Exit: Hopeless Blackness

“Drifting beyond all time
Out of the churning sky
Drawn to the beckoning light
Of the dark eternal night”

With his ear buds in David was deaf to the real world.  He had traded it in for Dream Theater’s Systematic Chaos album.  The band existed long before his time but the lyrics to the song he was currently listening to reflected his mood at the current time.  David sat on his knees in the common area of the cabin, trying to work his way through a third bottle of beer in the span of ten minutes.

David’s last ditch efforts to find Richard had lead him to this point.  The fact that the video of him roughing up the interviewer had gone viral had not helped matters either.  He wanted to be numb, to not feel any of this pain anymore.  He was “trapped in a hellish dream.”  Unfortunately, this dream was real life and there was no waking up.

“Hello, David,” said an irritating voice.

“What could you possibly want now,” David slurred.

“I simply want to chat, about all your vain attempts to make things right and find Richard, all of your embarrassing moments, your inadequacies, you know the drill by now.” Chirped the voice.

David screamed, “How come I can still hear you over this loud music and excessive amount of beer?”   He finished the bottle he was working on and smashed it on the ground.  He took the jagged neck end of the bottle and held it up to his now exposed neck.  One swift motion through the soft skin and everything would be over very shortly.

***

Geoff meandered his way as quickly as he could through the wooded countryside.  Finally he was at his destination.  Turning off the ignition he bolted from the car towards the cabin.  Little did he know what was happening on the other side.  It was one of those moments where he as a father was needed the most.

***

“Don’t do it!” Screamed the voice, losing his normal coolness.  “I need you, and our conversations”

“And why shouldn’t I?  Our conversations have gotten me nowhere. My greatest hope would be to be rid of you forever, even if it means being rid of me too!”  David said, as triumphantly as he could muster.

At this moment he slit his own throat and quickly lost consciousness.

The front door exploded open.  Geoff rushed in to see his son on the ground and blood everywhere.  He did what he could to stop the bleeding and then pounded three digits into his cellphone.  He immediately hung up without pressing send.  By the time the paramedics got here, David would have been bled dry.

Geoff quickly put his son in the back of his car and drove like a mad man to get to the emergency room.  Wherever there was a gap in traffic he was going to fill it in, no matter what the traffic laws permitted.  He had to get his son to a hospital.  Time was ticking.  It may already be too late.  Still he had to try.  He was the man’s father.  He thought about contacting his wife, but then decided it was best to focus on the task at hand.  This new knowledge would only worry her even more than she was already.   Geoff pressed on toward the hospital.  Hoping against hope that he might make it there in time.

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