The Resting Three

Slowly and stealthily I crept up the stairs, each of my steps creaking slightly as I ascended. I was glad that at least I was wearing my slippers. The smell of the wood floor filled my nose. It was a pleasant smell and I took a moment to take in a breath through my nose. The floor had recently been redone, it was time that I got rid of that old floor and put a new one in. The old wood floor was dark, dirty, and was starting to have a damp, moldy smell. It wasn’t strong but it made your shoes smell like a rotting log and if you touched it with your hand, it had to be washed at least three times to be rid of the smell.
Remembering why I was creeping up the stairs, I continued up them. Baseball bat in hand, I neared the room in which I thought the noise had come from and grasping the weapon tighter as I approached the door, I heard the noise again, this time much clearer. The sound disarmed me. It sounded like a pitiful sob coming from a woman. With a sudden flash of realization, I set the bat down and opened the door.
Sitting in the corner of the room, leaning over a dusty old desk, was the figure of a sobbing woman. Her shoulders shook as she cried, but it was mostly silent, a few small whimpers escaping from her throat. “What’s wrong dear?” I asked with honest compassion in my voice. The pale white face kept crying into the desk for a minute or two and then slowly turned around in her chair to face me. She was strikingly beautiful but with a very pale complexion, which probably amounted from all the sobbing she had just done. Her lips were thin and quivering, her hazel eyes avoiding mine. Recovering enough to talk, she finally looked at my face and said, “You know what I want,” her voice trailing off at the end and traveling into the darkness of the corner of the room. There was only one source of light, a small lamp that sat on the desk at the far end of the room.
The study was previously used by my father before he left the house to me, but I have no need for it and never use it. I remember my father locking himself in his study almost every night when he returned home. My mother didn’t show that she minded much but I could feel her pain. That man was obsessed with his work. Many days I would return from school and hope that my father would come back from his dismal office at the insurance company and be glad to see me, want to play catch with me, hug me. He wasn’t a mean man, or even a harsh one, but he was uncaring and unloving, at least to me and my mother.
The lamp flickered as I contemplated what I was going to say. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, wondering if that was the best I could come up with. Denying the obvious wasn’t easy, even for me. Our marriage was falling apart. She said that I was always distant, something that she could never reach. I never understood what she meant. I still don’t.
“You have to let go. You have to let me go!” her voice rang out, this time a little louder.
“I can’t do that, you’re all I have left.”
With a loud scream, the woman ran out of the room crying. I went back to bed and pondered upon what to do tomorrow. “She has to come to bed sometime,” I thought.
I awoke the next morning with nobody beside me and not even an indentation or even any mark that somebody had been there at any point in the night. Putting on my slippers, I go out to search the house for where she might be. She couldn’t have gone to work yet, it’s only six o’ clock. After walking through every room in the house, I give up and decide to eat breakfast. While eating a bowl of cereal and reading a newspaper, I happen to take a glance at the wooden floor. A chill went down my spine as if I had forgotten something very important. Trying to remember what it was I forgot, I realized that it is time that I go to work. As I drive, I reflect upon how I got this job.
I was never a very good student. It wasn’t that I wasn’t smart enough; I just didn’t care about school at all. I didn’t see any point in trying so hard for things I didn’t want. In later school years some kids tried to get good grades because they wanted to make lots of money some time in their life, but I didn’t even care about money. I never was a person that wanted to attain things. I never even finished high school; I just decided to get an occupation. It seemed to me better than school.
Some people say that your job reflects what kind of a person you are. I don’t believe that entirely, but there may be something to it. I never really cared what kind of job I had; I just took the first one that I found. It just happened to be one that nobody wanted. We call ourselves the cleanup crew. Whenever something happens on a road, gruesome or not, we have to clean it up. Sometimes it will just be scraps of metal and shattered glass, but other times there are human bodies that need to be cleaned up. They say everybody has trouble at first when doing that job. I never had trouble. Whether or not a person has trouble at the beginning is irrelevant. After a while, everybody either quits or loses all feelings for those around them.
