Through the Void

It was just supposed to be a short getaway. A break from all the stress, Amy and Dean Jefferson, just the two of us out in the cabin enjoying things. 

It was nice, I took time to try and get some writing done. Took some walks in the woods with her and devoted time to some of our more overlooked marital duties. 

Then it happened. 

She'd gone down to the dock with a book in hand wearing her bikini, a nice warm day to work on her tan. I didn't sleep well the night before, so I decided to hang back and take a nap.

I knew it was wrong even before I opened my eyes. I sensed it.

The clock was the first hint. The digital bars that formed the numbers flashing in all eights.

Still I lied to myself, 

"You're being paranoid."

To the blackout curtains I went. I pulled them open. 

Made no difference, impenetrable night. Everyone knows the lack of light pollution makes the country darker.

"I must have overslept." I assured myself.

Feeble little words spake not from the conviction of intellect, but of a compulsion to its fear. A fear which to my primitive self instigated the most ancient of reactions, run and hide.

"Amy!" 

She was not there, she was not anywhere: not in kitchen, nor bathroom, living room, nor even closet. 

With enveloping despair I moved to that place I now desired least to see.

I flung open the door knowing what I'd find.

Gone. 

All of it.

Endless dark stretched out before me, no stars, no trees, no car, no ground even just endless nothing. 

I closed the door, leaned my back against it and slid down til I came to rest on the carpet.

Time passed.

What is time in relative nothingness? 

Without the measure of clocks, without the rhythm of life, the rotations of those celestial bodies and the seasons which they give?

Food and death. That is all. 

I did not sleep though I gave it thought.

How long could I survive? 

I did not know. The instruments by which I could measure all forsaken to me. 

I did not take a single step away from the cabin. Instead I threw objects out the door to observe, not one of them behaved the same. 

That pan disappeared entirely.

That candle seemed to sink below some liquid.

The cup to flaming melted glass had turned flying endlessly on into the distance.

A shoe seemed to hit a wall and land on a surface sitting there tauntingly.

And the baseball thrown out the front smashed through the back door window. 

I slammed the door in impotent rage and disbelief feeling the edges of an object in my mind.

It was a dream, had to be a bizarre vivid dream. I decided I would eat some eggs, watch some TV. This would make for interesting writing when I awoke. The TV only partially worked, fuzzy static mostly with local news.

And what of Amy I wondered inconsolably worried. 

After a long while I showered, and to my bed intent to sleep again went, with fervent purpose to put this nightmare to rest once and for all. 

Vague desires flittered to life in my head as I lay there. I played it like film in my imagination:

Waking amidst the rays of late afternoon's light and the sound of Amy flinging open the curtains, to hear her teasing, feel her arms around me and warm kisses while she whispers sweet nothings stirring me to rise.

No such thing occurred. 

I performed the same routine the next "day" to no avail.

I did so again and again with the same results.

I began to suspect some intelligence, some thing lurking about or else not so hidden but just beyond the verge of my limited perceptions.

My rational mind wanted to dismiss such novel thoughts, but I was well passed rationality. I tried to see it in every mirror, tried to smell it in the cereal, thought maybe I could hear it in the TVs static, but nothing appeared. 

Suspicion bled into certainty, and certainty began to take the tone of madness. 

Every cupboard, every cabinet, all the closets, any space for storage turned inside out.

"I'm going to find you!" I screamed into the toilet bowl, slapping and splashing the water as I did.

Food dwindled and every object not bolted down, save for a single kitchen knife, became the toys of the void as I hurled them one after the next unsanctimoniously  into that hunger.

I smashed every window, lit the kitchen on fire, and ripped at the pipes.

I knew it to be there, just out of reach, just out of sight.

Mocking me!

I spat and I cried, I bled and I bruised, but never did it speak.

Finally the unthinkable act became the only one available. 

Bare foot and twitching with mingled horror and anger to the door I went. 

Random objects here and there in all their assorted varieties and odd fates.

With knife in hand, and eyes fixed I looked out.

I closed my eyes and took my first step.

Solid surface. 

Another step.

Solid surface. 

Opening my eyes I found no objects only dark.

I turned to see the cabin but it was gone. 

Walked and walked.

What is space when there is nothing to measure it against?

Ran and ran! 

Turned then turned again. 

Nothing. 

"I'm going to kill you!" I screamed. No echo, no nothing. 

I sat and stabbed the ground wanting it to feel my anger, feel my hate, to hurt and to bleed, but it did nothing.

I stabbed again repeatedly with feverish speed over and over.

After a period I tire, laying down I felt myself giving into the futility and looked up. Same above as below, as right or left same except a single surface.

I spread my arms wide and breathed. 

I knew what needed to be done, there were only two options. 

I gave a thought to hell as I squeezed the grip of the knife. 

Death or death it seemed. Sink the knife into myself, or give the blade to the abyss as I knew it wanted. 

Either way a leap of faith. 

"I'm sorry Amy."

I released the knife and it to was gone. 

"An interesting choice Mr. Jefferson. I believe we'll be seeing each other soon." A whisper of a male voice in my ear.

My eyes shoot open. 

The faint steady beeping of the heart monitor. 

Amy's face streaming with tears of joy. 

They explain later I might have had a stroke which caused the coma, but there was little evidence of that. It's mysterious for someone of my age and health. When I explain the void and the whisper of the man they assure me that coma dreams can seem very explicit and real, but that it is merely a side effect.

I pretend to go along with this explanation, but I know the truth. We will be seeing each other soon and when we do I'm going to kill him.