New Year's Eve (1) I was in love and by every indication, I felt Christine was in love with me. With Christine I felt a warmth and closeness, I’d never experienced before. We shared our times together joyfully, like small children wrap up in a blanket of wonder and innocence. It seemed that nothing could ever break the bind. Through her, life held purpose, but like a child my innocence was soon shattered. We had planned the trip only days in advance but it seemed right the moment we uttered the words. New Year’s Eve was near and we decided to rent a Honeymoon cabin in the mountains. No, marriage or anything as conventional as that was ever discussed. Who needed marriage when the perfect Honeymoon could be arranged? We already lived together and felt we would do so for the rest of our natural lives. The cabin itself was only a two-hour drive but a world away in so many ways from our home. We packed up the necessities and headed to our dream car to begin our adventure to the mountains. The car was a Mitsubishi 3000GT we had recently purchased. We both decided it was the best looking sport car for the money and perhaps the most beautiful automobile for any price. The roads to the cabin were twisting, winding and with the twirling snow a bit treacherous. The weather didn’t damper our spirits at all, in fact it enhanced them. It added more sparkle and romance to the mountainous roads. Together we were invincible. Our love would see us through the worse of storms...or so we believed. The scenery was spectacular the entire trip. Up one mountain then slide down the other. We laughed at the possibility of any hazards coming our way. At times we would stop and take photographs to immortalize our journey. The snow tipped trees were a mere background to capturing her expressions of love and happiness. We would get into small snow fights. It felt like life was brand new again, that everything was magical and would always be. When we got to our mountain retreat twilight was spreading its amber remains across the land. As soon as we entered, we knew. This was the perfect place for the perfect evening. The first thing that caught my eye was the heart shape hot tub but there was more. The bed was covered in silk sheets and white fluffy pillows. There was a kitchen with all the added niceties. A large sunken living room with a couch, VCR and color TV. The bathroom was it’s own enclosed room with its own roof and everything. The ceiling was high, probably twenty feet or more. Great wooden rafters extended to its peak. There was also an observation deck outside alongside the bedroom. . As we neared the windows we noticed two deer with their snots buried in the snow. A large wood burning stove kept us warm from the living room as we watched the deer frolicking about in their winter wonderland. We unloaded our suitcases and then immediately filled the hot tub. We both had the same notion of what should be first on our agenda. Christine found some bubble bath by the hot tub and added just the right touch. We had bubbles but not so much that I couldn’t enjoy the raw power of her glistering, beautiful naked body. At first we only cuddled and hugged. It was divine. Then we started to slowly kiss and we kept kissing for almost an hour. The kiss became more passionate and intense. Soon we were exploring each other softly with our fingertips. We made love sweet and slow. We found the perfect rhythm in each others bodies. It was in a word, magical. We exited the hot tub full filled but not yet finished. We walk over to the bed hand in hand. Christine and I made love on the bed but this time it was more intense and animalistic. It was a perfect combination of carnal lust and powerful emotions. After we had fully quenched each other’s desire, I suggested we go out to dinner and she readily agreed. The place we choose was quite a find. For such a remote and desolate setting a quiet romantic style of restaurant was like it had been placed there especially for us. I forget what we ordered but I remembered we both enjoyed the food. What was more important was that the food wasn't important. The conversation was lively like we were still making love, only this time with words. Christine and I spoke of inner secrets and of a wonderful future we both would share. We never agreed on anything, nor did we disagree. It was like two minds roaming toward a perfect destination. The path seemed chosen and set there for us. We only needed to speak the words and the journey was there like destiny. Never exactly planned but something that we could never change. Christine and I left the restaurant with a feeling of peace and well being. We had accomplished something, what it was neither of us could see, but we knew, whatever it was had been meant to be. Wine was suggested, I’m not even sure by whom, but we both thought of the hot tub and knew it was something we should do. The liquor store appeared like it was in a dream . Through a scrawl of snow the lights of the small tavern appeared. A neon light was barely visible but to us it was like it had always been in view. It was Karaoke night but that’s not what interested