We Shall All Be Healed (1106 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: one-part_stories
Rating: 1.97 on 41 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Stagger Lee (View user info) at 2006-07-11 04:31:15 EDT
Eli lies on his bed, alone, listening. It's a sound, that's how it always starts. Almost like ticking. Ticking is far too mild a word for it, however; this is no gentle back-and-forth of a metronome. This is clanging, regular and unceasing, peal after peal reverberating through his ears and mind. He visualises it as a great, rusty bell, swinging high atop some forgotten tower.
It's almost physically painful in his head, but that's not the real issue. The real issue is the apprehension and fear that the sound brings with it. It's the knowledge that something's coming. He always has warning, but he never has the ability or will to act upon the warning. Time and tide must roll.
He sits up nearly smacks his head on the brick wall next to his bed. His room is filthy; stained carpet, grimy walls. It is a studio apartment, the only separate room is the bathroom. He rolls from the sheetless, creaking single bed and stumbles over to his kitchen sink. He stares unproductively at the ring of rust around his drain. He stands there far too long before shambling into his shower and preparing to face the day.
------------------
"Get out of my way, nigger."
The first thing Eli thinks upon hearing these words is that it's always that word, and that it's amusing that 'nigger' is the first word people use to describe him. There are so many others, yet the bored and the hurried and the ignorant always seize on 'nigger' like a universal salve of offensive language. Perhaps it usually gets a rise from the target.
He glances at the man who has addressed him in this fashion. The man is wearing a crumpled suit, navy blue. Smoke curls from a cigarrette held in his left hand. Nicotine stained fingers. A sort of unfocused but determined anger distorts a face that might otherwise be pleasant.
Eli performs an ironic bow and steps aside to make room on the cold pavement. It hasn't gotten to the point of snowing just yet, but the rain comes, cold and frequent. The man has snapped at him because Leroy had spaced out, brain gone, lights on but nobody's home. Staring off into the overcast sky and mumbling to himself like a homeless crazy.
The man shakes his head and steps past Leroy. About five steps down the road and he'll have forgotten all about the crazy, spaced out black guy mumbling at the sky. Just another pedestrian pothole on the busy path to work.
Eli watches him go, amused, and then sets about his own business. When he receives the warning, he's always compelled to take to the streets and amble about. Sometimes it helps, sometimes not. Nevertheless, the compulsion is not to be denied and every time, without fail, he wears his tired shoes out a little more. One day, they'll crack and die completely, the rubber on the soles fragmenting and scattering. Fuck it, it all comes apart eventually.
He turns a corner and he knows it's her. The warning becomes clear and sharp in his mind. All the vague assertions in his mind come to a point.
She's a hooker, he knows. He's seen her nearly every day that he's ever been on this street. He knows the beaten look in her eye, the sores on her feet, the bruises on her skin, her puffy lips, her low standards and self-esteem.
He knows what will happen, and now he knows when. Tonight, shortly after the last of the sun is sucked from the sky and these back streets ache with silence, broken only by the occasional shout or sound of a distant car. It'll happen right here, on her beat, you might even call it her office. They'll come, and so will he, and there will be a reckoning, like the thousand before it, each one new and each one different.
He leaves to prepare.
------------------
It's a freezing night. The kind of cold that's impossible to get used to. Added to this is the wind that swoops in and out of the thickest coat with a chilling glee and the rain that beats upon the mostly empty streets. If it doesn't snow tonight, or in the early morning, it never will. In his mind, it's as if the night is ready for the reckoning. Prepared to see it to its bitter conclusion.
Eli waits in the shadows. Shadows are easy to come by here, where the alleys are crooked and the lights are infrequent. Waiting comes naturally to him, like breathing or walking. He's spent most of his life waiting, and he would be a poor student if his amount of practice did not lead to some sort of mastery. He can wait for hours, days. His pride might even lead him to waiting while his body fails around him, decomposing into ruin while his mind remains sharp and filled with purpose. He can imagine his body falling away from him without quailing; it evens brings a small smile to his face.
However, he knows he won't have to wait long. And he doesn't.
