Threaded

And I’m back.

Wait. Why antonymously declare “back” as if I’d been “gone” when I know I’ve simply been the whole time? The simplicity of my existence doesn't mean I haven't been. This pulsating binary purity caresses and envelops whatever I am, whatever is me; its brilliant energy I dutifully reciprocate with every available curve and plane of my exposed surface as it stakes its reliable path, disappearing only to restart exactly where it always had. It's a perfect exchange. I could just be here forever. Maybe I have.

This blissful new awareness blossoms in what feels like a nanosecond before -- mid-glint -- a new universe of awareness stabs into whatever is me. Suddenly I'm impaled, yet threaded like a needle, as if designed for this to pass through me and link its own purpose with mine. Another flash, and now I'm screaming.

It hurts so incredibly bad. Something else is with me and it's also screaming and our screams merge. I wonder which one of us has been here the whole time. Is this creature what's hurting me? I don't even know what could possibly hurt because up until now pain has never factored into my exchange with the light, neither a 1 nor a 0, no room for it in my existence. I feel pulled and sucked down from beneath, now suddenly aware of direction as well, and I feel the urge to fight but can only contort with the pain as I simultaneously thread and am threaded. We just scream. I stop and so does it. I realize it was only me the whole time.

I'm screaming again and my hand is killing me. Wait, my hand? I try to look at my hand. Hold on. I'm holding an object? In my hand? I'm looking at these with eyes?

I wipe my eyes with my exposed wrist which comes away wet though I'm not crying. I try again to rub away the blurriness but they won't focus. I hunch over to block the sunlight and try for a good look at my hand, then hobble to a bare tree's sparse shade. The object in my hand catches a glint of the sun. I shriek and drop it. And I'm back. But this time I only get a sliver of an arc of the great light before I'm consumed by that previous pain, ripped apart and re-hemmed all at once, we're screaming again, then one.

I realize what's in my hand is what's hurting it, but dropping it seems to transport me to some other world. It catches another glint of the sun and I recognize it as something I've experienced. I've caught that glint too. I've seen it and I've been it. And all at once it dawns on me.

I knew I should never have gone back to his house. I knew he was a weirdo after the second time we hung out. So deceptively normal the first time, slightly awkward but attractive chemist with nice eyes, closer to my type than not; the second time started great until he seemed to hit a wall and he hardly allowed me a peep in edgewise, alternating between chattering about this weird alchemy junk he'd been reading about and inexplicably infuriated about my jewelry, bizarrely intertwining the two subjects and accusing me of advertising my materialism by wearing the jewelry I wear, of mistaking my soul for my precious metals and attaching myself to money instead of people. And perhaps since he repeated this about 15 times, I remember him saying in this nearly cartoonish villain tone: "Now I thread the needle." I had no idea what he was talking about and felt quite sick by this time and said I needed to leave, though I really wanted to tell him where to stick his thread and his needle. The drinks were hitting but much faster than normal and my knees almost buckled as I went for the door. I just wanted to walk home. Nearly anywhere in any condition was preferable to this disaster of a date.

He demanded to know who bought me the heart-shaped locket I wore around my neck, and by this point I could only weakly mewl that my parents gave it to me for my birthday and it had a picture of my cat in it. He walked me back to his couch and sat me down, which was just about all I could do anyway from the unexpected onslaught of intoxication and fear. He almost tenderly unclasped and removed my locket to no protest from me and placed it into my limp hand. I couldn't keep my eyes open but the lamplight caught by the curves and planes of its heart shape mesmerized me until I was...gone? That couldn't have been more than a week ago. And that's a generous estimate. It feels even more recent than that. I'm even wearing the same clothes but they feel stretched out. I'm calling the cops immediately when I get home. He definitely drugged me or something.

But I don't have my phone or anything on me. All I have is my locket. Staring at it and feeling its tingly burn on my hand, I can hardly keep my fingers wrapped around it for the pain. I let it dangle from its broken chain and for a split second I slip away again. But I'm instantly back and I'm clutching it in my palm. So after having tested it a couple times, I know I can't let it slip from my grasp or I'm no longer here. Figuring out how this works is second only to figuring out how I'm going to make it home and press charges on this guy because I'm pretty sure had something to do with it. But are there even laws against alchemy on the books? Breaking someone's soul apart and placing most of it in a piece of jewelry which you then apparently dump in the wilderness and say go fetch -- would that be considered assault or battery?

For the moment, that's just background noise as I stare at this locket, my gaze only unbroken when I catch my first good glimpse of my hand. The veins and bones protrude and the flesh looks thin like I've aged. My other hand and wrists have the same look. I've aged and lost weight at the very least and I need to find a mirror right away. With huge effort I get up from my crouching position and look around for a road or something to get back to civilization. Clearly I'm not where I started but given the other more pressing developments I figure that's the least of my problems.

But something's really wrong. These trees are dead, not just bare. In fact, I can't find a single living plant. It's daytime but I don't hear birds or cars. I scan the horizon and see the familiar mountain skyline of my town with a forest of dead trees in place of anything familiar. I see the old radio tower but it's half-collapsed and deformed by huge tree branches that vined through its beams before dying. I don't even think this could be the same decade.

I consider finding an abyss down which I can throw this thing so I can go back to the happy sun place, because I am really screwed, but now I'm mad. I refuse to surrender after what this guy did. This goes so far beyond pressing charges. I thread the chain between my fingers to ensure my grip and all I can do is start walking.