"It takes but one person, one moment, one conviction, to start a ripple of change in the universe that we know of. This ripple creates alternate universes for the ones they love."

Tuesday December 22, 2008

Henry walked in the living room of his brother, Robert's, basement apartment. After Winter left, Robert took Henry in to live with him in his basement apartment so he could have close eye on his depressed, alcoholic brother who just had the woman he loved for eleven years leave him.

Henry was alone, or so he thought he was; He was never really alone.

Henry paced back and forth, thinking of everything he had lost because of the clown and the ghosts that clung themselves to him after the men in his family were killed.

He didn't blame Winter for leaving, as she was put through a lot with Vic, Ace and Belch making him lose his sanity, but he didn't remember a world where Winter didn't exist. They had been together nearly everyday since they were sixteen, and now she was gone, leaving a big empty hole in Henry's life.

He spent a week after she left in his bed, unable to get up, and trying to numb his pain and the voices of the ghosts with endless bottles of Rum and Whiskey. He always thought back to the time when he was looking for Winter in 1997, and met Vic and Belch, who gave him his first bottle of Rum. From that moment on, in a slowly developing tornado within himself, that's what he used to cope with situations he didn't know how to control or handle.

Henry took gulps of the Rum bottle as he continued to pace. The more he got use to drinking, the less it worked in shutting out Vic, Belch and Ace. It was starting to seem like no type of substances could silence them and make them disappear. When Winter was home with him, they were never there, at least not that he could see. He just wanted his angel back.

"She's gone, Henry. You've got to accept your fate... Now you have nothing holding you back from finishing what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to kill those seven. The prophecy is not finished yet," Ace said as he leaned against the wall in the living room and sharpened his knife.

"You're lucky we never killed her, man!" Vic said as he watched Henry pace and drink from his bottle, "We had to kill your dad and uncles! It was what Mr. Gray wanted us to do to get you to start doing your job! You're being a little pussy, Henry. It's really not that hard to kill. Once you feel the rush of control it gives you, the other six will be easy to finish off."

"I hurt her... Because of you guys, I hurt Winter!" Henry stopped and looked at the group of them with his bloodshot eyes from alcohol and tears, "IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT! Just leave me the fuck alone! You've ruined my whole life!"

Ace stepped up towards him, "I told you, Henry! You and I are the same soul! We are connected. You can't split something that is connected."

Henry looked at him, "I've never been connected to you. You're just trying to fuck with my head again!"

Ace licked his lips, becoming frustrated, "You know, Henry... Sometimes I wish I took over your body when you were having sex with Winter. Maybe if I was the one fucking her, she would still be here."

Henry put up his arm in fury and pushed Ace up to the wall, pinning his neck against the wall with his arm. As he looked into Ace's malicious smile, Henry saw red as he was so angry, "I'm going to find a way to kill you. I know you're already dead, but I will find a way! I'm going to make all you fuckers disappear. I lost my dad, my uncles, and now Winter's gone; It's all your faults!"

Ace continued to stare at him, wanting to egg him on, "We're not the ones who threw the bottle of booze at Winter's shoulder, Henry... That was you... And that's why she left. You were starting to become dangerous."

Henry became more angry and pushed his arm more into Ace's neck, "That's because you tricked me! I threw it at YOU, but then you weren't there and it was... it was her..." Henry's eyes filled up with tears. He thought about how the bottle hit her chest and shoulder so hard when she opened the apartment door where Ace had been standing. The bottle hit her so hard that it shattered glass through her skin and caused her shoulder to dislocate. He looked back at Ace, "You took everything away from me! You guys and that fucking clown!"

Vic and Belch went up to Henry with Ace pinned to the wall, "Don't make threats, Henry... We can still find Winter and end her life like we did with your dad and uncles..." Vic smiled at him as Belch chuckled.

Henry could feel his heart racing furiously. He took his arm away from Ace's neck and went back to pacing the floor. He wiped his red eyes and thought about Winter. He still couldn't believe she was gone and it was his fault.

"It's time to move on, Bowers..." Belch said, "You've checked the hospital, checked with your mom, checked with her parents, and no one's giving you answers. For all you know, she might be dead in a ditch somewhere..."

"SHUT YOUR MOUTH!" Henry yelled at him.

As the three ghosts watched Henry; He looked over to Kyle the Turtle in his tank. He was looking at Henry and appeared to be glowing white. With Henry's impaired judgement, he didn't know if what he was seeing or hearing was real, but he could hear the turtle talking to him in his head.

