DESERT SONS CH 13 DIVERGENT PATHS

[The Urbane Spaceman]

The Little Lion Man said, “We are now on a new level. It could go in two directions. It might be either fucking excellent, or it could become death. I have no idea how to go about this new thing, this new path.”


______________



Welcome back. Mix a drink for yourself. Shit is about to get real. The Hirsute Man got it right.




How had I ended up at this place, this point of life, this nexus? Why was I asking myself if I should follow that little guy with the dangerous, filthy heart of a hungry lion?



If you truly know me, then you don’t have to ask. Since you don’t know me; here’s a little taste of what some folks call: the back story. It’s hard to tell, but also, it may be quite long and painful. Get some lube.

DRINK!


*ahem*

I never wanted to be left behind in any pursuit. I always thought that I’d be missing something in any adventure. All I know now is that I am fortunate to still be above the dirt. I have no idea why. I’ve stopped asking.




There is no reason.



When I first came to Fuckno, it was because of my mother. Yeah, I know, you are thinking of mommy issues. But it wasn’t that at all. And Kahle, the last name of the first girl who loved me back, well, she was stolen by my brother in arms Joey.


Rrrrrrgh.


I need to drink more to begin this part.


Trvth. Damn.


Rrrrrgh.


This will be re-written tamarrah. Fuck.







.



Fuck.

I can’t be cheap like that. Rrrrrgh.


show, don’t tell… Music. It helps.



Rrrrrgh.


Divergent Paths.

Clarity. It was the start of this. It was the end of this. Full circle.
We left the heat of the woodstove into the grey day, leaving my sisters behind in the warmth and soft glow of the lamps toward dusk.


I followed her through the fresh snow, upon the layers of snow storms, like temporary archaeology. She walked faster than me. Her strides were long, and my legs were short.


I could not keep up. She disappeared into the woods. I sat down in the snow and felt…



Huh.



I stood back up and I saw her path. There was a path. It would take some struggle. I could go back to the house in the woods, or I could go further. I decided to follow. I was the chasist. I wiped the snot form my nose on my knitted mittens and I stood right the hell up. I would not be left behind.


This took some skill. I would find her. I would not be left behind. Her long strides stretched off into the distance, and they winded around the brown ash trees tight, and wide around the fir trees, lest she disturb the boughs and get snow down her neck, into her wool jacket. She was gone, and all that remained were the holes she left.



I growled. I said, “Rrrrrgh.” I said this thing when I was about to do something that I really did not want to do. But I would not be left behind. I pursued her.



Each step through two feet of snow crunched and popped until I sunk below to the bottom of the levels of fallen, layered crusts and dust, and I smacked my wee bollocks. I did not give up. Sometimes, I found brief respite on buried granite boulders with wind-swept clearance, or the backbone of the shale ledges; but her path was varied, as if thoughtless for those whom she left behind.


It was a test, I was certain of it. Perhaps it was thoughtful, or at least, mindful. I hoped for that. I would find out later that it was disregard. Catch up, or be left behind. Your last call.



The wind blew above as I passed under the big pine at Fort Dawson’s (don’t read too much into that: it was the name of the gigantic pine that had been scorched by a lightning bolt several times through the decades) and the wind shook snow down all over me.


Yes, I got snow down my neck, and it mixed with sweat on the back of my noggin and trickled down to my arse as I sat down and began to cry.

I lost her.

I failed.


I wiped my wet cheeks with my soggy mittens and turned back towards the path I had left behind me.



Time to go home.



I gave up. I pulled my shit together and stood back up.


Then I heard, “Will!”


Huh. How about that.


“Will! Hurry up! You’ll miss this!”


I turned back around and saw her on the river ice. It was at that moment that I hated her for leaving me behind. And it was also the moment that I knew that perhaps she would never truly leave me behind.


So I turned around and I chased her again.


Down the mossy, crusty river bank onto the glare ice on that grey day, I chased her. It was a strange feeling. It was the follow, the losing, the almost left behind, and then the capture. A divergent path. A place to make a decision.


I had made the wrong decision. I had cried and given up, to head back home, but she did not give up on me. She woke me the hell up. She called to me. She saved me form my weakness. So I followed her.


She was pointing to Orson Island, and I followed her. I slipped and fell on the hard ice, but I didn’t fall. The sound of smacking your head on hard ice will give you bright light in your brain and a sound you never want to hear again, ever.


I crawled when I had to, and my soggy mittens got stuck in the ice. I left them stuck to the ice and got back up, and l slipped and glided across the wind-swept ice to the other side of the wide river.


I found her. She picked me up and swung me around and hugged me. She kissed my cheek. She pushed me up the river back of black earth and I held onto branches to climb to the top.


Then we watched the sun peek through the clouds as it set. The grey sky erupted with orange flame and red coals, and the whole sky burned with fire form the west.


It was the west.


The west called to her.


That was how and why I ended up in the wild west.


And once there, after a few years, she abandoned me to head back to the east.


…Yet, she had come back to save me.





Yeah.



The first of two times. The second one was the most important.

…To be continued on this level of Rrrrrgh.



.

[oettinger]

Inspiring writing Urb.

Didn`t we meet once,

If you truly know me

, smoky dive, prague 86`?



Story almost sounds like a junkie writing letters to his H. I mean that in a good way.

Prosit

[mistah willies]

...story almost sounds like a junkie writing letters to his H. I mean that in a good way.

Prosit

Where the hell are the 'Splosions? Urbie, baby, yerr killing me here.