us. Another sign proclaimed the largest collection of domestic and imported wine and beer within the state. Although, normally I was a beer drinker, I knew tonight was for wine. As we entered the cabin with our two bottles of wine, we noticed a chill in the air. At the time it seemed to mean nothing but I believe that chill was demonically sent and changed our lives forever. As I turned on the light, my first thought was the thermostat but upon searching I found there was none, only that wood burning stove that hours earlier glowed with comforting warmth. I realized in that instant that this was not the perfect honeymoon hideaway but rather a strange beast that needed fed. The wood burning stove seemed so romantic before but now I knew it could mean our untimely demise. Wood...the word froze within my mind, because I realized without wood, we both could freeze. We had been in love and searching for eternity but this wasn’t the one either of us had perceived. My notion of this as the ultimate calamity was broken upon inspection of the back porch. There was more wood there, then we would ever need. I casually threw a few logs into the fiery remains. Believing quite foolishly that that would sustain us through the otherwise heavenly night. Christine and I returned to the hot tub and cuddled while we enjoyed our wine. Ever lasting love was sworn and sealed within our kisses. I had truly found my soul mate or so I then believed. We finished the wine and snuggled together in the living room watching an old movie. Christine was slowly starting to drift off into slumber, as I noticed the chill again. The beast needed fed. Christine abruptly awoke from her semi-conscious state as I went to gather more wood for the fire. I told her, I knew she was tired and that she should go on into bed. “What are you going to do about the fire,” she asked. “Not much of a choice, I’ll have to stay up and make sure it doesn’t go out.” It was well below freezing outside and the amount of logs that could be put into the stove at one time only seem to last two hours. She offered to stay up with me but I told her not to worry, I would take care of it. I then swept her off her feet and carried her gently to the bed. I tugged her in and passionately gave her the final kiss of the evening. As I looked into her eyes, for the first time in my life, I truly felt both in love and loved in returned. It was the best feeling I had ever known. I went back to the TV and could hear Christine’s soft snores almost immediately. I was a little tired myself from the wine but realized the importance of the task at hand. Feeding the fire could realistically mean the difference between life and death. Besides, I liked old movies so I sat down and watched. The first two hours went by quickly and I added more logs to the fire. It was then that things changed... then and forever. It’s like that night is always there, even now as I write these words. Strange unearthly visions suddenly swooped across the room. I saw the cabin become blurry and a silky blue haze formed against the walls. Only I sensed it wasn’t real. No, not real but maybe worse then reality. These seem to have a sinister power much greater then anything known to our conscious world. Only in the darkest regions of our souls do we dare imagine that such horrors can and do exist. Images, of what I believe now were of the past, began to flow into formation before my eyes. Visitors that had previously been guests in the cabin began to emerge from the haze. The first was an old man with white hair he sat beside me and told me his strange tale. He claimed he was at this very cabin for New Years Eve three years before but he had come alone that time. As he spoke, I felt like I should scream for surely this was a ghost or worse some strange hallucination, that I was now experiencing. But it was although I was in a trance I could neither move or speak. The old man told me how he and his wife had been guests in the cabin the first year it opened back in 1965. The man explained how much he had loved his wife and their stay at the cabin. ‘She died,’ he said shaking his head, over three and half years ago. “It destroyed me, she wasn’t just my wife, she was my life. Without her there seem to be no purpose. I was an old man already when she died. I wasn’t about to spend my last years on this planet in depression and misery. That’s when I decided, I would come back to this cabin to remember one of the best nights I had ever spent with my loving wife.” The old man shook his head and looked as though he was about to cry. I sat there in my trance like stare and examined this strange.... ghost...delusion...whatever? .... sitting beside me. He had deep seated wrinkles and jowls that hung loosely from his worn face. There was white stumble on his chin and he looked like a cross between a homeless man and Santa Claus but he was neither. “Yes, it was three years ago this very night, that I returned, the old man explained. I sat in this very chair and had a toast for my dear departed wife. Then I had more drinks. It didn’t really matter that night. I hadn’t drank in 15 years