"Henry, I can fix this for you..." the turtle whispered in Henry's mind.

Henry kept his eyes on the turtle as It talked. Henry thought towards it so the others couldn't hear, "How?"

"You already know how..."

Henry quickly looked up to the ceiling and kept his attention on the light fixture hanging on the ceiling. In the corner of the room was the rope he stored in case he ever needed to secure anything in the back of his pick-up truck. The only thing that came to him was that he needed to end his own life to kill off Ace, Belch and Vic.

"Trust me, Henry... It will ripple the universe that you live in, but you will be free and Winter will be safe from them... But, be aware that your actions will ripple in this universe and it will cause timelines to cross that were going to happen in the future, and events will happen sooner than when they were destined to happen... You might be able to fix it and put the universe back on the right axis when the time is right..." The turtle whispered.

Henry didn't understand exactly what the turtle was telling him, but he wanted the three ghosts to leave him in peace and for Winter to be safe. He figured, in time, he would know what the turtle meant. He believed his purpose in life was to keep Winter safe whether she was with him or not, and whether he was dead or alive.

Henry took one more shot from his bottle of Rum, and then set it on the table.

He grabbed the rope from the floor and tied a loop around it. He stepped onto the coffee table and tied a knot to the light fixture.

Ace, Belch and Vic stepped towards Henry.

"Henry, you can't do this! If you kill yourself, you're not keeping Winter safe at all!" Ace said to him.

Henry didn't believe him, like he didn't believe most of the things they told him. However, whenever they mentioned killing Winter, he always retreated back into a broken man who didn't know who to believe anymore.

"Trust me..." the turtle whispered to him.

"Don't do it, Henry!" Vic yelled.

Henry wrapped the rope around his neck, closed his eyes, and stepped off from the coffee table.

"NO!" Ace, Belch and Vic yelled when the rope caught Henry midway.

He dangled there by his neck.

The rope only held Henry for a few seconds before his weight took a chunk of the ceiling out and he dropped to the floor unconscious.

Robert saw the floor beneath him give out when he was with his friends in the living room above the basement and heard the loud crash.

He looked down the hole in the ceiling, "HENRY! CALL 911!" he yelled to one of his friends as he ran down the stairs to the basement.

Robert held Henry's lifeless body in his arms and cried, yelling at him to wake up.

As Robert held his brother, the turtle was turning white and glowing with a white light.

Sunday January 22, 2012

The rope held onto Henry by his neck and he swayed from side-to-side unconscious.

The old woman appeared. Even in the dream, she smelt like sewage. Her face was right in front of Winters; "You need to wake up, Winter!"

Winter woke up abruptly from her sleep and screamed from the dream she has had over fifty times since she was seventeen. She never understood why she would dream of Henry killing himself, but it haunted her even when they were in a relationship for ten years. Then that unexplainable woman who always showed up and told Winter to wake up. It was always the same thing... she would appear at the end of the dream and tell her to wake up.

Winter turned on her bedside light and grabbed her glasses. She grabbed her inhaler and inhaled her medicine. She sat in her bed and tried her hardest to calm down and stop panicking.

Her mind kept wandering back to her dream of Henry dangling from the ceiling by his neck. Since Winter and Henry hadn't contacted each other in four years, she wasn't entirely sure if he was alive, if he was okay, or if he got his life back together. She figured, though, that his mom, Robert or Sally would try to contact her if something was wrong. When she moved to Castle Rock, she had no cell phone, she didn't tell Henry where she went, and she had no idea how to contact Henry or where he was, whether he stayed in Pittsburgh or moved to another state.

Winter got up from her bed and ran towards her washroom. She lifted the toilet bowl seat and threw up. The panic from the dream made her sick, which happened a lot.

She coughed up more vomit and dry-heaved, but nothing else was coming up.

She flushed the toilet and put down the toilet bowl. She sat in the corner of the bathroom floor and continued to cry.

For the past four years, Winter only felt sorrow for leaving Henry behind. There was lots of grief from the break up and she couldn't find meaning in her life anymore. She felt like she was an empty vessel walking around in a meaningless existence. She couldn't figure out how to feel joy, happiness, love, find purpose, or anything hopeful anymore. There were too many overwhelming emotions that made her feel like the world beneath her was crumbling.

Winter grabbed her Silk razor from the sink and put the blades to her arm. She pursed her lips as tears fell down her cheeks and she was daring herself to let the blades pierce her skin. She didn't want to kill herself, but she wanted to feel pain, so she could feel something other than the mental pain.