My wife says I never should have taken that job, that it did me harm. She and I both came to realize that the job had nothing to do with what happened between us.
It was a Saturday afternoon, about two weeks ago. It was a beautiful day, but we decided to spend it inside. While watching the television, my wife turned to me and said, “I can’t do this anymore. You don’t love me.” She said this in a very calm and normal manner, giving no indication that she was distraught about it.
“That’s not true,” I replied, “I love you very much.”
I said this in an equally unexcited way, which surprised me even more than her manner.
“You don’t love me. You own me. You don’t know what love is.”
“What do you want from me?”
“I want you to love me.” She said in a rather exasperated tone.
“No, I mean what do you expect to gain from telling me all this?” I said in a frustrated tone.
“I don’t expect anything.”
“But I’m loving you! What else can I do?”
“Then why doesn’t it feel like love?”
“Does it always have to feel like it to be love?”
“No, but it has to sometimes.”
“Surely you feel loved sometimes.” A short pause left the room in silence.
“No, I don’t.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
“Then why did you marry me?”
“I thought it would get better. I thought I could show you how to love, but I know it was a dumb idea. You’ll never change. I want to leave you.”
Standing up I said, “You can’t, I won’t let you.”
“Just watch me.”
As she headed for the door I ran after her and tackled her to the ground. As she wriggled and writhed in my arms I whispered in her ear, “You will never leave me, not like this.” In a horrific rage I threw her to the ground, her head hitting the ground first, knocking her out. Walking calmly to the door, I turn the lock and make sure that she will never leave me again.
As I reflected upon that day, I think that I may have been a bit rash, but at least my wife is still here with me. After work I ate dinner and headed straight to bed. There was still no sign of my wife, but I knew she had to be around here somewhere.
During the night I had a dream. I was a young boy again, sitting at the table. My mother and father were making dinner in the kitchen. My father was cutting onions because they didn’t bother him and they made my mother’s eyes water a great deal and she liked to avoid that if she could. “Can I help you honey,” my father asked in a very loving tone. “Oh no, you have helped far enough already. Only so much work needs to be done. You can’t help if there is nothing left to help with,” my mother replied. They continued to finish making dinner. My father started whistling a tune and the room resonated with a cheerful melody. I felt very happy as I continued to watch them enjoy each other’s company. My father then turned to me and spread out his arms.
It was at that moment I awoke. I knew my father would never hug me. Sitting up in bed I heard a sound. It was coming from the kitchen. I grabbed the bat that I now kept beside my bed every night and crept out of my room and down the hall towards the kitchen. The noise was becoming louder and clearer as I drew closer. It was a slow shuffling sound followed by low and feeble groans. Creeping slowly into the kitchen I see nothing. Gripping the bat tightly and listening for the noise again, I look around the room
.
After feeling quite sure that there was nothing there, I flipped on the light. Just then I heard the noise behind me down the hall I just came down, this time it was faster, more frantic. Rushing back down the hall I see the figure of an old man.
“Oh, hi dad,” I said. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”
“Well there aren’t many places to go,” he replied through a sheepish grin. “I’m too old and weak to go very far. It’s been years since I’ve made it to the kitchen.”
“Why don’t I see you more often?” I asked in a polite and simply curious manner.
“Well, honestly, I don’t really want to be around you.”
“You’re avoiding me?”
“Ever since you locked me up in here.”
“Why do you want to leave? Don’t you feel guilty?”
“Son, I’m tired and I don’t want to waste my energy arguing with you. Let me leave!”
“I can’t do that dad.”
“And that’s why I’m avoiding you. Why can’t you just let go?”
“You have to pay for your mistakes!”
“And who made you the judge! I loved your mother greatly.”
“No you didn’t. If you did, she would still have been alive and I wouldn’t be here today. I wouldn’t be in this place.”
