Kissing Trees

Kissing Trees

It`s dark!
The face of the valley of grief sees no lights except those twinkling stars million light-year, away!
The face of the valley of grief dose not spark.
The valley of grief likes to be kept in the dark.
But who am I? I`m just a ghost from the past, carrying questions of what, how, and why!

It was night, and all I had is my car lights. And flashes of memories, that are not even mine! The road was hugged with two arms of trees; I thought it was pecan or elm. But my attention gone to Oak, "The Kissing Oaks!" I said to myself, "Or the Kissing Trees of the Valley of Grief! Are they really kissing? I saw some pics and videos, but I don`t know! They seem like everything I read about this valley, mysterious and weird".

I`m taking the exit, which is actually a wooden plate supported by a stick leads you to a pathway. "Thank God, I brought my jeep," I said to myself while I was facing the roughness of the pathway. I had nothing but my car lights to guide me through the dark pathway to the house of my grandfather.

I avoided looking at the trees because I started to feel regret of coming to this weird place, and because I had this weird feeling that the pathway was just the digestive system of something!

I`m in the mouth, but closed mouth, because it`s dark-red hall painted and floored by this lubricating material interacting with a huge suction power, and somehow I`m feeling wet, but going deeper and the weirdest thing is that when I looked back I saw those white creatures turning their back on me!

I`m stuck in a throat or something! But for sure something budging me down!
"Is this real!" I loudly shouted at the air, I figured out, since it`s all getting crazy, I don`t have to worry about anyone who might think I`m a crazy man talking to himself.
Actually, there wasn`t anyone so I shouted again, "Is there anyone here?"
I gave myself, (Come on! This must be a joke), but it wasn`t enough so I tried, (It`s obviously your subconscious!), but (Oh my God!) was a logical reaction in response to the sudden drop I just felt and since then I`m feeling I`m slowly moving down. My car window is totally covered with this weird mucus! Ok, stop! This is crazy, why I am feeling I am being swallowed!
"It`s ridiculous! You`re not even that good writer" I rebuked myself, hoping that my negative me stops, "Just focus on the things you`re sure of! Check your body! Great you still have a body, now check the car! The wheels still in front of you. Ok, what about stopping the car! Just remove the damn key.... Ok, that was a bad idea, But... What? No way!"

I`m sliding! Or... I`m failing... in a tube!
"I told you we`re being swallowed" I`m totally desperate now, I know that because I wrote a short story once about it.
"You see! I told you, it`s your subconscious"
"No, no, no! It`s happening and we are on our way to the stomach. And this is very bad! Because we will be... "
"What!"
"We won`t be protected in the car!"
"What? What do you mean?"
"You never heard of stomach acids and enzymes! The fluids stomach makes will kill us, no matter what!"
"Oh, and why we still here!"
"I think you got a point"

I moved myself out of the car, and took the car tools with me just in case. It`s disgusting! But I have to move up, the problem is that the tube is slippery! I had to use the screwdrivers as hooks, spearing my way up. But as I spear the screwdriver in my right hand, in the tube, I feel the whole world vibrates in pain!
"Just feel the pain now you monster!"
"Oh, now you agree with me!"
"Whatever!"
I am getting used to it. I hold my right-handed screwdriver, that is fixed on the tube, very tight; then raise up my body and my left hand to the farthest possible point, and then spear my left-handed screwdriver in the tube, and so on.
Finally reached for the throat! It`s the difficult one, but I had an idea! Just give it some stabs with the screwdriver and he`ll vomit.
Disgusting, isn`t it! But the most disgusting is finding yourself in the toilet, with... whatever you could imagine!
"Oh, please don`t flush!" I begged, but he did!
No need to tell you what I`ve been through, because you can imagine what happens in the drainage system. Anyway, after I finally passed the lake of..... , the lake where all those human outputs finally stay! I just needed a bath!

The first thing I noticed is that everything is huge, but I felt I`m growing, after I finished my bath in the lake, not that lake, the other one, I was complete again!

"Now where am I?" I retrieved all the knowledge I have to understand the location, only the Oaks told me.

