Chapter Nine- Voice and Eyes


The water was a good weight- a sturdy, comforting weight- in his hands as he continued his walk down the road. He had no idea how long he had been walking, but he had stopped being able to look back to see the car wreck a just a little while ago. While he had been thirsty in the car, he had been in such a state of shock that he had no desire to drink from his bottle. It felt like it was all too much at once for him, so all he could do was focus on the landscape around him as he trudged along. It was something more than fear and panic that he felt, especially after seeing the woman collapsed against her wheel back in the car. Since he had begun walking, he had refused to dwell on the corpse he had seen in the wreckage. He had not even begun to think about where all of the events had left him, aside from the fact that all he could do was focus on walking.

He walked a few more steps, trying not to think about anything about his situation. As he walked, he kept a constant look-out for anything that might appear on the horizon. Not that he truthfully believed there would be anything, deep down where it counted. As he scanned the horizon, he felt a chill go up his spine. Despite the heat, Gerald hated what he felt in the chill. It took him a few moments before he recognized the what he felt as feeling as though he was being watched.

Even though he knew that was impossible- it was so deathly quiet out there in the desert that he would have heard somebody coming up in the distance in a vehicle- he spun around. Nothing. No one, not even an animal, was out there, watching him. So, why did he feel so strange?

His heart uneasy, Gerald finally unscrewed the cap of the water bottle and downed some of what little was left in the bottle. Even the crisp taste of water heated in a car and baked by the sun couldn't take his unease away.

Gerald did the only thing he could do.

He continued walking.

He had just barely switched the bottle from his right hand to his left when he felt more than heard the whispering voice. You're walking into danger, boy.

Gerald froze mid-step.

The fuck?

This is not the right way towards your salvation. You may think that the only option you have is to walk this way, but it's not. It's dangerous.

Something in Gerald's rusting mind finally clicked. To him, by the looks of things, his life expectancy was looking grimmer and grimmer.

He had obviously begun to hallucinate. It was like those cartoons he watched back when he was a kid. The imaginary lake in the hot desert. Except, instead of seeing something, he was hearing something. Possibly the last human voice he would ever hear before he died?

He paused to see if the voice would begin again. And it did. You left that woman alone in the car. What if she would really die of heatstroke?

Gerald gnashed his teeth together and forced his legs to move him forward. He needed help- he needed to get the damn voice to leave him alone...

The voice paused for a second, waiting for him to maybe react or speak his reaction. After the second, the voice continued. You didn't even check her pulse, did you?

Against his own desire, his legs stopped moving. A kind of dull panic rose to the surface in him. It wasn't a new panic, but it was one he had kept hidden since he had walked away from the wreckage. Had he- could he- have intentionally known that Layla might have survived?

But, as was usual with Gerald, panic and fear were soon replaced by anger. He quickly forgot that he had earlier believed that he had been imagining the voice. "Listen, even if I had left her there while she might have been still alive, it wouldn't have helped if I had taken her with me. She's probably too hurt to move at all."

Who are you helping right now, then, if she IS still alive?

"If she is alive," he said, scoffing. "Which I doubt, then I'm helping both of us by going for help."

Wrong. You know that you're only trying to help yourself. I ask you again: did you check her pulse?

"What difference would it have made?!" he said hoarsely. "I wouldn't of been able to bring her along, as injured as she probably is- was."

It won't. The voice paused. If you turn back now, it won't. This is your last chance. Life or death. You may think that what you walk towards is salvation, but what you turn your back to is not a wreckage. It is your only hope.

"This proves it," Gerald said, grinning. He managed a weak chuckle. "you're just my imagination. Not going for help is the only way to save myself? And what, exactly, is going to save my ass? A car?" he pretended to laugh. His laughter felt painful as it came out of his throat. "Nobody else but us was on this road. For the last few hours, I haven't seen so much as a fucking big rig. I am alone right now. I am totally alone."

Salvation can come in many forms, if all you did was keep your mind and heart open to it.

"Yeah, yeah- you can talk all you want," he began to walk again- almost merrily. "it's not gonna stop me at all."

He tried to block out the voice as he continued on. As hard as he tried to ignore the voice, however, one thing the voice said that stuck out and for some reason gave him a horrible start was, Now I am not the only one looking down at you.

He shook that off only by distracting himself by looking at the ground around his constantly moving feet. It was only when he rose his head up again to look off in the horizon that he might have realized that the voice was gone. The importance of anything the voice had said, or of the existence of the voice at all, was quickly buried at the sight of the building far off in the distance. --