Daydream
05-11-2012, 08:37 PM
Hi all.
I've dabbled in writing stories before although I'm primarily a musician. I'd just like to know what people think really, if this story is worth submitting at all and how it reads.
Is it any good basically?
Any questions or criticisms are welcome. I suspect that the ending is a bit weak but I want it to be concise so see what you think.
The Pursuit & the Precipice
The moonlight is shining upon my face so brightly that I can see the light through my closed eyelids. I must appear wreathed in illumination to anyone watching and I can almost see myself surrounded by a reflective halo, standing upon the precipice of my window ledge over one-hundred feet from the empty car park below.
This brief moment of lucidity is broken in more ways than one as I open my eyes just in time to see the moon disappear behind grey clouds and all natural light is lost. From inside the small studio flat comes the faint glow of my bedside lamp and from the surrounding windows electric lights of similar weakness are reflected in the still pools of rainwater sitting in the recesses of the tarmac below.
I'm so tired now. So utterly exhausted, my reserves finally depleted, my submission complete. Only now does the dog stop barking. The huge, black dog from my dreams born of my nightmare hours, the only hours that seem real. I have no will to keep on running, even if I had the strength.
I wonder now where the dog is. Then I look down and see its gaping maw. The puddles I had mistaken for rainwater are pools of saliva in the corners of its mouth, the uneven tarmac its protruding tongue and the reflected night lights its insatiable eyes. A cunning trick to lure me here then, where he can catch my defeated body and swallow me whole.
I close my eyes again, hoping the clouds will part once more and allow me to bask in one last beam of moonlight. But the clouds don't acquiesce to this last request and instead I'm remembering the nightmares, the chase, the misery of exhaustion:
A piece of the minute precipice crumbles beneath my feet and I nearly fall into the bottomless chasm to my left. The ledge, no more than fifteen inches wide, seems to run endlessly alongside a tall grey cliff of infinite height. I move as fast as I can, grasping at slippery handholds in the wall for support, focusing on the way forward, not daring to look back at the source of the awful barking.
My right arm brushes against the rock and I wince in pain as the still weeping wound left by my pursuer presses against the rough surface. I stop for a moment to catch my breath but the barking gets louder. I marvel at the dexterity of the hound for its growling approaches with unbelievable rapidity despite the fineness and instability of the ledge which presented me with such difficulty.
I risk a look behind me before I continue to flee and see a fearsome creature surely beyond any of my own imaginings. Its red eyes burn with madness and its red tongue rolls from its ferocious mouth which foams and drips with saliva. The dog has tasted my blood and the desire to sate its ravenous hunger has driven it to the brink of insanity.
I turn then and run, to the best of my ability, from my rabid hunter...
Many times I have likened the black dog to a creature of hell, but finally I understand what hell is. As an atheist I always denied the existence of heaven and hell but I've been proven wrong. Hell exists, beyond a shadow of a doubt, but it's within the human mind. Perhaps only in the mind of those who have experienced the curse of enlightenment, but it exists none-the-less.
Perhaps the dog, then, is the servant of enlightenment. A paradoxical term when used in this fashion but if, like the moonlight, illumination can reveal such a pitiful man as myself standing on a window ledge in the dead of night then enlightenment can reveal the dark, mortal truth of hell.
I can never remember which came first, such depressing musings or the barking of the hound. Maybe one was born of the other or maybe not. Either way I've heard the dog and I've seen hell, and now nothing can be reversed.
The dreams persisted even when I believed myself rescued. Even when I would wake screaming to collapse into the arms of someone who loved me. I often catch a glimpse of my bed in the corner of my eye, and even as I turn to regard it now the same trick torments my mind.
Someone sleeps peacefully beneath the duvet. The sleep is so deep she doesn't move. I breath a sigh of relief. I can reassure myself with the knowledge that I'm not alone. My hunter, my vision of hell, the chasm, the hopelessness of my predicament, all of these things must be easier to be bear with someone to share the burden. They must be.
I often have to unroll the dishevelled quilt to convince myself she isn't there...
...keep running. Do not give up! There will be an end to this!
As I continue along the fragile precipice I motivate myself with these hopes and ignore their lack of conviction. What other choice do I have if I don't want to feed the tenacious dog. I rack my brain for another way out but it always comes back to the same simple choices...
My broken concentration betrays me for just a moment and my left foot slips from the ledge. I instinctively reach out to catch myself but once again the brittle rock crumbles at my grasp and I prepare to be swallowed by the cold darkness of the abyss.