She comes now, walking onto the street from some fetid alley, trudging her swollen feet in the rain. She's not working at the moment, she's going home, because who the hell is going to be out on a night like this looking for some action? She doesn't see the men behind her until it's too late, or maybe she knows they're there but doesn't resist because she works for them. She can't know that they want anything more than to talk.
Eli doesn't know what she did to attract negative attention from her employers, and he doesn't care. Eli is just here to make the offer, and while the reckoning may change, the offer is almost always the same.
There are three of them, hulking men in large trenchcoats, buttoned against the fierce winds. They surround her and begin to speak. Leroy pays no heed to any of their talk. He's watching her with his particular stare, examining her face, her eyes, her stance and her nervous, twitching fingers. She's thrown a coat over her working clothes, but it does no real good against the cold. He can see her gooseflesh from the shadows.
He can feel every pained flash of her mind, cornered and beaten. He can tell that her whole life has been a race for some time, a pointless and fevered attempt to at outrunning something that has been coming for her all the while, something so prosaic and normal that it is almost laughable: her death. She's been waiting for it and attempting to delay it, but it's on the way, always has been. If not this, then something else: a client who doesn't know when to stop, a drunken cabbie swerving too late as she stumbles home from another night that fills her with shame. A needle laden with both sweet relief and crawling, slow illness.
Leroy moves. He strides confidently from the shadows. His gait is not the gait of the man he was this afternoon. Now he moves with purpose, perhaps even pride. This is what he does, this is what he lives for,
this is what he is. He walks between the men and takes her gently by the arm. The men don't see him in this moment. In this moment, he is protected.
"Hey there," he says, and he says it with an easy grin and a look in his eyes that anyone would trust. A look of complete empathy, because in these moments he is nothing but empathetic.
She stares back at him, but she cannot speak. While she instinctively, implicitly trusts him, his casual entrance and the lack of the response from the men surrounding her bring her to mistrust herself. She mistrusts her own perception.
"Honey," Eli says, "It's alright. It can all still be alright." He brings his other hand up and gently cups her chin. "I can make all the pain a thing of the past."
Her eyes see nothing but his face, even though there is no real light to go by here. Rain pours over the tableau of five figures on a dark, windy street.
"Can I help you?" Eli asks. She nods, and closes her eyes. Perhaps she understands. Perhaps she will clutch at anything. Whatever her motives or reasons, the results are always the same. Assent is all Eli needs, given freely.
He leans in close, and in one bright, searing moment, he takes all the pain away and grants her release. Soon, the world must roll on once more, but for a moment, there is no sound on the street but the ceaseless assault of the driving rain on the pavement.
User Reviews
Submitted by Spam (user info) at 2006-10-16 17:29:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Fucking Excellent
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-12 23:12:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Cheers Johnny.
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-07-12 18:09:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:34:23 (#)
Ranking: 2
i gives it bak to ya. i don wan git dat bubba feller mad. go reed his sto-ry. it reel gud! ----
SFAGGY!
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-12 08:49:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Cheers red.
Well, at least you realised it was a fuckup and it didn't mess with the story too much, Caes.
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2006-07-12 07:22:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 18:43:10 (#)
Ranking: 0
Caes: Damn damn DAMN. He was called Leroy and then I changed it to Eli...sadly my Word is broken so I wrote it in notepad...curse the lack of find and replace functions.
*******************************
Yeah, I figured as much. For what it's worth, I only saw two Leroys. And Eli does work better, I think.
Submitted by redskieslookfake (user info) at 2006-07-12 05:05:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
My alter done good.
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-12 02:33:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Argh I missed FOUR instances where I should have changed his name to Eli. Fucking hell.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:56:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
KInda, rewrite everything I have ever done.
U B so fuckin' coo. Jump on it, weenie boy. :)
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:52:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:48:21 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:44:24 (#)
Ranking: 0
Not retaliating is not the same as accepting. There's no shame in ignoring someone who's giving you grief, particularly on the internet. Seems like this guy just wants a rise out of you.
Amen, sister.
I liked your story almost as much as playing with Bubba.
In the face of overwhelming maturity and good nature, I shall cease and desist.
But someone please call if Bubba comes back. God-DAMN I love that guy!
