When Aaron woke up the next day, he took one look at the bottle he had beside his couch and chucked it at the wall. He doesn't know what exactly the drink was doing to him but it was too much. If what he saw last night didn't solidify his point, the constriction he was feeling around his head would do it.
The first night in years that he went out to drink and he was already regretting it.
He should've known not to trust the idiot who said they'd stop after a drink or 2. "Mark John. The 2 first names should've tipped me off."
Small mercies had it so that he wasn't working today, so he ignored the mess the broken bottle made and kicked his legs up on the table in front of the couch.
He was really hoping he'd be able to properly watch something through his headache, there was a marathon for the Star Wars movies on and he hadn't watched those in a minute.
He grabbed the remote and tried to turn the TV on. It was flickering, flashing between a bright white screen and being off.
The feeling of constriction around his head grew stronger and he started seeing black spots in his vision. He rushed to stand but that made the room start swirling.
He could hear scratching through the walls behind the TV. No, coming from inside the walls behind it.
He heard a whisper that sent shivers down his spine. "Repent."
Sunlight flashed onto him from between the cracks of his curtain and the dizziness was abated. The scratching noises were gone and the coil around his brain loosened. He didn't even realize his legs had given out beneath him until then.
"Those drinks definitely didn't sit right with me." He was going to a hospital. He'd be damned if he let himself die because of negligence and a few drinks.
Of a Dream Past
There was nothing wrong. He'd gone in and they'd sent him away saying he probably just had a hangover. Sure they'd said it was a bad hangover messing with his vision, but they made it seem like it was no big deal.
He sighed. He honestly doesn't know what he thought he saw. The worst part was, the doctor was probably right. His gut, the paranoid part of him, told him it was more but he'd never drunk that much. He'd never even gotten a hangover before but he'd been drinking like a man possessed the night prior.
"Mark-fucking-John and his 'only a few drinks' pretentious ass."
Aaron wanted nothing more than to bury his head in a pillow but the thought of being back in his house petrified him.
He chose instead to go to a library. There were a bunch of books he'd been meaning to find time to read. He found the simplest of the selection and, before he knew it, hours had passed.
It was a nostalgic thing. It felt painfully unproductive but it had been a while since he sat down and actually got lost in a book. Probably not since just before college. He didn't even realize that the coiled feeling had largely abated as the day went by.
He looked around the library. There was barely anybody left in there and things were darker. Not quite dusk but nearly.
He knew he'd have to head home but he'd been hoping to put it off for longer.
The car ride back had been surprisingly peaceful. He felt that things were a little too dark for a spring day but he had actually eased up.
He fished his phone out of his pocket, figuring he'd give his mother a call. He hadn't done so all month and the guilt of it had been eating away at him.
He cried out in pain. He brought his hand up to his eye. There was a deep cut on his palm. One that was murky green and looked to be spreading veins down his arm.
Veiny lines stretched down his arm and, as if it was never gone, something wrapped around his head- but that wasn't exactly right.
All his other senses were drowned out by the pain of his arm and head. No sight, no taste, no smell, no hearing, just pain.
And something else.
If he focused, he could see. Nothing had coiled around his head. In fact, it was something in his head. Pulling visions into it. Eyes, lining the inside of his skull.
When those eyes opened, so too did the ones on his face open. Once more, he looked at his arm and saw so too did his arm look right back at him. Dozens of eyes and, behind them, a forest.
He couldn't explain what he saw and he never would, not in the waking world
He never noticed that he'd fallen back onto the road. He never noticed the car running him over. He never noticed that he managed to call his mother.
Small mercies would have his body found quickly. Small mercies would have it so that his mother would never see his arm and head. Small mercies would have it so that his close family never reach the dreaming world he found himself in.
A listless ghost cares little for small mercies.
Of a Dream Past
Mergo welcomed the new ghost to his halls with a smile on his face. He was happy to find that the forest was proving cooperative as it saw more. He'd need to collect many more magical elements for his realm, by merit of himself. He would not be controlled by his heritage. He would be the sole definer of his magnificence.
Of a Dream Past
"Do you want to know how see God?" She knew the real answer was no but also knew that he would stop her from answering. "I think that God is a loving father. I think he loves everyone unconditionally and wants nothing more than to coddle them and keep them and keep them safe. Children loathe the idea of a parent who coddles and controls them. One who has the power to control everything? That sounds suffocating."
She squeezed her hands together tightly; a sign of prayer. "That's what I told myself. He doesn't interfere anymore because then we'd all question how much of our actions are us and how much of that is God. Now though? I'm a mother–a grandmother, even. I loved my son unconditionally. I know, that I would've done anything to keep him alive if I could have."
Her nails, digging into each hand, started drawing blood. She fell to her knees and her eyes, previously wet started flooding.
"Why the fuck, does he get to say he loves my son like I do when he let him die! Let him be killed."
"Mom…"
She cut him off. "If there is a god anywhere, he's a cold unfeeling bastard and he has no right to say he loves us. No right to being worshipped."
Warm arms wrapped around, her son's, but they did not soothe her pain. She doesn't know how long she cried, fragile as a babe in her child's arms. Doesn't know when she fell asleep.
"There is a god; I am merciful."
That night, she slept well; so too would her family.
A/N: The characters' opinions aren't necessarily my own.