“I knew she wasn’t going to live and I gave up hope! I couldn’t bear it any longer; it was too much for me.”
“I don’t believe you!”
“Suit yourself, I’ll only be trapped in this house so long, but you, you could be stuck for much longer than I will be.”
The old man vanished into thin air, leaving me staring at the wood floor.
I wasn’t surprised at his vanishing, but rather the fact that he appeared at all. It had been a long time since I had last seen him. I knew he had to be around somewhere; I just never looked for him. It was his punishment that he had to stay in the house. That punishment was decided by me. There was no one else to inflict it upon him, but he deserved it.
The old man had it coming to him. He let my mother die, the last person I ever truly loved. I remember waiting by her hospital bed, tears in my eyes but not truly understanding what was going on. My father was standing beside the bed, looking tired and ragged, but not worried. He didn’t seem to care at all. In fact, it seemed like an inconvenience to him that he had to stay with her, as if he had better things to do. His favorite show was probably on or he had some work that was more important than she was. She was dying of cancer and he couldn’t give her the strength to carry on? She had no hope left and nothing to live for.
I could never forget her dying words. The coarse words wrenched themselves out of her raspy throat as she spoke to me, but didn’t turn towards me. “I’ll see you soon,” was all that came out of her mouth. I was the only one in the room so she must have been talking to me.
With those words, her dying sigh emanated throughout the room, only to be squashed by the sounds of nurses walking back and forth through the hallways and beds being rolled along on the cold, hard, tile floor. I was so shocked that I didn’t cry for three days. I couldn’t eat or drink anything either. I was forcibly made to drink some water, and upon its being forced down my throat, I could hold back no longer. The water poured down my throat and the tears streamed down my cheeks. It seemed that I was losing water just as fast as I was gaining it.
After all this happened, I don’t think I was ever the same again. My friends didn’t want to be around me anymore. They said there was a marked difference in my temperament. It wasn’t a violent change except maybe in the sense that I was violently indifferent to the world around me.
Enough ruminating. Time to go back to bed.
It just so happened that the next day as I was returning home from work, as I was stopped at a stoplight, I saw a large and innocent looking golden retriever starting to cross the street slowly. It seemed as though it was completely oblivious to the actions it was taking and the danger of it. The light turned green just as it started crossing the street and many cars started moving along just like they would any other time they were going through a green light. Adrenaline kicked in and I opened my door quickly and ran after the dog, waving at all the cars to stop. Many honks followed my actions; for many people thought that I was a crazy jaywalker. A big truck was making a left turn that would certainly flatten the dog, but as it was nearing the dog’s imminent death I picked it up and brought it to the sidewalk as the truck let loose a long and certainly unneeded blow if its horn.
Leaving the dog on the side of the street with a firm, “No,” to let him or her or whatever it was know that it was not to do that again. Walking back to my stranded car I see the dog following me. Knowing that if he keeps doing this he will get himself into the same predicament that he was in before, I quickly picked him up and put him into my car and continued to drive home. As I drove, I rolled down the windows and let him hang his head out the window. There was something special about this dog; I could just tell.
Entering the front door, I set the dog down on the floor and I look up to see my wife, standing there waiting for me, up from her usual resting place. “So this is him?” she asked with a peculiar grin on her face. “What are you talking about? Were you expecting this dog?” There was no reply as she went up the stairs. As she reached the top, a voice came from behind the shadows, “This will be good for you,” she said with a smile that I could feel but not see.
I turned to the dog and said, “Well, if I went through all that trouble to save you, I might as well just keep you. Of course, if I’m going to keep you I need to give you a name.” I thought a moment and tried to think of something catchy and ironic that had to do with how I found him, but nothing of any value came to mind. I finally decided to just call him Buddy, thinking that was just generic enough to be an unpopular name.
