~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Chapter 12

 Meeting with Evil

PartII

It took everything I had in me, but I did start walking towards them. For every small step I took I had to battle with my own overwhelming fear, but I did take one step after another. Carefully and ever so slowly I moved closer to them. As I did, I felt my incentive saying to me: "You can do this!". The words were spoken onto me more like a feeling than actual words, like were they uttered in a forgotten yet strangely familiar language. The note they were said in were gentle and soothing, still the meaning resounded clear and forceful. I 'heard' the words, and I understood them fully, but still, for every step I took I felt the fright grow heavier on me, and before I'd got there the fear within had reached a level beyond what I could handle. I woke up instantly, the anguish held my body in a grip so strong I couldn't move. After what seemed an eternity, but must in reality have been approximately 10 seconds, I could reach for the Cross on my necklace. When finally I held it safely in my hand I happened to look at the clock.. 3 am. "Satan likes that", I thought, "it's his way of challenging The Holy Trinity".
          I went up and made myself a cup of tea. I thought about the dream, trying to figure out what it really meant but it didn't make any real sense to me, so I gave up and went back to bed. After a short while I fell asleep again. Immediately I was back on the scene, right where I had left off. Only this time I found myself holding my special Cross in my left hand. I was still petrified from fear, the feeling I had told me I was moving closer and closer to the very core of Evil, but, fear didn't take full hold of me this time. It was as if the aura radiating from the guy on the moped didn't reach all the way through now. It felt like had I an invisible shield around me on which the waves of evil-radiation bounced off.
          This highly surprised me, and for a few seconds different thoughts went through my mind, battling with each other: Could I rely on this strange protection to continue, or was it likely to disappear as suddenly as it appeared? Since time was short I decided to simply believe in reality as it presented itself to me now, and I thought "After all, I need this protection so why should I deny what has been given me?" Making this decision in this peril situation, and the complete trust I put into it in itself, surprised me even more. For some reason all of this awoke a totally unexpected feeling of joy and rapture within me, which in turn gave me courage to walk faster towards the little kid, more and more steadily now for every step I took. When I was almost there I could even smile when I looked at the boy, and I told him with my eyes that he could trust me, that I was going to help him. When the boy met this look in my eyes I saw the enormous relief he felt. He raised his arms towards me so that I could lift him up and carry him away.
          When I held him in my arms a third thing happened that astounded me: A love so strong I couldn't hold back my tears came over me. Since I've never thought of myself as an emotional person this felt very strange to me, as was I experiencing a new and hitherto untried feeling. I held the little boy tight and protectively as I walked away with him, sensing how the warmth of his body so close to mine and the trusting child's-arms around my neck filled me with new energy. I don't know what happened to the guy on the moped, the moment I shifted focus and concentrated solely on the little kid – yes, the moment when I smiled at him – it was as if I lost sight of the moped guy, as weren't he even there anymore. When I woke up tears of joy were running down my face. 7 am.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

When I was a teenager I was killing men. One by one I killed them. For no reason at all, I just had to do it. In my heart I wished I could somehow find a way to stop doing it, but I couldn't find that way, it was like the door I was looking for were not only closed but also hidden so well I had no clue how to find it. So no matter how hard it was I continued my onslaught. For every man I killed I got filled with yet one more ounce of anguish. But a malice voice inside of me kept me going by whispering: "You know you have to do this, there's no other way". Of course, no one could ever find out about this, it was my secret, so I had to figure out some place where I could hide the bodies.
          The only place I could think of was a little room between the kitchen and the living room in the house I lived in. Soon this room was filled with a huge pile of dead bodies. And that threatened to reveal my secret. My deeds became more and more manifest the larger the pile of bodies grew. I realized that sooner or later someone was bound to find them since, by now, there were so many of them and they had began to decompose and smell. So, in order to protect my secret, I decided I had to drag them out of there and bury them outside of the house. As repulsive as it was I dragged the corpses out, one decomposed body after another, and I buried them in the garden. I had dug up a big whole in the lawn and now I filled it with the dead.
          When I got to the lower part of the pile in this little room where I had hid the bodies before, the carcasses were so decayed I couldn't bear touching them. And yet I knew I had to. No one could ever find out about my secret. I had to continue, so I forced myself to do so. I continued dragging out the dispersed bodies until I could no longer breathe due to the intensity of the stench. I choked, I struggled for air, I simply couldn't do it no more. But I had to. So I tried really, really hard to shut down everything around me and just focus on my conviction that I couldn't give in now. I tried to steer my mind into thinking only that I have to continue: I have to, I have to, I have to. But I just couldn't breathe.
          I woke up, still not breathing. After a second or two I realized I was lying in my own bed, and none of the killings had actually occurred. In realizing that, I could take a deep breath again. I looked at the clock. 3 am. The break of dawn was yet to come, this first day of a new year, the year I was going to turn 16. A whole lot of things stood in that doorway, still waiting silently as if reluctant to cross the new year threshold. One thing that was going to happen some months from now was me losing my virginity. Of course I didn't know that then, but even if I had known I couldn't have cared less. It didn't matter because I knew that whatever happened I was always going to be alone. I had only one wish, and I told God about it, only, He wasn't there. I knew this for sure, not from the lack of response – I didn't expect Him to respond, I'd given up on that hope a long time ago. No, I knew this from the void. It was a  knowledge conceived in that place of hollow emptiness in my soul which slowly, but steadily, grew in depth and darkness, like a luring gap ready to swallow whatever came close to it into its distorting vacuum.
          I also knew nothing could ever fill this void. I knew it. Still I just couldn't give up hope that someday the impossible would break through the border of what can't be.
          Oh, I almost forgot to tell you what my one wish was, I'm so used to not let anyone know about these things it just slipped my mind. You see, God was the only one I told it to back then, and I was totally convinced He didn't exist, funny, eh? Anyway, my one wish was that I would forget how to breathe. I never told anyone, not even God, about my Hope.