Day 273 - Statue Story

Statue Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

The statue watched the young lovers kiss. The young lovers didn’t notice. Young lovers usually don’t notice things like the statues they end up sitting beneath. They are usually too busy looking into the face of fresh eternal love.

Above them, the statue gazed, worn and tired, looking down on all the people below. The statue was covered in graffiti and bird droppings, a lost and destroyed beauty, forgotten from a different distant time. Pollution and wind and rain had slowly worn down the features of its face. It was now simply a nondescript female figure, fashioned in form to look like an angel or priestess of some sort. She wore a long and flowing robe and silently observed, perhaps as a symbol of holy guidance gazing down, or perhaps as justice. The original intent was long since lost. The statue didn’t know what it had been designed to represent. It only knew how it felt in the current moment.

The statue was sad, not that you could tell by looking at it.

The statue held one arm out, hand cupped, extended towards the sky. What was it doing? Holding a gift out? A promise? A bit of hope? What it a prayer or offering to the gods? Was it the motion of the beggar, the desperate soul searching for alms or answers?

Perhaps the statue represented man and man’s quest for answers from a seemingly cold and uncaring universe. The statue liked that thought. The statue was alone and lost and would have welcomed any answers anyone had to offer. The statue couldn’t ask, and no one thought to offer them to a statue.

Below the young lovers gently touched and caressed each other. They held each other and the warmth of their passion could be felt even within the cold stone skin of the statue.

The statue wanted desperately to be in love, to understand romance and passion and feel the touch of another. It wanted to taste the flesh and heat of breath and all the erotic moments of anticipation and nervous desperation, as if it too were one of the young lovers, touching for the first time, hearts pounding, blood flowing, senses heightened.

The statue longed for so many things.

Tears rolled down its face.

The tears dripped down to the young lovers below.

Finally they looked up. The rain had come. It was a dark and cloudy evening and not a night for passions at all. It was a night for the morose, for pain and loss and suffering and loneliness. It was a night for statues and their cold and stoic faces, their stone hearts and missing blood. It was a night for considering all things unhappy and wrong and for wishing for something better.

The rains chased the young lovers away. The rains hid the statue’s suffering, the streaks of water masking the streaking tears. The statue’s secret was safe, its emotions locked away, undetected, unnoticed, unjudged. The statue was alone, but the statue had its pride. It didn’t want the pity of the young lovers. It didn’t want their sad faces feeling sorry for it. If it had to be alone, then it wanted to be left alone. The rains were its only friend.

Someone ran through the park and took a necklace of cheap plastic Mardi Gras beads from around their neck and tossed them up to the outstretched arm of the statue. Their aim was good and the beads landed in the cupped hand. Then the person ran off, leaving the statue all alone again in the rain.

The statue felt a little happier. It had the gift of revelry and debauchery and it suddenly felt a little more alive inside. It wasn’t much, but for this one brief moment it was enough.

Day 272 - Reenactment Story

Reenactment Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

After the great disaster, very few people believed anymore. Faith was a luxury that few of the living could afford anymore. Of course when disaster happens, there are those that will always believe more. And this did happen. There were many new cults and many new ideas and rituals and paths one could try and take in an attempt to gain salvation. The vast majority were dead. And the vast majority of the surviving lost the ability to believe. But a very small and quiet minority gained a faith and a dedication that was unparalleled in recent times.

There were many ways to look at the great disaster and many questions to ask – was it deserved, was it fate, was it man’s punishment, was it salvation? Some would ask those questions. Others figured the questions didn’t matter. Others would contend it was happenstance or bad luck. Either way most of the world was dead. It didn’t matter what caused it, what mattered was how to survive it and rebuild it.

One powerful group of anti-religious fanatics decided it was those of faith that should be blamed. Their incorrect logic reasoned that the religions had gotten things wrong and they had prayed to the wrong deity and either the wrong deity brought death to them, or the right deity was very angry about the whole situation and decided to clean house. There was no way to prove such a theory. It didn’t matter. The remaining men and women of religion learned very quickly it was best to hide their beliefs. Hide them, or else fear for the worst sort of bloodshed retribution possible. The anti-religious fanatics were doing a little house cleaning of their own, and the new world held no place for the people of faith.

One man had his own private theory. He was not a man of science or of religion. He was a man of the strange, the dark, the mystic. He was a man of questions who sought truths that others were afraid of, or didn’t know existed.

He had one main line of questions – could man impersonate the gods, and if so, what would happen when he did?