"No way! Is this the valley of grief? Come on! It looks so bright!" I talked loudly to myself as I was getting used to it, "My God! This was the lake of grief! And those Oaks, No way! They are kissing!"
The oaks were pending at each other from time to time, while the sunlight, warmth penetrates the leaves, creates a glowing line sketching a face profile.

When two oaks bend to kiss, the male will be easily identified because of the obvious bigger and sharper nose and chin, but the soft-sketched female face-profile, especially with the sunset, glows orange shyness.
"I can`t believe this is the (Kissing Trees)!" I loudly said to myself.
"Why not? You stupid! Stupid! Stupid!"
"What? Who is this?" I looked all around me, nothing but trees!
"Here, you stupid! Stupid!"
"No way! Are you a talking monkey?" he`s a chimp! Jumped from the tree!
"Yep. Stupid!"
"How`s that possible?"
"Stupid! Don`t you see me talking now, stupid! About the monkey thing I guess there`s only one way to prove it! I have to show you my monkey.....! Back!"
"OH.... That`s disgusting! Ok... ok, I believe you"
"Stupid!"
"Would you stop this stupid thing? But just tell me, is this real because I can`t just...."
"Stupid! Well, there`s only one way...."
"No, no, no, no! Ok, we`re done here! Do you have a name?"
"Do you?"
"Oh... I guess I`ll call you Chimp"
"No problem! I`ll call you stupid!"
"No, I`m not stupid. I`m writer"
"Ok, Writer!"

His company is not fun, but better than nothing is. At least he knows the place, because it`s getting late and we better find somewhere to sleep. Since, we are on the other side of the lake, behind us was the hell of kissing trees and in front of us was the valley, but we have to cross the lake to reach it. I figured out since I came out of a drainage lake, so it seems logical that there are humans living near this area, so since I take the east direction that led me to the lake of grief, I decided to try the west in the morning. But Chimp told me that the west will take us to the land of the Giants, and the stories he told about them were not encouraging, so that left me with one option which is the east but Chimp said that deep into east is the forest and that`s not good too. Finally, Chimp said, "The Lake is a two-hour swims. You (Writer), don`t know how to swim so we make a drift!"
"What? How we do that?"
"Nothing much! We cut a tree, one-day job... Now Writer go catch some fishes while I make us something to sleep in"
Well, that something turned out to be a nest by the lake made of leaves, tree branches and plant stems. However, I can`t deny that Chimp did everything, the fish, the fire and the drift.

We didn`t have much time to know each other better, but I think I`m going to miss him, especially when we landed the drift on the other side of the lake and we had to say goodbye!
"Hey, Chimp come with me!"
"No! I live there! You go!"
"Why? What`s there? I mean, do you have a family or something"
"You tell! You`re the writer!" he said it while he was moving with the drift into the water.
We just shared a (will miss you) smile for a while until he faded away.

I`m on my own now, I made the lake behind me and I walked on the watercolored green grass. A mile away, my grandfather's house appears. It`s the only house in the site, as a matter of fact it`s the only house I saw since I found myself in the valley of grief.

"It`s weird! What about the house I found myself in its toilet!" I talked to myself loudly again, "How come I didn`t see any traces of life yet? And most of all, how come my grandfather`s house looks very new?"
"I knew it, you`re making all this from your subconscious!" my positive me said, I don`t how he came back.
"Did someone call you? Because I don`t remember I did!"
"What`s your problem? Can`t you see this grandfather when he`s thirty years old?"
"So!"
"So, it`s the time of the crime!"
"Ok!"
"Ok! My God, you`re making all of this you stupid wake up!"
"Stupid! I remember this! Where you`ve been since I met Chimp!"
"Where I`ve been! Are you out of your mind? I`m you, you are me, and I`m telling you`re travelling back to history, you must be in a comma or something! Wake up" he shouted the last phrase; I thought lights switched on, which made me hide behind a tree.
"Shush! Calm down! Are you saying I`m dreaming?"
"Or worth!"
"What worth?"
"Remember you`ve been working on this for months. You became obsessed with the crime"
"You mean I`m fantasizing all of this! Ok, how could I end this?"
"You cannot! I think you came back because you want to know what happened"

