Untitled - Chapter 2

Take one step back – no, not to the beginning just yet. Hold on for a tick – this part is interesting. It was frightening as hell at the time. But interesting all the same. First this, then the beginning, then the nemesis and then I can get to the meat of seeing (and recanting in due course) my life flash before my eyes before a painful demise … or almost-demise.

This was a month before psycho bitch with the crystal ball. A month before she warned us of a horrible fate and a painful past. If she really wanted to be helpful she could have told us a real way of averting it rather than staying away from Jen. It’s like telling someone that the only way they can live is to stop breathing. Perhaps I’m being a bit melodramatic, but … though you may not entirely understand how I feel, know that there are those (however few there may be) who do. And they’re nodding right now with a knowing little grin.

I imagine that she is crafting her own story of her life at this moment. Sorta like mine. But … no, anything I say now won’t reflect upon her in the best light. Not just now. It’s best to backtrack to the backtracking – to a month before crystal nightmares. Catchy, ain’t it?

Jen’s family – yes, she actually has one – lives by the ocean. No, not the lame beach kind. I’m talking about real ocean-front property, high atop a cliff that overlooks waves crashing with violent force against an insurmountable and jagged rock-face that can withstand any natural earthly challenge, barring the earthquake … I suppose that would be below the belt … get it?

At this time, a month before the last noted event, Jen and I were visiting her family. And the next thing to know about this section of the rock-face at least, is that it is home to an unbelievable number of caves that seem to go on for miles inland. And based on a recommendation of one of her step-sisters, we thought a bit of spelunking would be a grand notion. So equipped with head-lamps, timberland sandals, cotton clothing and some knee- and elbow-pads, we traversed a thin and precipitous path to once such cave that was referred to with a series of giggles.

We found the dark entrance with little problems – I led, as always … there was something in the air and I didn’t want to miss it. Jen was a bit scared, and normally I would have comforted her, but an unfamiliar urgency gripped me. I felt the coarse and uncompromising hands of fate upon me, guiding me onwards; To fight back would have been futile, I tell myself now. Easy consolation.

I don’t know how long we had been in the cave, but after a while, the ground began to thump. As if millions of feet were walking above us. There was the smell of smoke and blood in the damp and musty air. Jen coughed once. Twice. Repeatedly. Yet, I kept on, there was light ahead and we were closing in on the source.

As we neared, the thumps grew louder, now muffled by the sounds of shouts and screams. Metal clashing against metal, slashing bone and cutting through flesh. Each sound translated to a perfect image that seemed perfectly familiar all at once. I could hear Jen begin to cry. She sniffed. And snuffled. I spoke the only words between us in that tunnel.

- Shut the hell up, Jen. We’re almost there.

Regret’s a funny thing, but not when it flows through you like a million volts of electricity. And not when the woman you love suddenly falls through the floor and disappears from existence.