Five

The five sat alone in silence, their gaze fixed, not on one another, but to a spot in their center. It had been a cumulative effort of nearly two hundred years, but for them it was a mere moment, a blink. 
They were ever reaching, further and further, an incredible feat for most, but they knew, as very few could, their progress was actually just a beginning.  No one knew them, who they were, where they came from, their names or even where they were. 
Light and darkness came and went and often they didn't notice. Hunger pains would occasionally arise, it would be scarcely addressed, an annoyance really, but they would then return to reaching. 
It was a white light, pure, clear, no color whatsoever, almost unbelievably bright, yet not blinding.
They all saw it, together, yet also as a one to one relationship,  it's depth far beyond what even they could imagine. 
Nectarios, Demetrios, Vladimir, Seraphim and Ephraim, this is who they were.  Though they were simply five individuals who would never be known by anyone outside,  they retained their identities, specific people with specific personalities and spirits.  They would not be lost in the immeasurable depth of the white light, never lost, but always reaching deeper.  Five individuals yet one in a bond of love and commitment.
The five sat in a circle, ever reaching, ever deeper.

Up the hall

Cal was drenched in sweat and his walk wasn't getting any easier.  For a sixteen-year-old boy, Cal was exceptionally large and athletic, but that didn't seem to help much, here, in this situation.  He had been fighting his way up this hallway for as long as he could remember and it seemed that everyone else was going in the opposite direction.  Occasionally he would meet someone else, going the same direction as he, they would share a few words but then eventually drift apart.  Every so often, he would come across a small archway off to the side of the hallway, just big enough to hold his hulking frame, but eventually he would have to step back into the flow, going up stream.

Once he came face to face with an extremely large woman in a flowered moo-moo, who stank of fish and alcohol.  She grabbed hold of his belt and wouldn't let go, until Cal eventually broke her grip.  Another time, and this one really surprised him, a very petite cheerleader, about his age, came up to him from the side.  At first Cal thought she too was going up stream, but when she stopped him in his tracks and with her lips uncomfortably close to his, almost turned him downstream, Cal pushed her off and ran for a nearby alcove, actually losing about ten feet of progress, but freeing himself from her grip.

It may have been about twenty minutes before he maintained his composite and re-entered the flow.  It was the tall skinny guy with the shoulder length gray hair that caught Cal's eye.  The guy was definitely moving upstream, in what looked like a nearly effortless motion, and this truly perplexed Cal.  But then Cal saw the rest of them.  There were probably ten or twelve of them, all-working together, like a flock of Canadian geese, taking turns running point.  The tall guy with gray hair, whom Cal now realized was dressed in all black, made eye contact and waved Cal over.  Cal weaved through the mass of southbound people and joined the group.  Cal lost his individualism, but now covered more ground than ever before.

Extra baggage

Lawrence was moving really slow.  It could have been his imagination, but it really seemed to him that the mule on his back had gotten larger.  He still distinctly remembered, so many years ago, asking Mr. Paterson, his fourth grade teacher about the mule, but received only a quizzical look.  Lawrence wondered why he had a mule on his back.  But he also wondered why everyone else had various animals on theirs as well.  His best friend, Bart, had a boa constrictor on his and his dad, a pit bull.  After the brief conversion with Mr. Paterson, Lawrence didn't bother asking anyone again.

As he crossed over Seventh Ave. he passed a woman with a very large rat, perched on her shoulder.  It seemed to be whispering in her ear and Lawrence unfortunately made eye contact.  With the rat, not the woman.  It bared its teeth at him, but turned back to the woman's ear.  Lawrence involuntarily shuddered.  The mule on his own back, now he was certain, had grown much larger than he had ever seen it and Lawrence was growing tired.  He turned into Vlad's Bistro and Bakery for a mid afternoon snack when something caught his eye, something so unusual, so unexpected that he stopped in his tracks and simply stared.  A little old man, surely no more than five feet tall and very likely at least 100 years old, sat alone, facing the door, and Lawrence, and his back was empty.  The old man immediately noticed Lawrence staring and smiled at him with a slight nod.  Lawrence continued to the counter, ordered his blackberry scone and sat down.  As soon as he sat, the old man rose from his seat and joined Lawrence at his table.

