Obsession

It was midnight. The thunder rumbled and the very sound shook the heavens. The sky lit up with its own display of electricity. The wind blew, strongly, yet stealthily. The leaves on the trees rustled in the wind and some left their abode in the trees to fly with the wind to places never ventured before. Bad weather, in the conventional sense of a thunderstorm, was approaching.

The thunder kept on rumbling to warn the living world of the rough weather ahead. It told all that lived to be afraid of nature and all the power that it possessed. The lightning reminded the living that nature would take its revenge for any pain it felt. It was angry and it was ready to show that anger. The time had come for the reckoning, for the world to be reminded that nature was not going to lie down and let its demise take place.

A small wooden shack in the middle of nowhere stood strong against these warnings. It stood as a symbol of life’s fearlessness in the face of nature’s warnings. It stood there solemnly telling all that lived not to fear nature’s idle threats, for nature was life itself and nature would not end life. Life is what nature was protecting, not destroying.

However, inside the shack, the mind-wars between nature and the shack were oblivious. The shack wasn’t very large; it was just the size of a small room. Yet it stood there in the middle of nowhere, defying nature on the outside and unaware of any such skirmishes on the inside. The dying flame of an old candlestick lit the room. The candle was on its last tour of duty and was prepared for its end. It had provided much light over time, yet like all of creation, was nearing its end. It had done its job and was still doing it in the last few precious moments that it had.

The candlelight was dim, yet bright enough for one to see the whole room. There were two windows, one on the north and the other on the south end. Each window provided a picture of nature’s fury at both sides. In the room, there was a cupboard that looked old and beside it a bed that was just as old, but still in great shape. At the other corner was a desk, with three drawers on one side. Upon the desk lay dozens of papers, photographs and drawings. The candle hung from a hook in the middle of the room. It swayed in a circular motion and made the shadows move menacingly across the small walls of the room.

In front of the desk sat an ominous figure. Its head looked over the desk and the mess around it. Its hands supported its weary head overlooking the cluttered desk below. The figure was very quiet and still. The room was very quiet, except for the creaking of the candle swaying on its platter. The movements of the candle were small, yet noisy in the seemingly lifeless room.

The head moved up and down. The figure screamed a scream that rocked the heavens like thunder. The figure swung its arm across the desk, pushing everything off onto the cold, hard floor. The head dropped to the table and sat there as still as it could be.

The thunder rumbled like it had not before as if it had accepted the challenge of the ominous figure and was ready for a battle to prove its superiority. The thunder shook the figure, which got up, lost. It looked around for a sign of where it was. It turned to the light and let its face come out from the shadows. The figure was a young man, in his 20’s. His face was soft, yet cold and unknown. He looked down at the mess of paper on the floor at his feet.

Immediately he dropped down to his feet and scrounged around in the mess in the search for something. He searched frantically and finally found the object he desired. It was a photograph of a young girl, with a soft smile and the eyes of an angel. Every photograph on the floor was of her. Every paper on the floor was about her. Every drawing that lay lost among the rest of the mess was of her.

He looked at the photograph and then quickly tore it up. She was gone. She was never or would never be a part of his life. That was a decision he made and one that he would have to live his life by.

Her name was Jessica White. She was the girl of his dreams and she never left the realm of those dreams. She was the girl that he wanted. She was his obsession and desire. And that desire killed him. It killed his soul and hurt that dead soul which was left in his body.

It was that same desire that killed Jessica. Two nights ago, she had been shot through the head and the heart while enjoying the starlit sky. She had been sent to the realm of the angels by the very person for whom she was an angel, the most special of them all.

He had seen death. He had created death. He was the one who dealt death like a card in a game of poker. He had done that which he had never done in his worst nightmares. He had performed an act that could not be surpassed by any evil act in the world, in his opinion. He may have sent an angel back to where she belonged, among the other angels, but he had deprived the world of that one angel as well.

He felt pain and remorse, hurt and regret. And it would never leave him as long as he lived. It would haunt him forever and cut into his eternal soul. But he would end the pain, at least just a bit he thought. He took out his gun and sent a bullet straight through his forehead, dissecting all that he was. He was off to join the angel and to follow her in his eternal obsession once more.