« Re: Possible Exits?
Anonymous User
It started, as most bad things do, with a boy and a plea for sympathy from strangers in dark alleys. The stark brightness of the opening in the brick alleyway (which was not there before) framed all three of our hairs in a halo of pale yellow, while the awful boy in question stood just across the opening threshold, holding out his skinny hand to not a single one of us in particular.
Come here, he beckoned vaguely, I found something incredible that I need to show you.
Tell us first, replied my eldest sister in her usual shrewd cadence. She wouldn't know 'incredible' if it hit her in the face.
Yes! Show us! cried my youngest sister, her pale hands buckled into small fists of joy. Kept indoors practically her entire fifteen-year-long existence thanks to an inborn immunity disorder, she would've leapt off a cliff if the boy had told her it was incredible.
No, come, the boy insisted. You wouldn't believe it if you didn't see it for yourself.
His smile was easy. I should have resisted. Raised further inquiries. But back then, my being capitulated to my younger sister's wiles. Her wish was my own; her demands belonged to both of us, and so, ignoring Maria's indignant look, I led my darling Willow into the opening after the boy.1
We did see many wondrous things, though at first they appeared mundane. Yellow-lit office rooms, doors that lead to more doors, mazes of interconnected interiors one after the other. We soon hit an open, gym-sized space unlike the previous five rooms before it, its floors carved out by carpet-covered pitfalls stretching miles deep. Their bottoms opened up into lightless abysses that had Maria weak on her knees and Willow inching to get closer. The boy stood sentry behind our backs, standing smugly with his old camera in hand. I didn't know how he had found his way here, or how he eventually found his way to us. All I knew was that once we had snapped out of our reverie, Maria seized both Willow and I's hands and tried her hardest to rectify my prolonged lapse in judgment. But by that point, what had been committed had been committed, and the opening we had walked through minutes prior was not there anymore.
I never did forgive that boy. I knew he might have been able to cross over to us on our side of the blue hour alley, and ended his nonsensical night of urban exploration gone wrong right there and then. But in that moment, not only had he doomed his own life, he had also damned three more. When I imagine him, yellow bile rises in my throat.
Oh, how I hated him for the longest time.
But it hardly matters now, does it? Is this what drives you on; another selfish pursuit to fuel the hope that you could return to the home you so carelessly left behind? Maybe you believe that, at the end of this rainbow, the gratitude of the public will cleanse your past mistakes, and you'll be named a hero. Maybe that's why you just couldn't help broadcasting your location on the public forums.
As you search for your "possible exit", keep a close eye on your back, won't you? I wouldn't be far off.
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