"I know what you're thinking," the old man said, smiling.  "You are wondering why I have no dog, cat, llama or kangaroo attached to my back, aren't you."  Lawrence sat in stunned silence.  He has spoken to no one about the animals for so long, the mere fact of someone else acknowledging their existence, nearly befuddled him.

"Why, um, uh, y-y-yes," Lawrence stuttered.  "Yes, I see them as well, I always have," the old man continued.  "I too, have always wondered why no one else saw them or acknowledged them, and came to live with the fact that I alone saw them.  But we are not alone.  Every so often, you'll see someone, and the simple act of eye contact will tell you, they see them too.  But the bigger question that I know is on the front of your brain, where is my animal?"  Drawing a business card from his pocket, the man gave it to Lawrence.  He rose from his seat and simply said, "meet me at this address," pointing to the card, "Sunday at ten o'clock, and everything will be answered." With that the man put on his hat and left.

What color?

Eric awoke, his typical time, around six am, but this time he was in the blue room.  Every day it was something different.  Sometimes red, sometimes blue, sometimes yellow, but it wasn't just color changes, sometimes even the outdoors was different as well.  One morning he would awaken in a tropical paradise, others times, the inner city slums, but no matter what he did, he always awoke somewhere different.

Initially, his reaction was confusion, then panic, then fear and finally, resignation, which was where he was now.  Eric swung his feet, all three of them, over the edge of the bed and stood up.  He was thankful this morning.  Sunlight peeked through the blinds of this blue room and he could hear birds singing.  Sometimes it was gunshots, profanity, warfare and even once it was marching band music. Eric hated John Philip Sousa.

He stepped to the window and pulled it open just a bit, enough to let in some fresh air.  As was typical, a clean set of clothes sat on a nearby chair, neatly folded.  Eric didn't know when or who, but every morning, there they were.  And always a trio of footwear, which was polite, as his third foot really didn't do anything, it just hung there, off to the right of his right foot.  It fluctuated in temperature just like the rest of his body.  It had feeling, just like the rest of his body and would ache if he hit it on something, so the third shoe was nice.

He quickly dressed and tried opening the only door in the room, a plain white door with a shiny brass handle.  It really was a crap shoot, trying the door.  It was pretty much 50/50.  Sometimes the door would open, other times it was fixed in place, completely immovable.  Eric stepped into a lush, green lawn, complete with pink flamingos.  A middle aged woman in a flowered robe was snipping roses across an indescript cul de sac.  She looked up as Eric exited the door and waved, smiling.  Eric knew better than to approach her.  It was the same story every time.  He would smile, wave back, cross the street and epicly fail in communicating, the other person speaking some other language Eric could not recognize.  So he simply smiled back, gave a casual wave and started down the street.  He knew better as well than to try to return to the door he had just exited.  For it too would fail him.  The door would be closed, unwilling to grant him entrance.

Eric had done it all.  He had thrown himself in front of buses, under trains, he took taxis for hours and leaped off the top story of very tall buildings.  But he would simply awake, refreshed in some new environment.  But nothing ever really happened.  He could enter any restaurant and eat any meal, for free.  Any store would willingly give up its wares, for free. Once Eric drove a brand new corvette off the lot only to awaken the next morning with no car, in a different place. He had no recollection of any different past, but merely an endless string of disconnected days.  But today took a different twist. 

Stepping out of the Krispy Kreme, both hands full of s dozen doughnuts, an approach girl caught his eye.  There was nothing particularly extraordinary about her, except that she had three feet and made a very awkward effort to gain Eric's attention.  "Hello?" She said, more as a question than anything else.  "Hello " Eric responded, quite surprised at hearing someone else speak English.  After this brief verbal exchange they both stood, somewhat in shock, quite uncertain as to what to do next.  Then, in one harmonious motion, they both sat on the edge of the curb and opened the doughnuts.