But what happened?
I`m in the public library, searching in the archives. The Valley of Grief, it wasn`t its name sixty years ago, it was the Valley of Love. Because one of the oldest residents of the valley decided to bury his beloved wife in the hell behind the lake, then he was buried beside her, as he wrote in his well. The two bodies turned to two Oaks, kissing each other when the sun sets. Lovers came to the hell to see the kissing trees and by the time, the hell was crowded with loving trees. Then it was called the hell of Kissing Trees.
The part I was interested in was what happened after because it was related to my grandfather, "Rodney Scott". It` all started when I was sixteen, my father never mentioned grandfather, but when I was sixteen I accidently hear my mother talking on the phone, I assumed she was talking to my ant. I was leaving but I stopped when I heard (he will bury him in the valley, but no funnel!) I stuck in my place until the phone call finished then I left. I knew it was my grandfather, my father hardly spoke about him, and it was obvious that he was dead and my father went to take his body from some hospital called Clifton Mental Hospital and bury it in some valley. After a while, I tried to ask my father, but it was obvious he does not want to talk about it, I already had some information to start with like grandfather name and the hospital name.
In the past three months, I used to go to the library almost every day, but that I left later than usual. It`s cold and gloomy and my steps are ticking-seconds of the universal clock. I walk with my thoughts (Rodney Scott is a ruthless killer who killed his wife and two kids and buried the in the hell of kissing trees, but found insane and lived his remaining life in Clifton Mental). I didn`t believe the official story, maybe I didn`t want to believe it, but I was obsessed with the story especially when I started writing about it. The hospital gave the doubt I was looking for, "Psychosis" they said, "is a serious mental disorder characterized by thinking and emotions. The person experiencing them has lost contact with reality". That's what they said, but the diagnosis was based on the delusions he suffered from, but I didn`t consider them delusions because as I drilled the records of history I found amazing things about the valley. There`s a lot of questions about Mr. Gardner, the one who buried the first body in the hell of Kissing Trees, among them the large life insurance policy he collected after his wife died. If you take that with other reported events saying that weird things happening in the valley caused a lot of residents to leave the valley, even before the accident, add this to Rodney delusions, you got a story. I mean, I understand it`s not easy to believe evil spirits killed the wife and kids, but what police really got! The Forensic report said (no bruises, no trace for strangle or fight, no fingerprints. The cause of death is heart attach resulting from severe panic). If Rodney is not caught while burying them, he wouldn`t even charged of anything, he said he buried them after he found them dead in the garden, he heard voices telling him if won`t do it he will be killed. This is spooky, and I`m home, but who`s this man in front of the building.
I stopped, hid behind a car, he looked like a thirties gangster and I felt frightened before I feel a heavy strike on my back head and faint.

"You think he did it!"
"I don`t know, we`re here to say"
"But where are the other residents and the houses?"
"Remember, it`s your subconscious!"
"Wait! He leaves with his car! Just as he said during the investigation. Ok, come on, let`s get close and see what`s happening"
I crossed the garden, stayed behind the window.
"This is the wife in the kitchen making apple pie and the two kids watching Sesame Street"
"You can`t see that! How you know that?"
"I read the files"
"Files!"
"Wait! Something happening!"
A black shadow moved across the garden killing all the grass, he moved on, the shadow shaped in a man`s body.
"Isn`t that our father?"
"Shush!"
"He`s going on, we`ve got to do something"
"Now remember it`s all our subconscious"
"What are he doing?"
"He`s kissing her!"
"What? Let me see! What are you doing it`s our mother? You`re going back!"
"Shush! Let`s go up!"
I climbed the tree that led me to the window of their bedroom.
"No, I can`t see that! What are they doing? That`s disgusting!"
"Shush!"
"No way! It`s Mom, what Dad is doing to her! He`s hurting her, he`s making her bleed! No, no, no, no....."
"Shush!"
The woman suddenly bent her head down, I saw her face upside down and she laughed hysterically. I panicked and lost my balance, when the shadow man looked at me with eyes of fire. I fell down and fainted.

I heard some noises waked me up; it was the two kids playing in the garden unnoticing me. Suddenly they stopped and looked back at me and said (Dad!).

