Page 62 of The Spiral

His tone makes me peer at him through the cacophony of wings and arms. It’s so familiar, like an embedded resonance from my past. I can’t pinpoint it, though. It’s suppressed somewhere inside me, a memory carved into my mind that I can’t see. I grab the stone again, heaving my tired limbs forward to cling to it rather than have another man ever touch me again. Ghosts and guns are all I have left for men now. That and the reality of my life without anyone in it.

I feel dormant as I watch the silhouettes fight with each other, the crow bouncing between the light of the sky and the pitch black soil beneath them both. The man defends his position as he tries to get across the bog, arms striking at the crow as he keeps coming for me. The bog? I scan the ground, suddenly realizing where I am, and watch as the earth lathers and quivers around me, nothing but this stone somehow standing firm in the middle of it. There’s nothing else. Not even Lewis.

I frown, my hand reaching for the ground he was on a minute ago.

“Lewis?” I whisper, unsure what’s happening. Where’s he gone? I stretch further out, testing the sodden ooze of oily blackness, only to find nothing but more of it below the surface. “But he was here. He was. Where...” My eyes tear around the area, both hands reaching around me, searching for his body. I was lying on it. I was. I saw the bullet holes, felt the heat of his skin against mine. It was here. It happened. And where’s the gun gone? “Selma.” Her name whispers out of me quietly as I slowly move out into the bog, still searching for Lewis, fear I’ve lost my mind completely pushing me towards the only image of reality I have. “Are you still here?”

“Jesus. Don’t let go of that. Fuck.” His voice startles me back to the present as he latches onto my wrist and starts tugging. I stare straight up into blackness, his looming shadow casting into my face. “Just stay down. I’ll have to drag you out. Hold onto me.”

Hold onto him.

Time seems stagnant as I hear those words. Hold onto him. Just hold onto him.

I’ve heard that before. Moments ago, or perhaps years ago. I don’t know. I frown into the shadows around me, trying to remember when I heard it, or who I heard it from. It’s familiar again, like this man’s tone. He hauls me, my body sliding over the mud and ooze underneath us, powerful arms seeming to pull me along without any fear of this bottomless ground.

“Nearly there, just hold on. Can you push through with me?”

My free arm reaches for him weakly, my feet trying to propel me against the slippery surface, but I haven’t got anything left to push with. And why should I anyway? I probably deserve to die in here with Lewis. I should let this bog suck me under, let it drown out the last memories I have of a life lived inadequately.

Just hold onto him.

Get up, Maddy.

Real time comes racing back before I’ve taken another breath, her voice exploding in my ears. My vision swims round, bright colours erupting from the grey shadows I’ve been in, making me squint and hold my arm up to stop the brightness. I can’t move, though. I can’t. It’s pulling me back down, the pressure dragging me. I claw at him feebly, fingers trying to hold on as I feel my legs sinking back into the bog. It sucks at me, trying to yank me back regardless of his heavy pull on my arms and my pathetic fight against it. It doesn’t matter how often I push, or how hard I seem to try, I’ve got nothing left to try with.

I’m done.

Get up, Maddy. We need you. The future.

Something lifts my hips. I feel it, and the abrupt forward surge of my body has me clambering onto firm ground, looking back for whatever pushed me here. Nothing’s there. Nothing but the stone a few metres out and the sluice of bog I’ve come through.

I pant, weary limbs heavy against the grassy bank I’m on, and curl up into a ball again to stare into daylight, searching.

“Are you alright?”

Warmth dowses me, something soft landing against my skin and blanketing me. I shake under it, still staring back towards that stone and wondering what the hell just happened. There’s no Lewis to see. No gun. No sign of the men I thought I’d shot either. There’s only daylight, a bright spring day casting nothing but sun onto what was gloom and shadows a minute ago, birds chirping in the trees around me.

“Madeline?” The voice moves in front of me quietly, his tone lighter now he’s stopped shouting and yelling. “Are you hurt?” I don’t know if I’m hurt or not, nor do I care. I’m just a ball of nerves and sensations, barely registering anything but this daylight I’m in as I stare at the stone and finally see some reason for it. My fingers reach forward a little, unsure what I’m trying to reach for until something small lands in my hand. I bring it closer, suddenly understanding what it is and looking at the glass screen caked in mud. My phone. “Come on, let’s get you warm. Just hold on.”

I feel his arms pick me up, feel him shrug me into him and move, but I can’t take my eyes off the stone behind me. It’s the words I’ve just seen carved in. They’re words I didn’t see before in the gloom. Words I wish I wasn’t seeing now. And tears I thought had run dry come as I keep reading them over his shoulder, my head bobbing with his movement. They’re tears that threaten to spiral me into a madness of a loss I didn’t know I’d feel. Didn’t realize I’d have too.

Three names and dates. All of them together on a blackening stone.

The last one a man I loved.

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