Winter continued to hold the blades to her skin, "Feel something!" she cried to herself.

She struggled to keep herself together as she held the blade. She threw it against the wall and it fell into the tub. She continued to cry for a few more minutes as she sat with her knees to her chest.

When she had the strength, she got back up to her feet and walked into her open kitchen and living room. She flicked on the lights to her kitchen and then turned on the living room lights.

She looked out her screen-glass door and saw the darkness of the sky. It was 3AM, and after that dream, Winter had no intension of going back to sleep.

She stared over at her kitchen as she stood in between her kitchen and living room. There were no emotions that went through her and she stared at the room with her pupils wide as she had a flashback in hers and Henry's own kitchen when they were happily living in their apartment in Pittsburgh together back before the grief of his dad and uncles, the ghosts, and the alcohol took over Henry's life.

Winter walked in the kitchen and set her purse on the kitchen table. She had just gotten out of work at the vet clinic for the day. She yawned and looked over to the freshly baked cupcakes on a plate on the counter.

She walked over to the chocolate goodness and picked one up to have a bite.

"Hey!" Henry grabbed her from behind and wrapped her up in his arms.

Winter nearly jumped and almost dropped the cupcake to the floor from the spook.

Henry let out a laugh at her startle and kissed her cheek, "I caught a little cupcake thief!"

Winter giggled and leaned her body back into him. She rested her head on his shoulder and looked towards his face, "What inspired you to come home from work and bake cupcakes?"

"You..." he tilted her face towards his and kissed her lips.

"I thought you said I'm already sweet enough?" she smiled as she took a dab of icing on her finger and licked the sugary icing off of it.

"You are, but who can resist chocolate?" Henry smiled.

"My weakness..." she dabbed her finger back in the icing and put it towards Henry's lips, "Besides you, of course."

Henry quickly put his mouth to her finger and licked up the icing.

He let her go out of his grip and took her hands in his, "Actually, there is a reason why I baked today. There's something I needed to do that I haven't done yet."

Winter looked at him questionably, "What is it?" she wondered.

He wrapped one of his arms back around her waist as he leaned down so his lips were to her ear. Sweetly, he whispered, "Look at the cupcake in the middle with the green icing... What do you see?"

Winter grabbed the cupcake in the middle and the first thing she noticed, aside from the bright green icing, was the sparkle from an engagement ring on the top.

Winter gasped, "BABE!" She looked at him with excitement in her eyes, "But we're already engaged!"

Henry grinned from her excitement, "But I never got you a ring, and I told you I would one day."

Henry took the ring from the cupcake and held it in-between his fingers as he got down on one knee.

"Oh, my God!" Winter smiled. She thought back to when he purposed to her in the Barrens when they were seventeen. Now they were twenty-four and he was purposing with an actual ring. Although they wanted to get married straight out of high school, they realized that finances, school and saving up for a wedding wasn't as easy as they thought it would be.

"I don't care if it's in a year, five years, ten years..." he re-thought his words, "It will be less than ten years, so I'll just stop calling out numbers there..."

Winter giggled as a tear slid down her cheek.

"Winter, will you marry me and be with me forever?" he asked.

"Yeah, Henry... I will..."

Winter continued to stare wide-eyed at her kitchen from the flashback. She rubbed her ring finger where the ring use to stay until the day she left it on Henry's dresser with a note that explained that she will wait for him to get sober and beat his demons, but she had to leave. She still didn't know if she would be waiting forever, or if he would one day find her, or if they would run into each other one day. She still wanted to be with him forever, but needed him to get help without her around as the ghosts were becoming dangerous.

Winter got dressed and left her apartment in the middle of the night. She walked down the street towards the twenty-four-hour coffee house. It was a cold night and Winter could see her breath every time she exhaled.

The streets were dead as all the souls in Castle Rock were fast asleep, resting for the working day ahead. Winter envied the community as they slept, as she hadn't had a decent night sleep in four years.

After Winter grabbed her large coffee from the regular night-shift employees that knew her by name and knew her coffee drink without her having to tell them, she walked across the empty street to the tattoo and piercing studio that was there. There was only one guy who worked there at night, Jackson. He knew Winter, as he was working on a flower tattoo on the left side of her chest towards her shoulder to cover up the scars from the shattered glass bottle. She also went in frequently to get piercings on her ears. It had become her way of coping when she felt numb. The pain would temporarily shoot her back to life.

"Have a seat, Winter," Jackson directed to the back room. "Did you want to finish up your tattoo tonight?"