There were ages and ages of routines and rituals. Some of it was ceremony. Some of it was culture or tradition or history. But some of it was darker and more dangerous.

Deity impersonation was an ancient and important aspect of many lost civilizations. The priests and shamans would be dressed to represent the gods as part of special ceremonies. Sometimes it was believed that this was a simple ceremony, but sometimes it was believed that they could become the physical manifestation of the gods, bringing with them hope or fertility or any number of pleasant outcomes. Or if the gods were angry or dissatisfied, death.

What if somewhere in history, mankind had discovered the ultimate ritual of death? The ritual had been real and it could have been accidentally or purposefully recreated and when repeated it had caused the great disaster.

This was one idea. But if it were true, it would mean that of all the rituals and routines there was some bit of truth. If could mean that if there was the power to destroy, then there could also be the power to recreate. Man had gotten it wrong, but man could also get it right.

The anti-religious fanatics had killed and destroyed and burned everything they could. Right or wrong, they placed the blame on the men of ritual and were destroying anyone they could find that took part. They were oppression. They were death and destruction. The great disaster freed them and allowed them to become just as awful as they wanted to be.

The mystical man with the questions knew he had to stay hidden until he had some answers. He would be killed otherwise, just for asking the questions. He collected books. He collected knowledge and traditions. He wrote them down. He practiced them. Everyday he tried something new. Everyday a new ritual, a new reenactment. Somewhere in one of them would be a bit of truth, and the truth would be able to set them all free. He just needed time, time and patience and practice. The fate of the world rested in his ability to somehow recreate the one thing, the one most impossible accidental thing, which would work. It was infinity, with only the slimmest of odds, but he had no other choice. He learned the rituals and found new followers and prayed that he could get one thing right.

Day 271 - Pounding Story

Pounding Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

A pounding came at Emerson’s front door. Not a knocking, not some gentle or soft rapping, but a pounding. It sounded as if someone was going to break his door down. Emerson didn’t want to answer it, and he wouldn’t have answered, except that it sounded so urgent. That, and he wanted to make sure that in fact the person didn’t knock his door open and do permanent damage to themselves or the door. Mostly the door. Emerson didn’t know who it was or what they wanted and he wasn’t really that concerned if they damaged themselves or not. He just didn’t want the door to be broken and be responsible for the cost of fixing it. His landlord had plenty of reasons already to hate Emerson as a tenant and Emerson saw no need to add to the list.

The pounding continued. Emerson slowly set his paintbrush down. Emerson was a painter by hobby but had high hopes of becoming a painter by trade someday. It was hard to find the time to paint. After work and after his commute and after cooking and after a moment of relaxation, most of his nights were over. He didn’t think he could skip any of those steps. If he could, he would have skipped the work, but that wasn’t an option.

Inspiration was another problem. Work took a lot out of him. It drained him. He thought it was stealing a very important part of him, and not just his youth. He felt older, more tired, more jaded. It was hard to fight all of that and find the energy and desire to paint after a long day.

The weekends were filled with all the normal everyday life errands that had to be run – shopping, laundry and all the other things. With every passing day, it seemed like it became harder and harder to find the time to be creative.

That was part of the reason the pounding was so annoying. It had been so long since free time, energy and inspiration had lined up. Emerson needed to take full advantage of this moment. And instead he was being interrupted and distracted. He wasn’t the sort to worry about missing out on something. His friends knew him and knew that he had little desire to go out or waste time. He doubted that any of them would be at his door pounding away unless it was very very important.

The thought that it might be a life or death situation was one of the only reasons Emerson decided to get up. He had shut his phone off. He had been unreachable since Friday night after work. He had no plans of having any human contact until Monday morning rolled around. In the back of his mind he knew there could be some small chance that this was a real emergency that had arrived at his doorstep. He knew that it was his responsibility to somewhat do the right thing and answer the door, even if it was begrudgingly.

Emerson had been haunted by strange dreams lately. Normally he was not the sort to have nightmares nor was he prone to waking up and remembering them. But lately things had been out of the ordinary and his sleep was broken and restless. But he did have ideas. He saw strange lands and mysterious buildings and peoples. He saw the world in a dark and different way. There were angels and demons battling and death that came from above. It was apocalyptic and terrible but surprisingly beautiful at the same time.

Emerson painted it all. He had never had so many images all at once, never had so much inspiration all at the same time. He was afraid he wouldn’t get it all down and that the dreams would be lost and gone forever. He wished he could paint ten times as fast. He wished he didn’t have to rest or sleep or work or eat. Or answer poundings at doors. He really wished that was one thing he could avoid.  But for the moment, his energy was broken and he couldn’t get it back until the pounding was quelled.

