81

1996

Winter

I never meant for this life to be so complicated but yet, who does mean for that to happen. I sat outside and watched the cars go by and wondered what it would be like to just stand in front of one of them...but it probably wouldn't kill me...chances are. I would probably be maimed horribly and still be pregnant. I thought of getting a knife from the kitchen and slitting my wrists but I probably couldn't do that right either. As Venum walked outside to go to work, I looked up at him and wondered when I should tell him. He seemed oblivious to anything being wrong with me and so he bent down and kissed me on the forehead, told me he loved me and then walked around the corner to work. I watched him disapear and then continued to think of how I should end it all.
The darkness was normal to me...I found it pleasant sometimes and oddly comfortable. I would swim in the darkness, dance in the darkness and I would die there if darkness would have me. But I was innocent despite my dark and hateful ways. It was an innocence that was strange and yet as pure as new flowers...but it had spots...crimson spots of vengeance and retribution strewn all over its soft fleshy body. And the dark was innocent as well. It did not understand what it was doing and it had no concience to see and feel what the other was doing to me...changing and transforming me daily...but into what?


1996

The dreams continue

I saw her standing there...yes, it sounds like a line from a famous song...but I really did see her standing there. She was bathed in a beautiful golden light; but she was dead. I knew she was dead because I saw the crimson stains on her little dress again. But this time, she did not cry out and she did not plead for me to take her into my arms. She just stood there and looked at me and she was cold as cold could be. I could not touch her but I knew that she was cold.
And then it was dark..dark in my dreams. I was walking and I could feel sections of something underneathe my feet. I felt where one peice would meet the other and then I felt a large hard object bump up against my right foot and so, I climbed over it. I felt myself descending a hill in slow motion. Then I heard the sound, it was loud but distant...but growing closer by the minute. I saw the light and it radiated filling the whole environment with pale light. I Looked down and saw the grass beneathe my feet, looked back up the hill and saw the railroad track and then I saw her. My mother was running down the track away from the light but the light was gaining on her. She began to scream and so I made my way back up the hill to help her to get off the track. I could only go so far and I was stopped...by what, I don't know. I could feel the air was thick in front of me but I could not push onward. Mother screamed and ran faster. I saw the train then...a monstrous hideous thing that reached forward with steel claws. I saw its razor sharp teeth marred with gore and blood. I saw its eyes and they grew larger the closer the train got to my mother. I gnashed its teeth together and then it roared like a real train. Mother stumbled and fell. I screamed for her but she could not hear me, she was putting her hands over her face and all she could do was continue to wail. I watched the train grow closer...closing in on my poor mother. I heard the train roar again sending shivers throughout my whole dream being. I saw the train reach out...and devour my  mom.


1996

Winter

I knew this conversation was inebitable. I knew that the thing inside would feed off more of me than I had to offer. I cringed and closed the front door of the apartment. I had decided that I had to be away from my home for a while. The thing inside grew impatient and she wanted to play. I climbed into my car and drove away into the night while Venum was still sleeping. This night he has passed out drunk and I was sure I could get away without any problem. I drove through town and stopped somewhere along Main street, west of the coliseum. There I found a parking lot and stepped from the car. I was simply dressed; jeans and v neck shirt but I was pretty to say the least. I was not me at all and so despite what I wore...the thing inside made it more than what it was. The thing inside was invincible and glamorous and she had the will to make things immortal as it may seem.
I walked the streets of Tupelo and surveyed everything around me. I watched the  people getting into cars and wondered who it would be that she would approach this night. Then I saw him, he sat alone on the north side of the street with his head in his hands. I could feel his desperation and I wanted to envelop it. I walked across the street and languidly approached him. I put my hand on the top of his head and then the thing spoke for me.

"I am here."

The man looked up at me and he had tears in his eyes. I saw the anguish in his voice and the pain in the quiver of his lips. I also saw the surprise when he looked into my eyes. Did he see me there or did he see her. Exactly who was me and who was her...it became muddled sometimes.  I bent down and took his face in my hands.