From that point on, except when I was at work, buddy was always an arm’s length away from me. He would play catch with me until my arm was so sore I couldn’t hold up the newspaper to read it the next morning. He would just keep bringing it back, wagging his tail like a propeller gone wild, swinging back and forth and criss-cross until it seemed that it must fall off. I was right; there was something special about Buddy. He made me feel different. It was as if something inside me had come alive again. It was a familiar feeling and I liked it, but there was a melancholy note to the feeling. It felt as if my mother was still alive and I just had to reach out and touch her, but I knew she was gone, leaving a bittersweet feeling in my stomach.
The whole world seemed to fade away. All that I cared about was myself, Buddy, and what we could do together. One day, about a month after I brought Buddy home, my wife appeared again. Buddy and I were wrestling playfully on the floor when she appeared in front of us. Buddy immediately ran to another room.
“Finally, I was worried at first that it was never going to happen,” said my wife.
“What are you so happy about? I am perfectly happy and with no thanks to you.” I said with a proud smirk.
“I know. This is the best way,” she said, leaving me in a mysterious stupor.
After saying these words she vanished. I never saw my wife or father again.
Trying to figure out her cryptic little speech, I was suddenly struck with the feeling that I had forgotten something very important to me. I never saw buddy again either. Ever since he ran to another room when my wife appeared, I couldn’t find him. I blamed it on my wife; she must have had a hand in this. I knew she couldn’t stand to see me happy.
I was left alone in my house. Lonely and depressed, I was reduced to staring at the wood floor. There was something about that wood floor. I kept staring at it hoping that it would give me answers. It felt like the answers were inside me and if I stared at the floor long enough, I would be able to find it stored deep within.
It started off as a whisper every time I looked at the floor. It was almost as if it was trying to tell me what I could not remember. I tried to make out what it was saying to me, but it was too quiet to hear. The whisper became louder, now an audible noise. I could hear one word repeated over and over very slowly, “Come.” The voice continued to grow until it became two distinct voices, a male and a female. They were frighteningly familiar, but had a demonic aspect to them, as if they were under a trance. My wife and father were calling me.
It seemed as if I couldn’t think of anything else. I was being called. I was being called not upward, but downward, towards the place I had been avoiding. Their cries echoed in my head all the time. My entire being raged against their calling. Everywhere I went was I haunted. It came to a point where I couldn’t even hear anybody speak but those that called me to the floor! The ritualistic voices were now accompanied by drums, pounding my head into oblivion with a constant thump, thump, thump.
I wanted to leave the house, but every time I did the noise got even worse. I didn’t want to remember what I had forgotten anymore. I was so close to recovering what I had forgotten and was eager to remember, but the voices in my head made it clear to me that I did not really want to know.
The voices were very clear now. They had been clear for days. My wife and my father screamed at me day and night, not allowing me to sleep. I didn’t know where to go for help. Any logical person would have thought I was crazy, but I know I wasn’t crazy. The noise eventually became so loud and made my head throb so much that I could actually see my forehead bulging and receding beneath my long brown hair. My eyes were bloodshot and were encircled by dark bands of darkness.
As I tried to go to sleep that night, I couldn’t bear it any longer. Running into the kitchen with my bat I tried to break the wood floor but was unsuccessful despite the incessant battering of the bat against the floor, driven by the rhythmic beating in my head. Running out to the garage, I grab a sledgehammer and return to the room. After breaking through the floor, I kneel down beside the hole and start ripping up the wood planks in a furious frenzy. The jagged wood cut my hands and blood dripped onto the floor.
The beating in my head finally stopped as I stared into the hole I had just created. The only rhythmic sound I heard now was the constant drip, drip from the blood on my hands hitting the ground. Exhaustion finally took its tool as I fell into the deep, dark, tear.
“No, mother, I won’t see you soon.” I said. I closed my eyes.
Shadows danced and laughed on the walls, but there were no lights.