Emerson walked to his front door and opened it. The pounding stopped.

Outside in the hall stood an unfamiliar, familiar face. Emerson was looking at a distorted and different version of himself, as he might look in a funhouse mirror. The Emerson that stood there was thinner and frazzled. His body looked brittle as if he was ready to collapse at any moment. The face was tired and frightened. But it was him. For all the differences, Emerson could tell he was looking at Emerson.

The other Emerson trembled, opened his lips to speak, but just stood there. For a moment it seemed like he might laugh. Or cry. Emerson couldn’t tell. The other Emerson lifted his hand for a moment as if to touch Emerson and make sure he was real. Then he did smile. He smiled the smile of relief from a great pain or burden.

Emerson didn’t understand what was going on. He wasn’t sure if this was real, or if this was another of his recent strange dreams. He thought he should speak, but didn’t know what to say.

The other Emerson spoke first.

“I’m… I’m so glad to see you. And I’m so terribly sorry.”

He reached out and pressed a strange device to Emerson’s hand.

“I just can’t die there. I can’t.”

Something clicked on in the device and there was the hum of energy and Emerson could feel the buzz of electricity as it flowed into his palm.

And then suddenly Emerson was gone. The other Emerson sighed and stepped inside the apartment, shutting the door behind him. The hallway was once again quiet.

Day 270 - Staircase Story

Staircase Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

Terrance stopped on instinct. He had kept close track of each step on the stairs. Terrance had been skipping every third step. Every third step – that was the bad step. That was where the danger lay. That was what would kill him if he wasn’t careful.

Terrance looked left and then right, but not behind him. He didn’t know how far he had come and didn’t want to know. He was afraid it wasn’t nearly far enough. Step after step after step after step. It was a long climb.

He could feel the sun on his face. That was a good sight to see. The sun meant he was making progress. The sun was lucky. He wanted to believe that this meant he had a chance to make it. Terrance paused. It wasn’t so much that he needed to rest. He wasn’t in the best of shape, but the stairs weren’t so much a physical challenge as they were a mental challenge of dedication and determination. One foot after the other, one step at a time. It all boiled down to the will to make yourself move, the determination to take just one more step, no matter how slowly you took it.

Terrance had been ascending the steps for what seemed like forever. He didn’t know if that was really possible, but that was what it felt like. He didn’t know. He didn’t keep track of things like that. He did keep track of the thirds. “Life, love and death,” he had been told before he began. He didn’t believe it. He wasn’t a superstitious man. And yet, he had skipped the third step and then he did it again with the sixth. From there on out he had created a pattern and he stuck to it. He was good and sticking to patterns, whether he believed in them or not.

Step after step. Foot after foot. One by one by one. And then do it all over again. It seemed like the recipe for his entire life.  He was a man of patterns, routine. It was simple and ordinary and extremely functional.

The stairs weren’t simple or ordinary and they were hardly functional. They were the Forever Stairs. They went nowhere and everywhere. They went up, a long long ways up. And they went down – as far down as they could possibly go.

Terrance didn’t actually remember when he got on the stairs, what level he was at, or when his first step really occurred. He figured that was like life – nobody gets to choose when their life is going to begin and nobody really ever remembers their first step. The stairs seemed like a path when you reflected upon them, but really they were just as uncertain as any step or any choice of any path in life.

Terrance had been warned to stay hidden. He didn’t know how that was possible while on a flight of stairs, but he had tried to stay as invisible as he possibly could. He was to avoid strangers and avoid eye contact. He was an unwelcome trespasser. To climb so high, to show such hubris, only opened himself to being too easily struck down. There were those that would tear from below. There were those that would kick from above. Tumbling down an infinity flight of stairs seemed unpleasant to say the least.

Periodically he looked ahead, but usually he kept his focus just on the next step. He knew he had to watch for strangers. He knew he had to watch for those that would attack and destroy him. They would appear out of nowhere, without warning. They would stab him in the back if given the chance.

Terrance wanted a chance to be holy, to be clean and righteous. He wanted a challenge and he wanted to prove his mettle and finally rise to an occasion. He wanted to clean his soul and come out the better for it.

He took another step. And then another. And then another, making sure to skip ahead past the third step of the pattern. He walked and he walked and he walked forever. Not knowing where he was going. Unable to look back to see where he had been. It was routine. It was pattern. He just had to make himself stick to it. Over and over and over again. Forever. Forever or until death, whichever came first.