I felt I`m being swallowed, I`m sliding in a tube, no I`m falling and I have to go up.
"Disgusting! You woman can`t ever cook something I won`t vomit"
"It`s the pills you take Rodney" her voice came from the kitchen.
I went back to my typewriter, the book I`m working on for months.
"This one has to make it!" I said to myself, "It got everything, I can`t be rejected again"
"If I only know how the killer feel!"
"Rodney, they send the rent bill again, if we don`t pay this time we`re out" she shouted from the kitchen.
"If I only know what`s deep inside him" I talked to myself, while trying to write the end of the story, but she kept yelling and yelling.
That`s when the dark shadow visited me.
"Rodney! She will never let you finish this book. She and her filthy smell of onion, oil and disgusting food. Rodney I tell you she`s putting poison in your food, that`s why you always vomit after eating"
"No! No! You must be joking. She loved me"
"Of course she does, that`s why she will never let you succeed. She`s jealous Rodney, remember what she did when she saw you with beautiful Suzy, oh man she almost killed you man"
"That was a long time and she`s my brother`s wife for god sake!"
"That`s what I`m saying, she`s completely nutsy. She knows if you going to be a famous writer you would leave her!"
"I wouldn`t"
"You would, don`t be a chicken! You know you talked with Suzy about it!"
"What I never did"
"Not in words! You know she wants you. You feel her sneaky eyes like you and you promised each other, once you get rid of this filthy wife of yours and the two noisy kids, she will leave your stupid brother and fall in your arms"
"Are you crazy you want me to kill my kids?"
"Rodney, are you talking to yourself?" said my wife after she opened the door.
"You see the knife in her hand! She`s going to kill you"
"Shut up" I shouted at the black shadow.
"What? I`m calling you for an hour now and tell me to shut up" my wife exploded in my face, "You pathetic unemployed..................."
She just kept shouting at my face, as she will never stop, meanwhile the black shadow kept repeating the phrase (Kill her!).
When she finally stopped shouting, he also stopped for a second but then very calmly said, "You wanted to feel what the killer feels. This is your chance!"

.....

"Then you pushed her gripped the knife and stabbed her" said the doctor while staring at him, "Then you went to the garden with the knife in your hand and killed your two kids" the doctor stopped to make the coldness in Rodney eyes is real, "Then you came back and finished your story"
Rodney entered in a complete silence status. It was obvious for the doctor that he escaped to his defensive shell, fearing from facing the reality of what he did!

I felt I`m being swallowed, but after a hard trip I finally was able to see the kissing trees with the orange shadow penetrating their touching edges.

......

"That one must win" after taking a final look at the story, the writer felt completely satisfied with it. He has been getting great reviews from normal readers but suffered ignorance from publishing agents. He continues driven by encouragements from his reader and believing he has something to write. After hesitating for a moment, he finally posts the story to the forum, named (Kissing-Trees).
On the other side, the judge was a woman in thirties, checking her mail. She was almost finished when the story came to mail. Something told her to open it, and when she did, she couldn`t help it until she finished reading the last word.
"This one is great!"
She couldn`t sleep until she makes the review report. It was almost poetry; she finally sent it to the (Pub Mag Co.) and then went sleep fully satisfied.
On the other side, a man in his fifties sitting in front of a huge screen, received the mail and said, "We have a rate A+ here"
"Fine, proceed the usual" The machine replied
"But, the judge recommend that to be a winner"
"This is against the company procedures. It`s all about energy remember!"
"But this one is so good as the judge says"
"Good then it will get us a huge energetic response!"
"But if we make the phony story wins, it would be too obvious, we can`t even make a phony story that good"
"We will perform the usual procedures. Contact the writer and send him the story to make a similar one"
"It`s not possible"
"Offer him more money!"
"I can`t, If he makes it as this level he`ll publish it and make millions"
"Why cannot break the procedures. Those procedures are meant to make them more desperate"
"I know the more desperate they are the more creative their stories would be! I know but this was meant for amateurs but this is a true literature"
"The procedures go as usual. It is not your call"

..........

It`s dark!
The face of the sky was painted with energetic souls escaping from the machine that will lock them and turn them to another pollution.
............................................................................................................