Forevermore

Leoni Carson wiped his brow as he looked at the barren landscape. Sand dunes rolled up and down as far as the eye could see. After two weeks of searching for some kind of help on this desert world, Leoni and his crew were becoming very desperate. Only thirteen people survived the crash, a fraction of the seventy-two that originally manned the now destroyed vessel. Leoni sighed as he thought about his broken and abandoned ship.

As a young cadet of the UEE, the Universe Explorers of Earth, he distinguished himself by both his skills and his character. At the beginning, Leoni joined in an attempt to find who he really was and to find who he should be. Touring many planets occupied by humans and many others that were not, Leoni did learn something. He learned that the universe is a very lonely place, filled mostly with emptiness. The UEE had an eighty-five percent drop-out rate within the first two years and those that did not drop out were changed forever. Some say that exploring the universe is an addiction, fed by excitement. For Leoni Carson, his addiction was loneliness, and the universe was glad to provide.

The star ship captain’s mood had been solemn for the last couple days. Several people had died of heat stroke, fueled by the binary stars that heated the scorching desert. Water was running low, and the few remaining human beings knew that this could be their last day. They would finish the last of their water at sunset. The water synthesizer that usually quenched their thirst was destroyed during the crash, and the stores of food were contaminated by fumes from the explosion that followed soon after impact. As they all trekked along the dunes, one of the men suddenly yelled in pain.

“What is it?” the star captain asked.

“I think I just hit a wall,” was the man’s reply.

Hurrying over to where the man was standing, Leoni walked forward cautiously, his hands in front of him, feeling for something that did not appear to be there. As he approached the scene of the accident he heard a slight vibrating noise, like that of electricity. Reaching forward, the tips of his fingers seemed to vanish into thin air and then he felt the cool, hard feeling of a metal surface.

“It’s a cloaking shield all right. Let’s find a way to get in, it may be our only chance of survival,” stated the captain calmly.

All of their gadgetry that they usually packed was either dropped because it was too heavy to keep carrying, or fried in the violent heat. It would have been a simple matter to find the entrance to this unusual place if they had the proper equipment with them still. Feeling their way around the metal surface, they soon find that it is much larger than they had anticipated. It seemed as if it was a giant wall with no end. They walked for miles, dragging their arms along the edge of the surface, but at a relatively slow pace because every so often the wall would jut out and somebody would receive a large bruise on their body.

After about an hour of this, Captain Leoni’s hand brushed over a bump. The men turn to look at him as he stops rather abruptly. Feeling it carefully, he decides to push it, hoping that it is a button. The indentation moves inward, and after a couple seconds of waiting, a loud sound rings in his ears, and then darkness consumes him.

Awakening on a couch was not exactly what Leoni was expecting. He seemed to be in an average living room, at least average for a living room on earth. A little girl was sitting in an adjoin room watching television. A woman suddenly leaned over him and kissed him on the cheek.

“Rise and shine sleepyhead,” the strange woman said lovingly.

“Where am I,” answered a confused but unafraid Leoni.

“At home, where else would you be?”

“Where’s my crew? Do you know what happened to my crew?

“Oh no, this wasn’t supposed to happen. Come on honey; let’s get you to the doctor.”

“What doctor? I need to find my crew. There was this invisible wall.”

“Just come with me, let’s get in the car,” as she started to panic.

“No, I will not get in the car with you and go to some psychotic doctor!”

After saying this, he quickly bolted out the door, but was stopped abruptly after seeing
his surroundings. A blue sky stretched across the horizon, filled with fluffy billowing clouds. Birds sang as they perched in trees, joyful that the day was so beautiful.

“Leoni, wait!”

The strange woman came out of the house and walked towards him. Silence emanated from both of them as they tried to understand what they should do.

“Alright, I’ll go,” came the haggard reply.