The remainder of the day was a whirlwind of dialog, interaction, staring and hand holding.  As far as Eric could remember, he had never touched another human being.  Of course, the obvious question hung in both of their minds, what would happen with the arrival of the next day? 

The stars were bright overhead when Eric finally conceived a plan.  They would wrap themselves in rope, climb into a sleeping bag and lock the zipper shut and embrace.  They did so and prayed for the best.

          But Eric awoke alone, on a bale of hay, in what seemed a deserted town.  Eric threw up.  Eric cried until he was hoarse.  Eric yelled until he threw up again.  He ran face first into a wall, knocking himself unconscious, only to awake on the floor, next to the bale of hay, alone.  Slowly he arose and walked outside.

Volleyball game

Christopher clung to the rock wall, his face, wet with perspiration, pressed tight to the sheer granite, his hands, clammy, grasped, fruitlessly, to find a hold, and his feet, firmly planted on the sandy soil shuffled along, confused as to why they were even involved in this bizarre canter.  Then in one quick motion, Christopher dropped to his hands and knees, still pressed tight to the rock, trying desperately to avoid the blazing sun overhead.  The sun, a blazing golden orb, paid no attention to the desperate man trying so hard to avoid his touch.  Next Christopher dove to his left, wishing desperately that this now in reach rock formation would provide some sort of shade.  But it did not.  Christopher whimpered and scuttled somewhat crab like, back to the rock wall, sheer, smooth, unforgiving and seemingly without pinnacle.

He stepped over the motionless body of a very fat man, lying face down in the sand, his head mostly buried.  Christopher knew the man was not dead, no one ever died here, at least in the time Christopher had been around.  And that seemed like an awful long time.  So boring, so pointless, so hot.  Christopher could not remember how long he had been here or even arriving here, wherever here was.  He had it in the back of his mind that he was in Bakersfield, CA, but knew he wasn't.  "Here", was far too dirty and hot for Bakersfield.  At least there were no gangs here.  There was no community, no collaboration, no cliques or groups or collectives, whatsoever.  And for Christopher, that was perfectly fine, he despised others.  He turned around and kicked the fat man in the kidneys, simply because he could.  The man's body flailed in shock, but only for a moment and then went motionless again.  Christopher shielded his eyes and looked across the barren sand.  Off in the distance beyond the sand, beyond the stone bridge that crossed the yawning precipice, Christopher could see nearly a dozen young men in knee length white shorts and no shirts, playing a game of volleyball.  The men didn't see Christopher, or at least paid him no attention.  Typically, Christopher avoided exposing himself to those on the other side, but the slight hint of music that had drifted across the chasm, caught his ear.  He shuddered and retched, the music actually triggering a physical reaction in him.  Christopher looked at the stone bridge, covered in dust, having never seen use, at least in the time that Christopher had been here.  "Although there was that one time, quite some time ago", Christopher said out loud to himself (and finishing the thought in his mind), that one really skinny guy started running toward the bridge, but just before he reached its opening, he veered to the left and threw himself over the edge, into the chasm. The sudden movement startled Christopher, especially seeing the guy disappear over the edge.  But he merely paused and turned back to the rock wall, only to meet the same guy, ten minutes later, one again gripping the wall and swearing under his breath.

Moving along the wall, Christopher stumbled, smacking his face on a small protrusion, chipping his tooth.  He looked back to see a single hand, actually only four fingers, sticking out of the ground. It was grasping, reaching, struggling, eventually working out to an entire arm, shoulder and then upper body.  An extremely homely, old woman pulled herself out of the sand and threw up on Christopher's shoes.  He kicked her and continued on his way.

