Limbo | Teen Ink

Limbo

August 31, 2011
By Phia15 BRONZE, Wisconsin
Phia15 BRONZE, Wisconsin
2 articles 0 photos 1 comment

This is what death feels like. I do not exactly feel anything though, so I cannot say it feels like anything except the absence of feeling. The best way I know how to describe this feeling (or absence of one) feels… it feels like a dark, empty cave. Still, that is not quite it. It feels… like floating on top of a cloud? No, that does not work either. I do not feel happy. There never will be a way to describe the empty way I feel. It is not though, a feeling! I review my body. I ought to be hurt if mortals break bones falling off cliffs. My bones feel whole. With a jolt, I realize I am blind. I checked myself over with my thoughts and my vanished feelings. If I feel nothing, how in (or out of) the world do I know how to feel myself? I cannot answer that question.
Oh. I cannot see-- my eyes closed themselves. I do not want to open my eyes, but now that I realize they closed themselves, I feel compelled to open them. Finally, I acquire enough courage to look around. I seem to be floating in a white, cloudy mist. It seems like I am floating within a cloud.
I inhale cautiously, thinking of smelling and tasting my favorite food. After all, I am in heaven! Or am I? I smell not the food I love, but the scents of dust and water. I frown, severely disappointment. Maybe I smell this, but I am very determined to taste something else. I only hope. I cross my fingers as I stick out my tongue to take a lick. I hope for the cool, sweet, rich taste of ice cream. For an instant, I taste it on my tongue. My hopes leap into the air like a frog jumping and, like the frog, fall to the ground in the timeframe of seconds. It was an illusion; like the mirage that led me to my death. For the thousandth time I wonder whether I really died. For the thousandth time I tell myself what I already know.
I hear voices… might it be music? It sounds like singing. If the sound is music, I never heard anything like it before in my life. However, this is not life, now, is it? I cannot decide whether it is a good, happy music or if it sounds bad… terrible…
I feel as if two opposing forces are pulling me apart. I know which way I want to go- left- but I feel as though the force on my right pulls me the other way with the same strength. I feel in limbo.

Fourteen hours later, I felt a miniature, but persistent tug. It feels like my little cousin pulling on my pants. I think I moved only a foot or so in my first hour. The second hour I moved four feet. The third hour I moved sixteen feet. I kept getting faster, and faster. I fell… and fell. I remember this feeling from somewhere… Ah. I realize. I felt this way when I fell off the cliff. When I tripped off the cliff, I fell and fell until I hit the ground and died. I suddenly knew what was going to happen.

After falling for- hours? days? weeks?- I hit the ground. I think one thought when I hit the ground. “I was right.” However, I was not injured. I did not really expect to be, but it still felt weird to fall and not be in any pain. I look down at myself. Seeing me is like looking through a foggy window.

I feel myself drifting through the world. I try to talk to people but they hear nothing. My touch feels like a breath of wind on their skin. I start drifting. Through experimentation, I realize I know how to counter it; I let myself drift. I see a somewhat poor family, fighting over who gets their deceased relative’s money. I laugh. The money they use for the lawyers probably exceeds the money they inherit. It serves the greedy pigs right. My family lived on less money. At least these families always eat; sane parents greet their kids when they come home. I feel a tugging on my right, but I drift on. A young girl, my cousin’s age, I see playing with a small bunny. I smile at her. The thought that she cannot see me cleans the smile from my face. I feel a tug on my left side. I keep drifting. I see another child, a boy this time, biting his parent. Ouch! I feel bad for the mother, but cannot help her. As I feel a tugging on my left, I keep drifting. Then, fury cuts into me like a knife through butter when I recognize the person in front of me. It is the bully who used to torment me at school, who showed me the cliff, who enticed me to go to the mirage, who (accidentally) led me to my death. I feel the fury rip through me. I want to push, shove, hit, and bite him. I HATE him with all my soul. I want to kill him!
As soon as the thought becomes prominent in my brain, I shoot upwards. My eyes sting from the rushing wind and I close my eyes. When I next open them, a few minutes later, I am back floating in the white mist. Even though I lived here less than twenty-four hours ago, I forced myself to remember how I hate it. I feel a sharp tug on my right and I start slowly drifting that way. I frown, knowing I am going the opposite way that I want to. I decide to ignore it, dismissing the thought.
I start thinking again of seeing my enemy. My blood boils. My thoughts feel like giant fists, clenching and unclenching. I feel the unfamiliar feeling of hatred ride into my brain like a huge wave. It drowns out all other feeling like a tidal wave. I always held it in, suppressing it. Now, I let it run wild like a stallion over the plains. I let it consume me, take control. I am helpless to stop it now. Once I let it go, I cannot rein it in. I could never rein in my horse either- not when I give him his head. I let it drown me. I let it fill me up. I let my anger rule me. I am no longer in charge. I do not care that I am being slowly, but steadily, tugged to the right. I do not— Wait… moving? to the right?
I rein in my stallion of anger with difficulty. I have to be in charge. I have to think clearly, unhindered by my anger.
I am in charge of myself now. With a frown, I hear the bad music playing quietly. Not for the first time, I wonder where it comes from. When I feel another more insistent pull towards my right, I release the thought. The tugs get faster and faster, finally merging into a flow- not separate tugs anymore, but a connected pull. Helpless to stop it, I close my eyes and sleep. I wake up, still moving to my right. The bad music grows worse, and louder. And louder. It seems to stick in my brain like barnacles to a boat. Zooming to my right, the impossible happens. The music gets even louder. It overtakes everything. To me, it now seems like this terrible music is the only thing that is, has been, or ever will be.
Suddenly, it stops, I stop, the world stops. I do not realize I have closed my eyes until I open them. I land in a cell. A prison cell. I hear tortured, terrified, pitiful voices all around me; but I am alone. I now know where I was pulled. I was pulled into my worst nightmare that I will remain in for the rest of forever.


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