Winter quickly looked over to the vintage gothic rose that was nearly done on the left side of her chest above her breast, "No, I was thinking of just a piercing."

"Are you wanting the Rook done tonight?"

"I was thinking a facial piercing. I never thought I would get a facial piercing, but I figure why not? What do you think would look good on me?" she really had no desires for piercings other than her ears, but she thought the change would give her some joy.

Jackson took a quick look at her face, "I think you'd look cute with a Monroe." He gave her the handheld mirror and put a dot on the left side of her upper lip. "What do you think of that?"

Winter liked it, "Yeah, let's do it."

"Sweet!" he said as he prepared the needle and sterilized it. "I've seen you sitting on the bridge on Mountain Road above the river..." he said as he prepared. "Are you an adrenaline junkie?"

Winter let out a tiny laugh, "No, I just sit there sometimes and watch the waves crashing. Why would you assume that?"

He shrugged, "You come in here to get random piercings in the middle of the night, sitting on the edge of a bridge that no one would dare sit near because of the fatality rate; Yet, sometimes I see you walking the edge. Either you're trying to kill yourself or you're numb and the danger excites you."

Winter blinked at his observation, "I guess more of the second one."

Jackson nodded, "I figured. Are you dealing with PTSD or trauma? Does it have to do with the scars you're covering up with the flower tattoo?"

Winter weakly smiled at him, "You're good at reading people."

"Yeah... Well... I spend my day and nights tattooing people with lots of different stories. I've seen it all..." He looked at her with the needle, "You ready?"

Winter nodded.

Jackson clenched the upper left side of her lip with his tool. On his count, he put the needle through her skin. She winced at the sting and a tear formed in her eye. It was finally a tear from physical pain rather than her heartbreak.

"Perfect!" he smiled at her, "Take a look!"

She lifted up the mirror and looked at the left side of her upper lip with the small steel ball. She liked how it contrasted well with her pale skin tone and it somehow brought out the color of her eyes.

"So, are you finally going to tell me your story or are you always going to be a mystery?" Jackson asked. He sat down in front of her in his chair and lifted the sleeves of his sweater, exposing his inked-up arms. "There's not much action in here at this time of night other than you, so I have time."

Winter smiled at his interest, "It's a crazy story that I won't explain all the long details, but I got hit on the left side of my chest, close to the shoulder with a glass bottle of alcohol. It was mean't to be thrown at someone else, but it ended up hitting me. I hit the wall when it hit me, it shattered and cut up my shoulder and chest area. It dislocated my shoulder, too, so it took a little while to heal..." She nodded as she explained, "That's it... I'd rather not look at it, so that's why you're covering it up for me."

"Shit..." Jackson said, running his hand through his hair, "I bet the person who did that felt like shit."

Winter looked down to the ground at the comment...

"Winter, I'm so sorry!" Henry ran over to her with towels as she clenched her shoulder and cried on the floor from the pain, "I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry! Are you okay, baby? Oh, my God, Winter! I am so so sorry!"

She looked up to his red face that was caused by crying at what he did. She could see the anxiety building in his expression over hurting her. She could also smell the alcohol on his breath. She knew he didn't mean to hit her when she walked in the door, as she could hear the familiar voice of Ace right on the other side of the door, taunting Henry, right before she walked in at the wrong time and got hit with the bottle.

"I'll take you to the hospital!" Henry got up to his feet and stumbled to find his car keys.

Winter tried not to slip on her own blood as she got up to her feet and held onto her dislocated shoulder, "No! You're drunk, Henry!" she cried.

She looked back up at him, "Yeah, he was really upset..." She came back to reality as she looked up at Jackson who was looking at her. "I have another scar I want to cover up, but I don't know what do get..." She lifted up her sweater and showed him the three scar marks on her stomach that were left behind from the clown fifteen years ago.

His eyes went wide, "Holy fuck! Did you fall in the lions den at the zoo?"

...The clown appeared in front of her. It had claws this time, which rose up and sliced her stomach, like a threatened lion ready to kill.

Winter shrugged at the comment, "You could say that."

"If you come up with an idea, I can try to create something. They look like they were really deep, though, so I don't know if I could cover them up fully. It could be worth a shot, though."

Winter weakly smiled at him and put her top down, "I'll try to think of something. I should probably get back home, though."

As Winter was about to get off the chair, Jackson's hand glided her thigh. Right away, she could feel her scars on her stomach begin to burn. The clown's mark on her had become kind of like a sixth sense. Whenever she felt like someone wanted to get their own claws into her, the scars warned her. It taught her that, although there are good people in the world, sometimes they didn't have good intensions.