Christopher would have maintained his current path, but the music caught his attention again, but this time he noticed the volleyball games had stopped.  All twelve men were looking over toward Christopher.  One of them waved.  Christopher threw back his middle finger.  He would have spit too, had his mouth not been so dry.  All of the men turned and walked to their end of the bridge.  It was then that Christopher panicked.  The far that gripped him clouded his vision and turned his stomach.  But he had no where to go.  The rock wall kept him circling the chasm but led no where.  The men stopped at the bridge's opening and waited, for what, Christopher had no idea.  Christopher hated them, deeply and passionately, thoughts of violence and perversion flooded his mind, things he could do, or would do to them, if he could muster up enough courage to not run away. But he only ran.  In pointless circles around and back, trying desperately to avoid the men, eventually, they turned, disappearing from view, leaving Christopher to curse them, without reason and running in circles.   Eventually Christopher collapsed, tripping over the fat man.  He too lay motionless, trying to catch his breath, but only sucking in dust and sand.  He lay for a while, but began to itch as sand fleas worked their way into his pants and shirt, biting him.  Christopher arose again, clinging the rock wall and cursing.

The slippery slope

Luther had been walking for a very long time.  Initially it had been a family outing.  His wife and children happily had joined him, the path wide, smooth and sparkly bright.  But eventually, the light began to dim ever so slightly almost unnoticeably, but the darkness came upon them and his children began to peel off, one to the left, one to the right, even Junior eventually left but his was a dead stop and a sprint in the other direction.  For awhile Luther could see them, in his peripheral vision, but eventually they were out of sight.

The last to leave was his wife.  He noticed her occasionally sniffing.  Next, she was fanning her nose, then plugging her nose and finally holding her breath.  "Don't you smell that, Luther?"  she cried out.  "Good God, it smells like rotten eggs!"  Her last exclamation was followed by a half retch.  She stopped in her tracks and bolted to the left eventually moving exactly backwards from the way that that had just come.  Luther paused and sniffed, shrugged his shoulders and kept walking.

It was the stars overhead that caught Luther's attention. "I guess it is getting darker," he out loud to himself. His pace slowed as he looked out around him, for the first time in a long time.  The first thing he noticed was his lack of company.  Of course he knew his family was no longer with him, but it was the lack of anyone else that puzzled him.  He had seen no one (at least that he could remember) for a long time.  The second thing he noticed was the road.  It had become more of a path and had started to slope downward.  The further he walked, the more sloped it became.  It was still plenty smooth and clear.  The surface had almost a springy feel to it.
Luther's horizon had become more bleak as well.  Trees became far and few.  The occasional shrub, dry and brittle.  There were no animals, not even bugs, but Luther was thankful for that.  He despised the idea of dealing with mosquitoes. Luther could see further and further out, the horizon a sharp line between land and sky.  Eventually, it was only Luther and flat surface.  They land had lost all character.  No sand dunes, no rolling hills, no plant life, animal life or movement.  Luther stumbled and fell to his hands and knees, actually sliding forward as he hit the ground.  The slope had definitely become more pronounced and Luther noticed something else, the horizon looked closer.  "That's odd," again spoke out loud to himself.  "The horizon almost seems closer enough to touch."

Luther rubbed his eyes and refocusing, nearly lost his breath.  His path had shrunk to an eighth of its former size. He more seemed to be on an isthmus, his surrounding an indistinct fog.  He really didn't have the motivation to turn around and walk back up hill, so he continued down, the fog occasionally licking at his feet.  In less the length of a football field, Luther was walking a path no wider than a notebook, the sharply descending edges, pea gravel.  Suddenly it stopped. Everything.  Luther was standing on a floating patch of land, no larger than a stepping stone.  His world had disappeared.  And it was no longer even flat.  A lump, the size of his fist lay under his left foot.  Looking, Luther realized the lump was a mass of rope, a knot.  Luther sank to his knees and could feel that the rope descended directly beneath him.  Letting out a puff of breath, Luther swung down into the rope, into the fog.