The strange woman went back into the house to fetch her daughter. After a minute or so, they were all in a car heading towards the mysterious doctor. Nobody spoke as Leoni stared out the window. Leoni had never been to earth, but he had seen pictures in history books. What he was seeing now looked like the pictures of America at the turn of the twenty-first century. Streetlights lined the side of the two-lane highway. Speed limit signs reading forty-five miles an hour were abundant. What was this place that seemed to be frozen in a time long past? The scenic drive ended abruptly as the car stopped at a large building with large words on the front. The words read, “The Institution.” Fear filled Leoni’s heart as he walked closer to this building. What was going on?

As he walked in, a receptionist greeted him with a smile, but did not ask his name or what he was there for. She just dialed a number into the telephone and told him the doctor would only be a moment. As soon as he sat down to wait, a nurse came to bring him to the room where he would see the doctor. Following the nurse through the hall, he was almost lost in anxiety. As they approached and entered a door, Leoni was surprised to find that he was not in a patient’s room but in the doctor’s office. The doctor faced towards a window at the other end of the room, with his back to his new guest.

“Please sit down,” said the doctor in a deep and powerful voice. “There is much to tell you.”

“So I’m not here for medication?”

“No, no of course not. It is complicated. Why don’t I just simply explain it to you. This place is a safe house, a strong tower for those that have been abused in other parts of the universe. Excuse me; let me start from the beginning. A long time ago, there was a planet called Nuben. The civilization on that planet grew so sophisticated that they learned how to live forever. This further allowed for more technological improvement because people could keep on living and learning forever, continuing to advance without the delay of death. There was complete peace on the planet. There was no hunger or disease. It seemed all evil had left them. Over the course of about a millennia, a gradual change shifted the entire population into something that it did not have before. Everybody was lonely and bored. There seemed to be no new experiences left to do, no new smells or new sights. People were bored with each other and began to search for new things outside of their own planet and their own people. As they left to explore and try to find things that they had not found before, they all went in separate directions, not thinking that they might forever be leaving their friends and family behind. As the years passed, there seemed to be no new things in the universe to find that they had not already experienced, at least at some level. Most of them are dead now, killed by other people that have not found immortality in science. Others killed themselves, not knowing the purpose as to why they should be alive. A select few did find meaning and new experiences, but in a way they did not expect. They found meaning in helping other people. I am one of those few that found meaning. Here, I am conducting an experiment as to how to make human beings as happy as possible. I have already concluded that immortality is not the way to happiness, but the way to loneliness. I am very close to achieving my goal. The people here seem very happy, but they aren’t happy all the time. Permanent happiness makes it normal and nothing special. In order for there to be as much happiness as possible, there must be sorrow and death also. This is where you come in.”

“What about my crew,” Leoni interrupts.

“They are happy. They have been lonely long enough and now have chosen to be happy.”

“What does that mean? Have you drugged them?”

“No, again, of course not. Everybody here is perfectly sane. What is it with you and drugs?”

“Then what do you mean? How did they choose to be happy?”

“They decided to live the life I gave them. I know the lives that people want. I know the lives that people really need, so I give it to them.”

“But what about me? That life you gave me was not the one I wanted. I know what I want.”

“Yes, I know you do. It is a strange concept that I have not dealt with before. No one else has known so exactly what they wanted. No, the life I gave to you is the life that I want. I knew you would not be satisfied. I just had to make sure.” I want you to trade places with me. I want you to become forever immortal and I to become a man that will die.”

“You just told me how bad it is to be immortal. Why would I want that?”
“No, I told you that being immortal is lonely, not bad. I know you Leoni, you love loneliness. You were made for loneliness. No one else in the universe was made for loneliness like you are. I am ready to become old and die. Will you grant me my wish?”

“I don’t have a ship to leave this place. I can only do it if I can explore the universe.”

“I have a ship ready for you.”

Leoni Pondered for a moment, but realized that this was his chance, the life that he really wanted. It was hard to believe that a crash landing on a barren planet could have become such a wondrous adventure that is sure to become many more adventures. Sometimes, things just need to be grasped when they can.

