Chapter 5 Inner Darkness Part 1

I walked very slowly down the smooth crosswalk. I glanced over and saw the bridge that connected the parts of town that lied across the lake. I felt a shudder run down my spine. I had been here before as Eas. I had summoned a Nakewameke. I think I am actually standing in the exact same spot.

"Hello!" I hear a young voice call out to me. I turn and see a small boy. The boy is accompanied by a dog with honey-colored fur. As soon as I see that dog, I felt my breath stop midway. I felt my heart stop. It was the same dog.

It was the dog I heard turned into a Nakewameke.

"Lucky!" the boy called to the dog as it got away from him. The dog ran with the excitement of a hornet right towards me. I feel my fear accentuate with each clumsy step that this great beast decides to take. I expect it to run my over in fury. But, to my complete surprise, that does not happen. Instead, as if he had sensed my fright, Lucky the dog stopped and gently licked my hand. The boy came up to me with a giddy laugh and a goofy smile.

"Lucky likes you!"

Huh. Lucky likes me. I was not expecting that.

Lucky's tail is wagging, waggling even. He looks at me with his adoring, chocolate brown eyes. They sparkle in the afternoon light. The little pants escaping from his mouth sound odd to me. Normally, in a human, panting likes this signifies exhaustion. And yet...Lucky doesn't seem exhausted. He seems...thrilled. Lucky is thrilled to see ME of all people.

You were the one who hurt them, a voice in my head screams. You were the one who turned Lucky into a monster. You were the one who wiped that smile clean off that poor boy's face.

I feel tears building in my eyes. All this time, I was moping over how I could no longer be Eas. Yet Eas was the one who was willing to destroy. She was willing to kill, for no other reason than to satisfy a distant idol that she had blindly followed. She turned animals like Lucky into monsters because she was a monster. Because I was a monster.

"Hey," Lucky's owner says. He grabs my hand gently. "What's the matter?"

I stare at him vacantly for a split second. Then I squeeze his hand gently.

"I am sorry."

"For what?"

"For everything." I kneel down and wrap my arms around him in a hug. "I am so sorry!"

I hold him in an embrace for a solid two minutes, all the while letting the tears loose. They drench my face, drench the boy's shirt, drench my shirt...they are so strong that they even drench my mood.

"Hey," the boy says as he patted me on the back. "It's okay. I forgive you."

In that instant, I feel all my guilt wash away. I stare into the boy's big blue eyes.

"You do?"

"Yeah!"

I smile. I smile better than I ever have before. I smile warmly, I smile brightly. I smile cheerfully and honestly and happily.

Why? Because I am forgiven.