"You know, Winter, if you ever want to try other coping mechanisms to stop feeling numb, don't hesitate to give me a call..." his face was close as he stared from her eyes to her crotch.

Winter sat there for a moment, dismissing the burns coming from her scars and put her attention to her pussy that was beginning to tingle. It had been four years since she had sex, so the comment tempted her. Plus, the idea of sexual pleasure did seem like a good idea rather than physical pain to make her feel alive again.

She stared at Jackson as he continued to glide his hand closer to her pussy. The image of him standing in front of her, pounding her pussy as she sat in the tattoo chair crossed her mind and it turned her on.

She quickly looked down towards the bulge in his pants from his boner, and for a moment, she wanted it. Then her attention went to his hand, and he had a wedding band on his ring finger. When she saw that, she didn't want to do it anymore.

Winter looked back up to his face, "I think I'll just keep seeing you as my tattoo artist."

He inhaled deeply at the rejection and he knew it was because of the wedding band. He looked up back to her face, "I respect that. I'll see you around, Winter."

She got up from her seat and put on her jacket, "You, too, Jackson."

When Winter got home, she sat at her keyboard that she was using to practice her singing. She found the only ways she was distracted from her darkness was to keep singing and working at the hospitals. She found joy from expressing herself through singing like she did when she was a teenager. She also found enjoyment by helping people at the hospitals she worked at.

When she arrived in Castle Rock four years ago, she looked for ads in the paper for anyone who needed a Veterinarian. As it turned out, Castle Rock was not in high-demand for Veterinarians, but the city was always hiring nurses. She decided to go back to college and get her nurses degree and become a RN. However, since she was on her own in life, she needed to make money. She found out that there was a celebrity couple in Castle Rock that were looking for a live-in caretaker for their exotic animals.

When Winter found the ad, she didn't think it would be such a high-status celebrity couple. When she arrived for her interview, it was a lawyer the couple hired to interview her. It wasn't until she got the job and was being shown around the property that she found out that the house she was going to be moving into was a seasonal home owned by Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson. When she met the couple, she was told she had to sign a Non-disclosure Agreement; She was not allowed to tell anyone who she lived with, anything the couple did in their home or what they talked about.

Although they were barely at their home in Castle Rock, Tom Hanks was building a business at his property where he would let people rent the property for weddings as there was so many acres. He wanted to create a luxury nature experience for couples that wanted to get married there, or even if anyone wanted to book it for parties or conferences.

Whenever Tom and Rita had their big celebrity parties at the property, they asked her to be the performer. When the high-status musicians came to the party, they wanted to be entertained rather than be the entertainers. It was definitely weird for Winter, but she did it anyway. They would pay for her time.

When Winter got her RN license, Tom took the opportunity to move his mom, Janet Frager, into one of the bedrooms in the house as she needed part-time supervision to be sure she took her medicine in the morning and the night. Winter would also help her take baths in the evening. She acted as a Personal Support Worker for Janet, but it was to Winter's relief that she really didn't need too much attention. She was still independent enough to get around while Winter was busy at work or doing other things.

If Winter didn't have enough on her plate already, she was also studying part-time to become a doctor. The busier Winter was, the less time she had to think about Henry or the past. That's what made the night-time so hard, though; That's when all her ghosts and darkness would appear to her.

Winter sat at the keyboard, playing a piano melody that she was in the process of writing lyrics to. As Tom and Rita knew she was a good vocalist, they had asked her to write an original wedding song that they would buy from her and copyright it to belong to the property for when they do open up the wedding business at the property.

Winter had no inspiration to write a song about love, though, and she had been trying to write it for three months.

"It wakes me up at night...

Needs to share its light...

It doesn't get how dark it is outside...

Warms the rising sun...

It kisses everyone...

It doesn't remember the hate of yesterday..."

Winter sighed frustrated at her song. She lost the love of her life, so she didn't know how to write a song about love when all she wanted to sing about was the darkness she was trapped in.

As she sat there, she began playing the keys to songs that she could actually feel emotionally connected to at that moment. Since it was a sound-proof basement apartment she lived in, she belched out the lyrics to the Evanescence song that she was feeling so deeply connected to with the tears running down her cheeks.

"One day we won't feel this pain anymore...

Take it all the way!

Shadows of you...

'Cause they won't let me go!

So I have nothing left!

And all I feel is this cruel wanting!

We've been falling for all this time...

And now I'm lost in paradise!"