Messa

I've walked around this table twice, looking underneath for things to say. Digging my crescents in the insides of my own palms, for your shoulders lack. I've tried to locate the story, but my feet keep betraying me, and carry me backwards, when I think I've made progress, find myself removed entirely from the race. I'm afraid I've been indolent. In my own time, misallowed.

There's a man in a long, tarp jersey standing over me, with his back to the world, while I whimper and begin, hesitantly, to climb. There's a progression of too much. And he looks down at me, as if reminding himself that I, also, am somebody's child. I'm bleeding, but I'm not hurt. Or is that the wrong way around?

I could as easily be hurt, but not bleeding.

Intimidated, as often, by people who listen to me like I got things to say. Suffocate the echoes of the story, and ascend like a myth higher than high above. I'm the story of the story of the story of who I could sometimes be.

When we realized the great expanse loomed like an invitation, fake, we began digging, and called it ascension, still. The rule became - rebirth and redemption need not aim necessarily up. I was among the first to volunteer. I imagine, of course, in the fourteen years since I enrolled, there's been others, but they must be further up along the path, 'cause I ain't seen nobody but the toll booth trolls, the keepers of secrets. Seemed to accept them with more ease than we did the lean, smooth ascent into the heavens, once. Like there must be bridge keepers, hooded silhouettes to hound you down your path.

At the last toll, I used my nails to dig out a molar, said thank you and please, counting how much worse things might've been if I'd had to pay both. It's been months now since I've seen a single piece of furniture, and wish I hadn't still. Wish I could undiscover the table, and keep on my path, except see no other option here but to pluck out my own eyes. And perhaps they're not made for plucking, because how else would I record what I encounter down here?

In my travels, I've come across two lawn chairs, an old mahogany wardrobe with both doors blown out, a fridge door sans fridge, and this table. Which tells me there's things still living out here, and no space for us. Or at least, not yet.

Resting rough back of my palm heavy on the dull surface, I unstrap carefully the six hinges, and rock the parcel back to front. In fourteen years, Alex hasn't grown much. In ways, he clings still as a child, and digs his fists into the lumps on my back.

Alright then, kiddo, I say, and he gurgles contentedly at the sound of my voice. First ascending into the dirt as a newborn, my Alex is more mole than child. I suspect for a long time his eyes see nothing, but still, when the toll trolls ask, I prefer other means of payment. Hold out hope still, at the core of the earth, there's still a tremendous, fat beam of light that may yet restore the boy's eyes.

Lovingly, I check his nappy, and burrow into the pack for a new one, a last one. I really must stop soon, and scrub us both clean again. But can't afford yet. That will be at least a few days' worth of loss. It seems the deeper we go, the more eager to reach our destination, the more worried and wanting in equal measure to turn back. Find what rests still up there. When we go home, what might be left of our house? Is my mother above only a carcass? Will I find my father in the belly of the earth?

Or am I perhaps better off kicking up the dirt, riding my way down to Hell by the skin of my remaining bargain-lucky teeth?

After an exam on Christian symbolism, what could you expect? I'm fascinated, still, by the way the Devil leads the soldier down to Hell, but also, increasingly, by the ways we might in turn lead ourselves.