but on that night, it didn’t matter, nothing did. I had also brought some sleeping pills that I took with the last sip of my Scotch. You see I wanted to be sure, I’d heard of people making attempts and failing. That wasn’t going to be me, I knew what I wanted and I wasn’t about to let any shrink screw around with my mind till I felt differently.” The old man stood up with a great amount of effort, as though he was still alive, with me in this room, but that couldn’t be. “It was from those rafters right there, he said, pointing upward. You might not believe it but I climbed on the roof of that bathroom there and hung myself from those very rafters. Surprisingly, the Scotch didn’t hinder my climb; in fact, it seemed to help me. I don’t think the sleeping pills had really kicked in yet, probably a good thing, the old man said with a laugh.” As I starred at the old man I saw welts suddenly appear across his frail neck. I could see the impression the noose had left as it had extinguished his life. As I gazed at his face I saw that it had turned a deathly shade of blue and his eyes were now protruding from his skull. Was he telling me the truth? Did this really happen in this cabin three years ago to this very night? Was this man dead? As I pondered for some logical explanation, the old man walked slowly into a gray haze. Right before he disappeared he turned and said to me, “we all come back and so will you.” His final words were chilling and I felt a shiver go down my spine. What was the truth here? What was real? What were the old man departing words suppose to mean? Before I could even begin to find some rational explanation, a younger man in a green suit appeared from the haze. “It’s time to feed the fire, he said, then I will tell you my tale.” I stood and walked without any thought. It was as though I was a zombie blindly performing my needed task. I gathered the logs and placed them into the burning coals. “My name is Nick, the young man in the green suit stated. It was five years ago on New Year’s Eve, the fateful night that ended my life. That wasn’t the first time I’d been here. Oh my no indeed, the first time was eight years ago, our honeymoon and one of the best nights of my life, Nick said. My wife Megan, she was everything to me. The first time I was here, I was sure we would last forever. Well, maybe we would of, who knows after all it was my idea to return three years later to try and relive the magic of our honeymoon night. I mean, I knew I wasn’t well. I have a condition you see, Nick explained. It’s just nerves I suppose but what they can do. I so wanted our second time to be like the first but she had changed or maybe it was me. Maybe it was us, or perhaps the condition, my condition, that at times felt bigger then us both.” As Nick was rambling off his narrative I realized that this man wasn’t just dead he was also insane. He frightened me, although I sensed he meant me no harm. I looked more closely at his face and realized he had a bullet hole in his left temple. There was something that resembled blood dripping from his temple, only it wasn’t blood. It looked almost clear and smelled of embalming fluids. “Megan was aware of my condition of course, Nick said, and she just couldn’t handle it. She had plans to divorce me you know. She never told me that but I knew. The voices in my head were screaming it to me constantly. I tried to make them stop but they just laughed and told me they would never go away...and they never have. I never meant to harm her, I only wanted us to become as we were before. At first it was good. We enjoyed the hot tub and were watching TV but then she starting asking me what was wrong and the voices inside my head began to answer her. I had only brought the gun for protection. I was scared, hell I still am. I confronted her, called her names but she wouldn’t admit she was planning to leave me, but the voices knew the truth. Then it was like it wasn’t me anymore. I could see myself shaking her but it was from above. I was no longer in my body. How could this have been my fault? Megan kept pleading with me saying I wasn’t well. That she loved me and we could find the help I needed. This only made my voices angrier. I began slapping her and calling her a lying bitch. Then it occurred to someone in my head, she wasn’t going to leave me she was going to kill me. So, I was only protecting myself when I pointed the gun at her. I even gave her another chance asking her to kill me first , but she only began to cry. That’s when I shot her right between those weeping eyes. She slummed to the floor with a thud and I knew she had died and I had killed her, but I was wrong.” “Megan had never been there at all. She had divorced me over six months earlier. She left me shortly after the car accident. The one where the doctors claimed I had suffered a severe head trauma that could explain some of the problems I was experiencing. My mood and general personality were forever altered after the high-speed collision. They put me on anti-depressants and tranquilizers but none of it helped. My mental state began to deteriorate and I began to drink