“I accept your offer.”

“Excellent.”

Truth

Sometimes, when no one is looking, extraordinary things happen. Love is born amidst a crowd of hurrying and bustling people. Beauty that could conquer nations passes over the eyes of those not seeing. Nobody sees these things though, because nobody knows where to look. My grandmother would tell me this every time I visited her, and every time I would ask her if she had ever seen the extraordinary things. Her reply would always be, “I never looked.”

In contrast to the extraordinary things, my life seems so ordinary. Imagine a fairy tale, but take all the interesting parts, the love story, the adventure, the magic, even the sorrow, and throw them away. What you are left with is my life, uninteresting and plain. Sometimes when I am tired of hoping for a love story or adventure, I degrade myself to hoping for something far less good and exciting. I start hoping for sorrow, for at least it would bring some interest to my life. Sorrow, that lonely friend that comes in the night, not to comfort or encourage, but to bring suffering and longing, a yearning for something more, has sometimes found me, but never for long. It has never come for long. At the best of times though, I search for truth.

There have been times when I am absolutely sure that there is a point to my searching, an end to my quest. But other times, I fall bleakly short of my end of the deal and plummet into disbelief. The answer is out there waiting. It will not stop its job. There is an answer to everything, absolute truths that the world and all its inhabitants adhere to, whether they know it or not. All that they do is be true and wait for those that seek them to find them so they may give them their truth. They will always wait, but I have, at times, stopped looking for them. This is not a fault on the part of the truth, but it falls on my behalf, because truth never changes.

Quite some time ago, I had stopped trusting in humans. Their lies surround them, envelope them, transform them, and define them. Most are so deluded that they cannot see past the scales covering their eyes. Most don’t even try.

Walking in the woods near my house, I looked upon the distant mountain, and I wondered how far away it was. It had three peaks, each the same height as each other in a parapet style spacing between each other, reminding me of an ancient castle, both majestic and malignant. Its white, snow-capped peaks were perfectly contrasted by the faded purple color directly beneath it.

As my eyes descended the mountain, I admired the wonderful paint job that was done on the mountain. It definitely was not made using MS Paint. The colors blended perfectly, reds and yellows and oranges, all completing this wonderful masterpiece. I wondered to myself how far away it was. Suddenly, I had a very strange desire to go towards it, to climb it, to be with the mountain and just stay there in its beauty.

Following my instincts, I started through the forest, heading towards the mountain, a glorious symbol of the end of my quest, my adventure. Was this really my adventure? Was something interesting finally happening to me? No one else will think that hiking to a mountain is interesting at all. But for now, I have a task, and this one I will stick with.

Hiking for hours upon end, my body started to fatigue, even though my mind was still pushing me onward. I started to realize that the mountain was much farther away than I had at first perceived. Unfortunately, it seemed as though I had made no progress, the mountain still sitting in its place, and I, wishing I was there, seemed to be stuck in one place, away from the mountain. Coming to my senses, I realized that I should head back, seeing that it was already dusk and I wouldn’t make it back till late at night. A brief fit of anger took hold of me as I realized how stupid I had been, but then something caught my eye.

A small house, hidden by trees and vines, cornered in an obscure part of the forest. At first I wondered why there was a house in the middle of a forest, away from civilization or any form of human contact. Reason told me that it was an old abandoned house, used centuries ago by settlers, left deserted and alone. I inched forward, slowed by the eeriness of the moment, yet pushed on by curiosity. As I drew closer, I began to see more distinct features of the house. The door was a solid piece of wood carved from a large tree, obviously handcrafted, but it looked very sturdy. Two windows, in symmetry to each other, separated in equal distances by the door in the center, added a quiet softness to the house, almost as if it had a face. It was a small cottage, overgrown by vines.

