Author Games: Brave New World

Quarterfinals: Demetrius Vittore

I was cold. Like a blizzard of drizzling snow had turned to flaking skin- cold, cold, and cold. Demetrius was tapping his fingers to the floor, quarantined in the corner of a makeshift, dark, tent-like structure. We could hear the sounds of outside, but the whirring thoughts were more impressionable. Each thrum of the ground was like a signal, a bass tone- climactic and unearthly.

It makes me cold.

They sent us away to isolation. As if information was plentiful with riches; mere heath escalated to a ghost of a thing. We'd never have either, not for sure. On Danu, diseases were easy to contract, and anyone who lived without sickness should be feared.

Except, well, for me. My mind was seldom plagued by headaches, heart slowed by weak beats, or even capsizing lungs like a ship upon murky waves. None of it- I understood none of it. I've grown to be familiar with my type of peace. Yet, seeing Demetrius cringe into himself, rocking back and forth with minimal breaths, I echoed a groan. His eyes, at the times I could see them, were wide and white. The irises blended with the darkness to expel an awful energy throughout the room. We were experiencing an idea of death; it made the room feel awake.

I was still, unmoving because his hands were not around mine. I watched him. He was stiff in his movements, neck craning like it was stuffed with concrete. However, when Demetrius stood, halfway through the night, his legs were loose and limber. I could tell the soles of his feet were tingling with sensual sleep, a crippling sensation that I've seen, but didn't know. The shirt he was wearing was his favorite- a plain black pattern discoursing all around the long sleeves. I saw my reflection in the color. Black. Insane. Dark.

Demetrius paced around for what I assumed to be hours, but just as likely been minutes. He made time seem irrelevant, whispering and muttering irrepressible nothings at the depths of air. Demetrius pulled at his hair and cracked his knuckles. It was the most afraid I had ever seen him.

We are cold.

Then, he screamed.

I don't know what it was that provoked the harrowing sound, one that could peel skin and rip a throat. My existence shattered at the harrowing shout, like a flinch. The way it tore the darkness like a beam of deplorable light was moronic. And sadly, I could not tune it out. Demetrius screamed; I don't remember why.

It reminded me of the past. Of his childhood. He'd grown a lot since he slept down the hall of his parents, safe and sound from the demons of downstairs. I still remember the blue walls in the bedroom, situated perfectly around a child's mattress, covered in sheets of a young boy. Zoo animals superimposed the fabric artfully, a tiger expanding its jaw and a bear smiling for the world to see. Demetrius loved those animals so much, but not more than he adored the physical ones he owned. Not more than he adored me. There were a few others, but he attached to the teddy bear of brown fur. It may have been my shape, or maybe he disliked how the others felt in his hands; either way, I was easily his favorite because my mind was bigger than my body. My thoughts were real. And the reality of that fact was unseen and unknown by the Vittore family. If only they had realized...

Then, we'd be okay.

Demetrius' scream reminded me of the past, of a fateful night when he stayed awake through the dark. It wasn't his decision to prevent sleep, but the house itself was creeping upon the edges of the room; like him, the structure was breathing and living with shadows and monsters that no one would ever see. And again, I was excluded, because I saw them. They were demons of a figure, both breathing and silent. I saw them with blurred clarity- it was an irony of vision, really.

The darkest night of his childhood was the one without a nightmare. Usually, a thing like me comforted him. Usually, he'd hold on to me with fright, jumping at the slightest of creaks. However, that particular night, it did not happen. From the sequestered pillow towards the brim of the bed, I watched as Demetrius stood and walked to his bedroom door.

On Danu, in quarantine, he cried and screamed like he did that night. We were back to nightmare, and I loved it. Demetrius never saw the demons that haunted him as a child, but that didn't mean they weren't there.

"No, no- I'll be fine. Demetrius, you'll be fine!" Demetrius said to himself, neck tightening with every new word. It caused me to realize- to what extent was I different than the other animals in his childhood home? Because I was colder than the rest, meaner than the stigmas we contained, and I felt a quake underneath where my bones would stay.

Demetrius looked at me.

Demetrius looked at me.

"You," he said, voice a polymer of nostalgia, comfort, and broken wonder. It was like I disappointed him in some way, like he wasn't supposed to feel afraid because I was there with him. His eyes bled a different color than white, skin paling above the moon's lantern. Then, as I suddenly snapped aware to the disease we were hidden from, I quivered with a single thought: if he dies, do I go too?

I desired against that assumption. In the moment of isolation and devastation, I looked at him with a new thought. Those shadows I saw when he was young were the same ones I saw on Danu. Overcasting his head, a blank and black shape covered the skin I was accustomed to seeing. His eyes were no longer visible, skin no longer pale.

Please, stop.

I'm scared

I'm cold.

It almost made me laugh out of morbidity, for I was well-acquainted with the villains that lived with us, day-to-day. I was familiar with them! I've seen them and heard them and I knew they existed. So, as the shadows from his childhood invaded our quarantine, I formed a letter to him. A message to the man who had loved me since he was a boy.

Dear Demetrius,

It is time for me to go. Away.

I don't have a careful mind for what you decide; leaving is my choice. I have the control, Dem, and I'm using it to sway the morning light. To give you more time.

Goodbye.

Demetrius never received that letter because it was impossible to be writ. With a leg here, an arm there, I was torn, shred, ripped and tattered to impossible-to-mend pieces. Of course, I was still whole. The haunts tore me apart, but Demetrius held me in my entirety. I was fading.

I was dead, but that didn't make me gone.