more. I once went to the Ponderosa Ranch near Lake Tahoe. You know where they use to filmed Bonanza, anyhow they had an exhibit there called Hose’s Gold Mine, the floors were slanted at such angle that you felt unbalanced like at any second you could fall. I felt that way all the time, discombobulated was my constant state of mind. I felt like, I was unbalanced and falling into a deep well. Megan tried for a while to cope with this person I had become but she just couldn’t deal with it. I don’t really blame her, Nick said sobbing, hell I couldn’t stand what I had become. That’s why I came to this cabin to end my life. Somehow, my brain made me feel as though I was killing Megan but in reality it was only myself. I had actually shot myself in the temple when I had imagined putting a bullet between Megan’s eyes. I could never have hurt Megan, she had helped me to end my own life and I suppose that was for the better. It was going to be her or me in the end. The fever inside me was burning me alive, something had to give. I’m glad it was me, because it could have been her. It’s better it was me, Nick said mumbling to himself, as he wandered back into the haze.” “Hey there sport, I heard a voice say, time to feed the fire.” As instructed, I gathered the logs and fed the fire in some kind of surrealistic daze. “Heat starting to get to you there, sport” The man was dressed all in black like an artist or one of those gothic nuts. “Dylan’s the name, he said with a grin. I suppose you’re wondering what this is all about? Well, to tell you the truth, I don’t really know. Me and my old lady use to be guests in this cabin almost every weekend back in the mid-eighties. Quite the times! Partying, loving life, living off mountain breeze and sweet sunshine. I was a writer, or at least I was trying to be. Even sold a few pieces but not that anyone would know. Yeah, it was crazy times, problem was I enjoyed the free-wheeling artist life-style more then the actual work involved. I thought of alcohol as just a tool to enhance my writing but in the end, the booze and the pills finally got to me.” The guy seem hyper like he was a speed freak or maybe just the real nervous type. You know the kind of dude that always seems uncomfortable no matter where he was or what he was doing. He did seem to have an intensity about him though, like he held some secrete inside only he would ever know. He seemed like an artist. One that lived like he was here only to party but at night when all alone, would write strange, dark works of fiction or poetry. “Yeah, my lady, Jessie was her name and I had quite a time in this place. Man, if the walls could talk...oops I guess they kind of do, well, to you. Anyhow, you’re just at the start of the journey, my man, I’m sure you’re ride it through. Like I was saying this was kind of like mine and Jessie’s home away from home. We came here for good times and cheap thrills but it was more then just that. Sure we did a lot of drugs and stuff but we were searching for something, a meaning that some how escapes just about everyone you’ll ever know. It’s hard to explain but it’s like a groove you’ll know it, if you ever feel it. I guess we were kind of on a journey ourselves. Just wished it could have ended better. I guess me and her kind of burnt out somewhere along the way, seems like it happens to some of the best people, or at least some of the best, I’ve ever known. Like I said, I got some things published but not enough to live on. We were always spending more then we were making. I mean, I had a straight job and all...well at least for awhile. I thought, if I quit, I could devote more time to my art, at the time it seemed like a damn good idea, too. I guess, when I quit the straight gig we just kind of got lost. Spent more time having fun then having anything to show for it. Jessie ended up throwing me out of her place. I guess in a way she was right. I only wish she could have had more faith in me. I mean, I would have come around. Yeah, but when she gave me the boot, I just went into a tailspin.” “That’s how I ended up here again, seven years ago, New Year’s Eve. I came here to get away and remember some of the better days. The whole purpose was to write not to die. Well, I wrote alright, cranked out a fifteen thousand word short story. Been told it won an award a few years ago, shame I wasn’t around to see it. Problem was the whole time I was writing, I was drinking and mixing it with pain killers. Yeah, the words flowed but so did the booze. By the time I finished my little claim to artistic fame, I was gone. They found be the next day declared cause of death an overdose and exposure. Guess I forgot about that damn fire, too. Never got my change to write the great American novel. Just might have been able to do it, too. Well, what can you say, women they give us life and they can take it away. But who’s to say, if it hadn’t been for Jessie, maybe I would have never even come back here. I mean, at least I got that one short story that still carries on my name to this very day.”
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Copyright © 2002 Dougie Dosha |