Yet there was something more to this house. At first, it seemed as if the house carried an air of tranquility about it, and indeed it did. But it was something much more than that. It wasn’t the scenery or the presence of this strange house, or even the bygone era that it seemed to represent. Something much deeper emanated from within the tranquil scene. It was a strong feeling, an overwhelming power that threatened to take my whole being, and yet I wanted it to. I had never felt this feeling before and now I wanted to delve into it and stay there forever. Every muscle in my body relaxed and I felt a quiet strength, added from somewhere that was not my own. A cool breeze brushed my face, awakening me, and I realize that I could go inside this mysterious house.

As I walked to the door and reached for the handle, a thought occurred to me. What if this house was evil? I pulled my hand back in a jerky manner and began to think. Maybe there were dark forces at work, weaving extraordinarily strong lies of goodness and peace. Lies of goodness and peace? Peace! There it is! I had finally pinpointed what the feeling was. It was peace, a truth I had never hoped of obtaining before, but here it was, offering itself to me freely. This house couldn’t be evil. No dark power could ever produce something so perfect and complete. After finishing this conflict in my head, I slowly reached for the handle.

The door opened easily, not even a creak emanated from its ancient hinges. My eyes quickly scanned the room, looking for the source of peace that I assumed emanated from within. Nothing caught my attention, so I began to look around again, this time studying it. There was only one room in the entire house. No bedroom, cellar, or kitchen separated the interior or added to its volume. There were very few items found in the house. There was a rectangle on the floor in a corner that was slightly discolored, giving the impression that a cot once made its home there. A small bookcase was pressed up against one of the walls, lined with books I had never heard of. To the left of the bookcase was a desk. It was waist high, and whatever chair used to accompany it had been removed long ago, for there was no such seat in the house at the present. I wondered to myself what kind of person would live in a place like this, and then it caught my eye.

A book, lying face down on the table, no markings upon the back or the binding to set itself apart from any other book, called to me, demanded my interest. Slowly and in a relaxed manner, I walked towards the book. Curiosity had taken a hold on me, but something stronger gave me the feeling that I had time and there was need to hurry. It almost seemed as if this moment was planned.

Picking up the book cautiously, I was surprised that nothing happened as I touched it. No stab of pain shot up my arm. No magic powers were imbedded into me through the mysterious book. Nothing happened at all. Disappointment and relief simultaneously converged upon me, but both were laid aside as I looked at the title of the book.

The Truth.

That was the title of the book. The Truth? Could it be that an insignificant-looking book, in a small abandoned house, in the middle of a forest, really contained The Truth? I opened the book furiously and started reading as fast as I could. I read for hours and hours. The book only looked as if it was a hundred pages long, but I know I read many more than that. All the truths that I had ever wondered about: what gives life meaning, what happens after you die, why people are shrouded in lies, and why my life is the way it is. There were complete explanations about every physical law that governed the universe. I only understood a few, but what I did understand gave new revelation to that which I already knew. I read and read for what seemed like days, ending my truth marathon when I fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.

I woke up the next day excited and filled with purpose. I ran out of the house and went to tell everyone I could about the book and all that it contained. It was a couple hours before I reached the edge of the forest, and when I started telling people about the book, most did not believe me. I yelled and screamed at them that they just had to follow me and they would find the truth, but only a few followed me. After gathering a group of six or seven, we started back to the forest. I led them to the place where I had found the house beforehand, but it was not there. Shock filled me and doubt flooded my mind. Had I really read the book? Of course I did. I know I did. My group, reasoning that I must be crazy, started to leave the way they came. I just watched as they left, both saddened that they did not believe me and that they did not find The Truth. As the last person went out of view, I turned around again. There stood the house as it had before, emitting its ever resonant glow of peace. I yelled for the group of people to come back, but they were already too far away. I grumpily walked into the house and picked up the book, excited to read more, but disappointed that it seemed as if I was the only one that could see this place. Opening the book, I read the only line on the first page.

“Seek and you shall find.”