Initially, it was an easy climb.  The rope had knots which fit his hands quite nicely. But after a few minutes, Luther noticed the knots getting smaller and further apart. Eventually the knots were gone and the rope smoother and smaller. Luther began to slide down more than climb down.  It was when the rope was no more than dental floss that Luther simply let go.  And he fell.

It was his wife that found him.  Somehow, Luther had wedged himself into the engine cavity of his car.  The engine wasn't running, but Luther's mouth was.  His inane babbling a mixture of laughter, philosophical lingo and grocery items.  His ever favorite autographed photo of Aleister Crowley, gripped in his sweaty hand.

The man who cried banana

Reeking of formaldehyde, he sat on the bench and smiled.  Randolph had been watching the crowd for just over two hours when the police arrived.  Initially, Randolph was nervous, afraid that someone had noticed him, became suspicious and called the authorities. But the two, shiny police officers didn't even look at Randolph as they hurried past, looks of determination creasing their faces.  Randolph relaxed at their passing.

Randolph had documented fourteen in his first category, thirty-seven in his second and nineteen in his third, all of them exemplary. He decided to give himself one more hour and then he would stop for the day, pretty well content with his level of success.  The last hour passed rather uneventfully, with the exception of the young man in short shorts who winked at him, Randolph was the proverbial "fly on the wall."  Gathering his notebook and pen, Randolph started his walk home.

The sound of a thousand donkeys

"Bolivian camels! Graham crackers and cheese! Constancy and deliverance!"  Carl had been bellowing for nearly an hour and he was making less and less sense as time went on.  How he managed to crawl out onto the ledge of the fourth floor and maintain his balance was anyone's guess.  But there he stood, in only his socks, and yelling.

Technically, Carl was not insane, but for all intents and purposes, the crowd who had gathered below, humored at the naked, yelling man, had officially labeled him a nut job.  One could only guess at what was taking place in the mind of Carl.  The path from his mind to his mouth was a short one and if his mouth was actually communicating what his mind told him, then it was a scary conversation.

As Carl stood upon the fourth floor, back at home, his donkey, Larry, waited.  Larry was generally patient, as he learned was in his best interest, as Carl was typically unscheduled, but four hours past lunch had exceeded Larry's limit of patience.  Now was the time for action.  Larry pushed open the aged, worn out gate and made his way across the backyard to the back door.  Gripping the door handle with his lips, he granted himself entrance and entered the kitchen, eating a small block of cheese, now room temperature, from the kitchen table.  Larry found a loaf of bread on the counter, near the toaster.  He helped himself and upon finishing, drank what remained off the dishwater, suds and all.  This would prove to be his most unfortunate move.  Moving toward the living room, Larry consumed a large bowl of apples from the entry table and lay down in the middle of the floor for a nap.

Larry dreamed of flowing water, he dreamed of mud, he dreamed of large mules and clover fields, but then he woke up, simultaneously, to a pounding on the door and a very warm puddle.  The officer, a certain Sgt. Mackelmore, had been told to go to Carl's house and speak with someone named Larry, as no one answered the phone at that address.  So Sgt. Mackelmore stood on the front porch knocking, loudly, but getting no response, tried the door handle.  What met him came as a surprise.  A large donkey peered at him over an old flowered couch, surrounded by an overpowering stench.  The officer retched, regained his composure and called out for Larry.  Larry, of course, hearing his name, brayed in response.

What happened next would be ingrained in Sgt. Mackelmore's memory for years.  After the initial shock of seeing a donkey in the living room, the police officer took a step in only to be confronted (and speedily approached) by a hostile and remarkably agile donkey named Larry.  Sgt. Mackelmore nearly lost his left hand pinky in the ensuing scuffle, but managed to draw his weapon and drop the over protective donkey.  Carl, in the meantime, was being "helped" into the back of a police car, naked and yelling about chickens in the mist.

Some say it was paint chips, others suggested excessive formaldehyde fumes at Carl's work, but regardless of the origin of weirdness, Carl would spend the next six months in observation with court order for an additional six months of counseling.  Carl considered moving to Romania but thought better of it.