Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
HE PLAYS PIANO in the forest, whistles to the deer who've up and gone and hears the thoughts of shadows when they have nightmares.
he still drinks peach tea and hears the sounds of the night at his door when the static of his t.v. never put him to rest. the static would soon, if not already, become a default replacing silence - a never ending loop of ghosts screaming behind the screen. he always has a gun under his pillow, always has a knife in his jacket pockets. it cuts holes into his skin and they never seem to heal, but he never sheds a drop of blood. he still listens to mooncore and plays that tune. the tune played in the forest. he remembers where it came from. of course he would.
summer hasn't ended. he thinks it never will, but if winter comes, the town will finally freeze over. so will he.
he likes to think the town didn't eat him alive, he's sure he's still him.
the church down near the outskirts of town-a darker, more gruesome part of town he should say-is open 24/7. he takes a visit even in the thunderstorm. these timed of rain are rare. he wants to revel in it before such things as this never appears again. and things like him aren't allowed inside the church, but there isn't anyone to stop him anymore.
he's met the priest multiple times. the priest had always complimented his black pea coat and asked why he had no other color in his closet. he never knew how to properly answer. he wears that same thing. just for him as a gift. as a gift in response to that same sentence repeated to him the last time he visited. it's his last day, after all. old age came quick on him.
today, the priest tells him again as soon as he walks in-a lit cigarette hanging from his plump, pink lips, but never inhaling, hands relaxed in his coat pockets-you are not cleansed, and johnny's eyes flicker as they did in the mirror a few days ago, he assumes. they match the red candles under the cross everyone seems to worship over and the crimson tide that washes up the grey sands of the beach.
it scares the priest into the afterlife (you are the spawn of all sinners with chains for halos and cigarette smoke for wings) and johnny gives him a burial in the forest. he knows he wouldn't want his corpse to be eaten up by the deer.
he visits the diner, soaked in water from head to toe and his cigarette forgotten under the dirt in the forest. he walks in, knowing fully well that these unsuspecting people would never know that he had come back from burying a body, but it gave him great satisfaction that he knew something none of these diner dwellers knew. they would point, screech and yell at him that he was the killer.
it wasn't me, he would fight back, a sick, widening grin on his face. it was natural order. drenched in sweet ice tea, the town would believe him. he didn't know whether it was because of the chilling expression on his face, the rattling, incredulous laughter bursting past his lips, or the fact that his light brown eyes had never come back. he never knew for sure.
johnny leans over the counter and asks the waiter for tea, adding a slick smile after. he gets the drink for free. he always does nowadays.
walking back into into the forest, whistling, the trees grow in height and the shadows are waiting there, finding a moment to make him disappear. there will never be a moment, he thinks. he's carrying a white wooden cross in one hand and the glass in the other and another smile appears on his face. lethal.
he plants the cross, not flinching when the sky thunders. he stares down at the grave, eyes dead as the person under and he pours, throwing the glass aside when it was emptied.
"rest easy."
it is drowned out by the storm.
a year here in hadestown. the town ate him alive.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