But I am held aloft. I realise that I am suspended just inches from the precipice and I regard the source of this suspension with frustration. I have been saved by a huge seashell, roughly ten feet in diameter. The hellish barking alerts me to my senses and I scramble with some difficulty from the shell and resume my awkward flight from danger.
Another time this happens, I'm caught in the safety net of the seashell and again I scuttle back onto the ledge. And this isn't the last time as again and again I am saved by this ever watchful protecting palm. I soon realise that resigning myself to the plummet, giving up my flight for survival and dropping from the ledge would be impossible. The shell wouldn't allow it. If I am to end this I must allow my body to be agonisingly ripped to shreds by the drooling black dog.
If there must be an end, it won't be without its fair share of agony.
But even when she was there her to help she was unavoidably, to me, a hindrance. What if I wanted her to let me go, to allow me to rest in piece. She wasn't being pursued by cacophonic death. On the nights that I was ready to end it all she would always be there to flush away the pills, hide the razor and never let me leave her sight.
It was almost like living back at home with my parents.
But now I have no guardians, no stifling protective shell. Now I have only myself and one last night to look the dog in the eye and allow him to feed, allow him to end my consciousness. There will be no more running, no more cuts and bruises, no more deafening barks behind me in the darkness.
I realise I have been stood on this window ledge for quite some time. I haven't ran through all of the dreams in my head like this before.
I sense the clouds parting again but I frown because I'm not bathed in the familiarity of the moonlight. To my surprise my recollection continues, and the sky changes...
I'm running on nothing but adrenaline now, apart from perhaps my instinctive will to survive. I wonder if this life is really all that different from the lives of others. Everybody wants to survive and everybody runs.
Or do they?
This chase has withered me over the years. I feel old and most likely look it. I've knocked and gashed my skin so many times on the harsh cliff beside me that I'm like one big callous on my right side. There really is only one thing left for me to do.
I turn around and wait for the hound to claim me.
And, of course, it comes. It is everything that I fear and every terror I have ever ran from. But one thing has changed. As I look into those frenzied, bloodshot eyes I see a glint of something new. A reflection of light in its tiny pupil, mirrored from somewhere behind me...
I close my eyes tightly; I'm not used to sunlight.
I've dabbled in writing stories before although I'm primarily a musician. I'd just like to know what people think really, if this story is worth submitting at all and how it reads.
Is it any good basically?
Any questions or criticisms are welcome. I suspect that the ending is a bit weak but I want it to be concise so see what you think.
The Pursuit & the Precipice
The moonlight is shining upon my face so brightly that I can see the light through my closed eyelids. I must appear wreathed in illumination to anyone watching and I can almost see myself surrounded by a reflective halo, standing upon the precipice of my window ledge over one-hundred feet from the empty car park below.
This brief moment of lucidity is broken in more ways than one as I open my eyes just in time to see the moon disappear behind grey clouds and all natural light is lost. From inside the small studio flat comes the faint glow of my bedside lamp and from the surrounding windows electric lights of similar weakness are reflected in the still pools of rainwater sitting in the recesses of the tarmac below.
I'm so tired now. So utterly exhausted, my reserves finally depleted, my submission complete. Only now does the dog stop barking. The huge, black dog from my dreams born of my nightmare hours, the only hours that seem real. I have no will to keep on running, even if I had the strength.
I wonder now where the dog is. Then I look down and see its gaping maw. The puddles I had mistaken for rainwater are pools of saliva in the corners of its mouth, the uneven tarmac its protruding tongue and the reflected night lights its insatiable eyes. A cunning trick to lure me here then, where he can catch my defeated body and swallow me whole.
I close my eyes again, hoping the clouds will part once more and allow me to bask in one last beam of moonlight. But the clouds don't acquiesce to this last request and instead I'm remembering the nightmares, the chase, the misery of exhaustion:
A piece of the minute precipice crumbles beneath my feet and I nearly fall into the bottomless chasm to my left. The ledge, no more than fifteen inches wide, seems to run endlessly alongside a tall grey cliff of infinite height. I move as fast as I can, grasping at slippery handholds in the wall for support, focusing on the way forward, not daring to look back at the source of the awful barking.
My right arm brushes against the rock and I wince in pain as the still weeping wound left by my pursuer presses against the rough surface. I stop for a moment to catch my breath but the barking gets louder. I marvel at the dexterity of the hound for its growling approaches with unbelievable rapidity despite the fineness and instability of the ledge which presented me with such difficulty.