"I have been looking for you. All these places, all these towns...and I walk into yours, huh?" I smiled

This made the man smile then quickly look confused but yet,  he beckoned me to sit with him. I sat down and watched his face as it turned to mine. He was cute, maybe he was 27 or 30...he was not that old and he seemed awfully mature for his age. He talked to me of his problems and his life before moving down south. I listened to every drop and morsel which fell from his lips as he talked. I moved closer to him and sniffed him...he smelled like sweat and way too much alcohol....but i wanted him....she wanted him...the things writhed within to take him at her pleasure. I felt her moving inside and telling me to take him...push him down to the concrete and have my way with him. She said he was fodder for me to grow and that I needed this.

The thing spoke.. "I think your soul needs mine.... What did you say your name was?"

The man looked at me and frowned. "I never told you my name but it is Ramone."

"Ramone...what a wonderful name." The thing smiled inside and then I smiled.

As I was moving in for the kiss, I stopped abruptly. I felt myself shaking very badly and then pulled away. The pain started..somewhere in my belly I felt a sharp pain as if I was being stabbed by this stranger which sat before me. I felt myself rise up against my other and I bled inside. I cringed and pulled back against the curbside. The pain grew worse and the stranger moved to help me. Before I knew what I was doing, I pounced on him knocking him backwards onto the pavement. I looked down into his eyes panting with pain. His face was a mixture of anger and excitement and so he smiled timidly. I fought there for long moments with the thing inside and right before I gained control, It spoke to the man once more.

"Ah...this little bitch is inhibiting me from my purpose...and now she grows another within that shall take her heart. If her body wasn't mine as well....I would tell you to kill her....and you would."
I know the man pushed me off and called me a bitch. I know he called me crazy and he walked away but...

That's all I remember. I just know that I made her leave that night. I told her to go away and never come back. I was having my baby and there was nothing she or anyone else could do to make me change my mind. I screamed for her to leave...while trapped inside while she attempted to molest that poor man. I have bits and peices of this but no real recollection of the order in which the events took place. I was to learn many many years later how to control the thing within...to a certain point...but I was never ever going to make peace with it. It was simply...the other.

I know that I left that curbside and that stranger in one hell of a hurry. I never seen him again in my whole life. I slipped back into bed covered in tar from the pavement. It's funny how people never notice things about others...like how Venum looked at me and never asked me why my hands were covered with debris form the asphalt nor why I just wouldn't talk to him that morning.


1996

Winter

I wasn't giving it up and I was poor. Venum never gave me money and I had very little to spare after bills. Lots of times, I would pay most of the bills due to the fact that Venum found other things to spend money on. Don't get me wrong, I blew vast amounts of money on fast food as well. We were both very immature and just learning to be adults.

I couldn't afford any more doctor bills and so I found a free clinic called "Save a life". This clinic was where girls would go to keep from having an abortion, an Abortion Alternative Clinic. These ladies specialized in arranging adoptions, counseling, free pregancy tests and etc. I went in to the clinic and waited to speak to someone.

The deal was..if I went through all the abortion counseling, took bible courses and agreed to take my prenatal vitamins; I would get free  things for the baby and all my tests would be free as well. I agreed to the arrangement and made my first appointment to follow up after the pregnancy test. I took the official pregnancy test and I was indeed pregnant. I smiled for the first time in so long because I was gonna have this baby. For that moment in time...I could not have been happier.

I talke to Damian...all the way home. I know that I did not know his name then...but I would. I would know Damian for 9 months before he ever entered the world. I would talk to him, read to him and play music with a little radio pressed up against my belly. But I get ahead of myself...things will be revealed in time.

When I left that clinic, I drove to a park and sat within the car. I had one more chance to speak the words that I needed to speak to the thing within.

"And I mean what I said...I don't need you anymore. I want to be good, I want to be innocent...If I am good then they will be good to me. Please, let me have this."

I cried and left the thing behind. I looked in my rearview mirror and watched the little fairy that was me, sitting at the foot of a tree with her arms crossed. I couldn't tell what face she was making but I could feel her tugging at me.