The Darkness Comes

The Darkness Comes
by
Keaton Foster

The light of day creeps low in a red sky, the shadows of the day replaced by the night's darkening ways. Time comes and goes, an ageless masterpiece. Somewhere near, a broken clock keeps pace, and I know that there is no way to stop what is about to unfold.

The blackness begins to twinkle, the light sent from space keeps absolution at bay. A haunting moon dances before me in misshapen ways. Across its face are the scars of its pain, and to it, sadly, I can relate. Large oaks cast madness about, the shapes of such giants easily breaking up the display of moonlight. Their branches stretch out, frightening creatures they seem.

I stand here, a man in the most disturbing ways. My past is littered with all the terrible things that have been done to me. Any future that I could have had is damned by all that has transpired. I am afraid, and I must confess that I have seen it all in my brief life. I have felt every emotion that can be conveyed to levels that go way beyond what others have felt.

I have felt love for a time, yet it remains a stranger to me. I have felt hope, but that was quickly brushed away by the reality of this existence. I have felt joy in the smallest of doses along the way. I have felt them all, things good, but in time, they all have faded away like the day's sun.

One thing that has remained quite constant in my brief life is pain, and not just pain in the simplest of ways, usually explainable through emotions. This pain is absolute in its design. It is all-encompassing, all-devouring in its rage, and it is complete. It is simply my God in every conceivable way.

It pours into my life like a river, and its hatred for me knows no end. Its fury has no release. It pulls at me from every direction as it works its way through me in an endless display of power and control.

It has me pinned here to my seat. I struggle to breathe as I convey these feelings for all to read. The fear of all that is before me and around me is overwhelming and, at the same time, comforting. Like an old friend, whom I have come to hate because he is always there, even when I want to see him least of all.

I was not born this way but rather forced into this life by a beast that I call the darkness. I have conveyed my relationship with the darkness in every possible way, and I am confident in saying that just about everything that I have ever penned has some connection to the darkness.

I have screamed its name in the early day and I have screamed its name in the deepest, darkest of nights. I always see the darkness, unfolding before me in everything it creates and enslaves.

At night, deep within its namesake, is when its true power is displayed. As I lay in my bed, pretending to sleep with my head buried deep in the soft pillows, often peeking over the safety of my warm blanket, I know it's out there. For it always has been. I know that it's there, waiting for me to see all that it means to me.

As it does every night, my mind flashes back to June 16, 1982, because that was the first night the darkness came for me. I remember it as if I were there right now. I can see my small feet poking out from under my warm blanket. I can see the toys of my youth strewn about. I can see the child that was once me.

Then, just as it does now, there in the corner of the room, the darkness advances on me in horrific ways. Its eyes are terrifying in their color and shape. Its fangs spew hatred as its body changes from a human form to a shadowy mass of indescribable detail.

It screams at me in pain. It warns me of what is coming next, knowing all too well that there will be no escape. As it approaches me, I freeze in terrifying ways. I am a child of fear, turned into a man of terror. I know no other way, for the darkness made me into what I am.

On that night and one hundred and twenty-three others, the darkness would have me. I marked their passing by scratches that turned into scars on my arm. To this day, they remind me, and I know each one quite well, just as I know the nights that I got them.

The darkness was always sure to utter hateful things as it beat me into a bloody pulp. I was often broken and bruised, and I suffered horribly at its menacing hands. I felt every blow. There was no escape and no way to resist its hate for me.

Age has done little to change such afflictions. Sitting here in tears, I shall reveal its true fate. The darkness pushed me down to my bed, there it held me as I screamed in silence. I was too broken, too afraid to make a sound that could be heard, and if I did, that would only enrage the darkness even more.

The darkness held me down as if I were a dog and it were my master. It inserted all its hatred for me until I collapsed in pain. It did this for hours that seemed to be days. Such terror would go on for as long as the darkness wished.

The darkness lived to inflict its true nature. It knew no bounds, and it had no heart. It had no sympathy for me in any way. I was but a boy, a pile of flesh and bone. I meant nothing to the darkness, and I meant nothing to those who brought it to be. I was sure it would kill me. Death would have been easy compared to the fate it had in store for me.

One day, as quickly as it all came to be, the human form that represented the darkness of my youth was cast away, never to return to my room. With him went my mother; I would never see her again in my youth.

That man, the darkness, took my childhood away. He took everything in that long year, and all that remained is what I am now, a tormented, confused human being who has all he can do to make it through each new day.

What stands are the terrifying memories of the darkness. Since that first night, and every night since, for all my life, I have seen the darkness just beyond the safety of my warm blanket and pile of pillows.

I know no matter what I do or what I say, the darkness will always be out there waiting for me. I can no more make it stop now than I could when I was twelve. It does what it wishes, and when a new day comes, it leaves, taking a small part of me with it.


The Darkness Comes by Keaton Foster Copyright © 2022.