaper walks to me and takes out a scythe.

I look down and can see the coffee shop. The time reads 15:55. It’s already far too late to get in the car. Unless that was what Michael was planning all along. As the coffee shop gets closer, I finally understand what he is trying to do.

The reaper swings and I duck. Feeling helpless, I pretend to plead with it by putting my hands together and kneeling. The reaper gets his hand ready to lay on top of me.

I look up to see Michael jabbing the rest of his knife down on his reaper’s skull, which starts to freeze itself over. The grid begins to crack. Michael jumps back and tackles me off the grid as we crash right into the coffee shop along with the reaper. My watch beeps.

20 Minutes

As we hit the ground, the leftover frozen grid breaks apart above us. Big ice blocks fall sporadically. Michael gets up like it’s no big thing as I begin to panic, wondering if the reaper is still alive.

As the heels to my shoes touch the floor, they automatically retract in the cleats, leaving me astonished at how well they seemed to work.

Michael glances around the shop and sees the now frozen reaper lying still, dead, atop the espresso machine. He smirks at me and says, “I hope you like your coffee chilled.”

I look out the window to find the snow has stopped. I don’t waste anymore time. I stumble my way in to the park as Michael screams back, “Come on! That was fun! Wanna go again?” I look back and see him taking a picture of the coffee shop window. I continue on, not thinking anything of it.

Looking around outside, I find no trace of anything remotely covered in snow, like it all just evaporated into thin air.
Where did it all go?
I wonder.

I sit on the bench in the park, nervously checking my watch, and then looking around to make sure Michael has not followed me. I can’t believe I made it here just in time. That was nuts!

A wind blows through, catching and lifting autumn leaves. They swirl around, hovering just above the ground. I see the Ferris wheel rotating faster now due to the high winds. Not seeing anyone in the park, I relax a little and take out the balisong knife to practice twirling. I drop it almost immediately. With each new try, I continue to fumble and drop it.

While I am getting frustrated, I notice a picnic set up by the dead oak tree. A scene flashes back to me, something that had happened right here. I was with Madi. We were the ones picnicking under the tree. We laughed. The memory overtakes me.

The leaves swirl lightly in the wind, falling all around us. Madi is gathering a pile of leaves. She runs over and drops it on my head before turning and running away. I blow the leaves out of my face and chase her. She approaches the oak tree, looks back at me, and runs inside it. I suddenly stop chasing her, too scared to follow her.

I stop fumbling with the knife and throw it to the ground in frustration.

Suddenly, the memory fades away. I am back on the bench as I look up to find
Michael
sitting next to me.

Both scared and angry, I quickly stand up, grabbing the knife from where I dropped it, and step back from Michael. I look at him angrily, then down at the knife and remember his instructions. Reluctantly, I resume practicing the trebuchet trick.

“The more you begin to break away from your chains, the more you begin to see.”

I look up at Michael momentarily and then back down to the knife. I feel trapped, captive, unable to leave, and desperately wanting answers.

“Hold that thought,” Michael says. I see him walking to a statue that is right beside us. He takes a picture of the glass box that the statue is holding. The picture develops and he puts it in his pocket.

“Let me tell you a story,” continues
Michael
. “The Lord instructed a prophet to say to another man ‘Strike me!’ The prophet refused. Then the wrathful God said unto him, ‘Because thou hast not obeyed the voice of Jehovah, behold, as soon as thou art departed from me, a lion shall slay thee.’ And as soon as he was departed from him, a lion found him and slew him. Now I am no Jehovah, but when I say ‘stab’ you do it, or I will show you
my wrath
! You feel me?!”

Though terrified of Michael and confused by everything happening to me, I begin to feel something new inside me.

Michael looks to me and says, “I see you are starting to feel it burning inside of you. The feeling of anger is an emotion that is very freeing. Everything that has been bottling up inside you wants to come out. You really should release the tension before you explode.”

I reach deep down inside and begin to tap in to that hidden emotion that has been buried within me for so long. My mind races with dark kept in thoughts. Like religion! Religion is a crutch for the weak! All that creation stuff is all a bunch of garbage, I think. Whatever’s going on right now is psychological and that’s all!

I close my eyes tightly and try to calm myself. I turn away from Michael and continue fumbling with the knife.

“You want to feel anger, but you have no idea what real anger is. To feel anger, or any feeling for that matter, you must acknowledge your fear and surrender to it. Let the fear burn deep within until it’s all you know. Let the fear in. Then that fear will turn into hate and anger,” he says. “If you think you can win by only using your fear as a crutch, be my guest. Show me.”