Forsaken

Her incoherent cooing resonates around the Pit. She frets and fusses, tugging the remains of my dress down my thighs. I am empty. The shock of it has stripped me of all feeling. And yet i thirst for water, for food... for salvation.

She slides Her bony arm around my waist, lifts me gently off the muck I had festered in for days, the tendrils clutch at me, denying me release. I hear Her nails scrape as She scurries up the wall with me, and the jagged edges of the Pit cut into my skin. Blood spurts out and the warmth of it eases me.

We reach the mouth of the Pit & the light pierces my cornea, shooting a tremor straight into my brain. I have to retch. She gently lays me down at her feet, folds Herself down to my level and pats my cheek, cooing again. "Look" She croaks softly.

The light blinds me for a few seconds and I flinch in pain. I slowly open my raw eyelids and let my vision adjust to the light. I lie on a hearth, too vivid to be real. The shade of green looks unreal, corrupt, … these are no leaves, just blobs of green, clumped together. Garish.

The light that seems to pierce through the wall of green seems to want to gouge out my sight. I throw up and blood trails down my throat, oozing down onto the hearth. She wipes her hand over it and smears it senselessly against the green. "Flowers… pretty flowers" She croons, the tune, a forgotten melody from years past.

She had made this. For me. It is like a child's first painting, globs of colour clumped together. A tale only the child could decipher. There is no rhyme or reason to it.

"See" She croaks. "See" and drags me onto Her lap. Cowering down to my face, Her spine bending to an impossible curve, She touches Her forehead to mine and closes Her eyes. I take a deep breath and close my eyes as well.

When I open them, I see through Her eyes. We are in a clearing within a forest. Sunlight streams through the leaves above. Yellow butterflies flit past us and She giggles in joy. Poppies grew in patches nearby, the petals, the colour of fresh blood.

She grins at me, maniacally. Proud.

My scalp feels Her nails dig into it as She strokes my head. "There, there." She whispers hoarsely. I manage a smile, a thin curve of gratitude on my sunken face.

And so we stay here on the mouth of our Pit, me lying on Her lap and Her, stroking my head. Choosing delusion over reality.