I risk a look behind me before I continue to flee and see a fearsome creature surely beyond any of my own imaginings. Its red eyes burn with madness and its red tongue rolls from its ferocious mouth which foams and drips with saliva. The dog has tasted my blood and the desire to sate its ravenous hunger has driven it to the brink of insanity.
I turn then and run, to the best of my ability, from my rabid hunter...
Many times I have likened the black dog to a creature of hell, but finally I understand what hell is. As an atheist I always denied the existence of heaven and hell but I've been proven wrong. Hell exists, beyond a shadow of a doubt, but it's within the human mind. Perhaps only in the mind of those who have experienced the curse of enlightenment, but it exists none-the-less.
Perhaps the dog, then, is the servant of enlightenment. A paradoxical term when used in this fashion but if, like the moonlight, illumination can reveal such a pitiful man as myself standing on a window ledge in the dead of night then enlightenment can reveal the dark, mortal truth of hell.
I can never remember which came first, such depressing musings or the barking of the hound. Maybe one was born of the other or maybe not. Either way I've heard the dog and I've seen hell, and now nothing can be reversed.
The dreams persisted even when I believed myself rescued. Even when I would wake screaming to collapse into the arms of someone who loved me. I often catch a glimpse of my bed in the corner of my eye, and even as I turn to regard it now the same trick torments my mind.
Someone sleeps peacefully beneath the duvet. The sleep is so deep she doesn't move. I breath a sigh of relief. I can reassure myself with the knowledge that I'm not alone. My hunter, my vision of hell, the chasm, the hopelessness of my predicament, all of these things must be easier to be bear with someone to share the burden. They must be.
I often have to unroll the dishevelled quilt to convince myself she isn't there...
...keep running. Do not give up! There will be an end to this!
As I continue along the fragile precipice I motivate myself with these hopes and ignore their lack of conviction. What other choice do I have if I don't want to feed the tenacious dog. I rack my brain for another way out but it always comes back to the same simple choices...
My broken concentration betrays me for just a moment and my left foot slips from the ledge. I instinctively reach out to catch myself but once again the brittle rock crumbles at my grasp and I prepare to be swallowed by the cold darkness of the abyss.
But I am held aloft. I realise that I am suspended just inches from the precipice and I regard the source of this suspension with frustration. I have been saved by a huge seashell, roughly ten feet in diameter. The hellish barking alerts me to my senses and I scramble with some difficulty from the shell and resume my awkward flight from danger.
Another time this happens, I'm caught in the safety net of the seashell and again I scuttle back onto the ledge. And this isn't the last time as again and again I am saved by this ever watchful protecting palm. I soon realise that resigning myself to the plummet, giving up my flight for survival and dropping from the ledge would be impossible. The shell wouldn't allow it. If I am to end this I must allow my body to be agonisingly ripped to shreds by the drooling black dog.
If there must be an end, it won't be without its fair share of agony.
But even when she was there her to help she was unavoidably, to me, a hindrance. What if I wanted her to let me go, to allow me to rest in piece. She wasn't being pursued by cacophonic death. On the nights that I was ready to end it all she would always be there to flush away the pills, hide the razor and never let me leave her sight.
It was almost like living back at home with my parents.
But now I have no guardians, no stifling protective shell. Now I have only myself and one last night to look the dog in the eye and allow him to feed, allow him to end my consciousness. There will be no more running, no more cuts and bruises, no more deafening barks behind me in the darkness.
I realise I have been stood on this window ledge for quite some time. I haven't ran through all of the dreams in my head like this before.
I sense the clouds parting again but I frown because I'm not bathed in the familiarity of the moonlight. To my surprise my recollection continues, and the sky changes...
I'm running on nothing but adrenaline now, apart from perhaps my instinctive will to survive. I wonder if this life is really all that different from the lives of others. Everybody wants to survive and everybody runs.
Or do they?
This chase has withered me over the years. I feel old and most likely look it. I've knocked and gashed my skin so many times on the harsh cliff beside me that I'm like one big callous on my right side. There really is only one thing left for me to do.
I turn around and wait for the hound to claim me.
And, of course, it comes. It is everything that I fear and every terror I have ever ran from. But one thing has changed. As I look into those frenzied, bloodshot eyes I see a glint of something new. A reflection of light in its tiny pupil, mirrored from somewhere behind me...
I close my eyes tightly; I'm not used to sunlight.