For Katblu42 and their challenge: Song Prompt – Don't pay the ferryman
The long stretch of road ahead of him beckoned. And he was going faster than he should have been. Always was, that need for speed was such an compelling force.
He knew this road. Knew it well enough that there was imprinted in his mind the map he needed to follow. Follow the road. Past the ragged hill and onward.
Down to the river.
The air was electric. The clouds promised rain, pregnant and black, and he could smell the water waiting.
He'd been here before. More times than he cared to remember.
Every time there were the voices who called him back.
Not this time.
This time he'd gone and done it properly.
He stopped his car at the river, stepping out and looking her over. Shana was his favourite car. He owned several, all called with names beginning with S – he wondered idly where he had picked that habit up from – but Shana was the first.
Bright blue with dark blue accents. Pale blue leather upholstery. Convertible because of course! He wound the hood back up to protect her from the rain and the thunder that was surely just about to start.
Just as he finished securing his car the first flash of lightning illuminated the scene. The desert behind him, all flat except for that one ragged hill. The river in front of him, a fast-flowing torrent.
In the flashes of lightning he could have sworn there were bones in the water. The bones of those he had failed to save. They were dancing in the blinding flashes. He stared at them. They call to him.
As he watched the rain fall a mist begins to creep around him, swirling up from the river, tangling in his ankles and impelling him towards the wooden dock he can see there.
Suddenly there is a silence in the storm, and he can hear the steady splash of an oar in the water. He stares, waiting and watching, as a boat appears, steered by a tall man dressed in a black robe.
The man nods to him.
He nods back.
It is a routine he has done with the man many times before, and he knows now the drill.
A coyote howls somewhere in the desert as he climbs in the boat and settles down. The ferryman pushes them off.
He doesn't look behind.
The bones are still dancing. They are almost halfway when the ferryman turns to him and says 'There is trouble ahead. You must pay me now.'
And this is still the same as before.
He reaches into his pocket to pull out the coin he has saved for this trip. But before he can hand it over there are voices calling him.
'Don't do it, Scott!' Virgil.
'Don't leave us!' Alan.
'Fight, you bastard!' Gordon.
'Hang on, big brother.' John.
And he faulters.
'You must pay me now.' The voice is empty, monotonous yet there is an urgency in his words, and almost imperceptibly his hand holding the coin moves towards the outstretched hand.
'We're losing him!'
The desperation in Virgil's voice stills Scott's hand more effectively than anything else.
But this time he has got into the boat.
Every time he had been here before he had stopped on the dock. He had never got into the boat.
And he is torn.
He wants to stay with his brothers.
They need him.
But if he doesn't pay the ferryman he's afraid he will be stuck here, forever. He knows the stories. Pay Charon or remain a ghost, a restless dead. Pay the ferryman and pass on to the other side.
Where his mother waits.
He has kept her waiting long enough.
He reaches up to hand over the coin.
'Please! Please, Scott. Don't leave me. Don't leave me.'
And there are tears on his face as he listens to his baby brother's appeal.
He puts the coin back in his pocket as the ferryman speaks again.
'Pay me.'
It is a command, but this time he has the strength to ignore it.
He dives into the river, swimming for shore. The bones cling to him, trying to drag him down. No, trying to drag him back.
But he is strong, and soon he is pulling himself back onto damp wood, staring up into a dark sky. There is rain on his face and he closes his eyes as the last whisper reaches him.
'Don't worry, Allie. Scott's strong.'
He wakes up in a hospital bed, with his brothers around him.
There are tears. There is the thunder of hearts.
And he has won this round again.
Scott says a silent apology to his Mom.