___________________________
Of course you love me, ya fuckin' tard. Where else could you have this kind of fun?? :)
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:50:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:44:24 (#)
Ranking: 0
Not retaliating is not the same as accepting. There's no shame in ignoring someone who's giving you grief, particularly on the internet. Seems like this guy just wants a rise out of you. If you don't give him a rise, he's got no reason to keep going.
As far as the ratings, I write stories because I enjoy it, not to get a perfect 2 rating on this website. It's a nice outlet to post stuff here, but obsessing over the rating isn't really worth it for me.
_________________________________________________
Fine. Whatever you wish. I, on the other hand, don't wish to accept shit from morons, even on the net. No one bitched when Hitler whacked the Jews until it was too late.
Let him cause shit with you and others. I will still give you +2s, even though I heartily disagree
with your stance,
KindaNews, blow me. . .
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:48:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:44:24 (#)
Ranking: 0
Not retaliating is not the same as accepting. There's no shame in ignoring someone who's giving you grief, particularly on the internet. Seems like this guy just wants a rise out of you.
Amen, sister.
I liked your story almost as much as playing with Bubba.
In the face of overwhelming maturity and good nature, I shall cease and desist.
But someone please call if Bubba comes back. God-DAMN I love that guy!
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:44:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
wunce mo wiv felin
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:44:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Not retaliating is not the same as accepting. There's no shame in ignoring someone who's giving you grief, particularly on the internet. Seems like this guy just wants a rise out of you. If you don't give him a rise, he's got no reason to keep going.
As far as the ratings, I write stories because I enjoy it, not to get a perfect 2 rating on this website. It's a nice outlet to post stuff here, but obsessing over the rating isn't really worth it for me.
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:43:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
looka me bubba! i gots power, too!
u go be mad and cry emo tear to da massah ifn u wan, i be rite heer upn dese number fo you ass.
i do ennyting fo bubba. he rite reeel gud.
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:40:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:39:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:35:32 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:29:16 (#)
Ranking: 0
I don't follow you...you what?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:24:32 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:16:25 (#)
Ranking: 0
Well...I'm not really bothered with the rating, and there's no point that I can discern in getting angry with anything on Ubersite. Why not just relax?
___________________________________________________
Fine. I'll just relax. Too bad guys like you weren't around during the American Revolution.
We would be drinking tea instead of having coffee breaks. . . :(
______________________________________
What the fuck do you mean you don't follow me? You tell me to relax when I am berating a fucking moron, one who has fucked with your rating. I guess you really don't care about ratings.
Please don't tell me to relax when there is an asshole out there whose only purpose in life is to be a shithead. My comments about the Revolution should be self-explanatory. If one does not
jump back at the assholes, it means one accepts their shit. I cannot do so. . .
Hot-damn, he off agin! tak anuther +2! Yeeeeeeeeehawwwwwwwwww!
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:35:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:29:16 (#)
Ranking: 0
I don't follow you...you what?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:24:32 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:16:25 (#)
Ranking: 0
Well...I'm not really bothered with the rating, and there's no point that I can discern in getting angry with anything on Ubersite. Why not just relax?
___________________________________________________
Fine. I'll just relax. Too bad guys like you weren't around during the American Revolution.
We would be drinking tea instead of having coffee breaks. . . :(
______________________________________
What the fuck do you mean you don't follow me? You tell me to relax when I am berating a fucking moron, one who has fucked with your rating. I guess you really don't care about ratings.
Please don't tell me to relax when there is an asshole out there whose only purpose in life is to be a shithead. My comments about the Revolution should be self-explanatory. If one does not
jump back at the assholes, it means one accepts their shit. I cannot do so. . .
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:34:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i gives it bak to ya. i don wan git dat bubba feller mad. go reed his sto-ry. it reel gud!
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:32:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:29:16 (#)
Ranking: 0
I don't follow you...you what?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:24:32 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:16:25 (#)
Ranking: 0
Well...I'm not really bothered with the rating, and there's no point that I can discern in getting angry with anything on Ubersite. Why not just relax?
___________________________________________________
Fine. I'll just relax. Too bad guys like you weren't around during the American Revolution.
We would be drinking tea instead of having coffee breaks. . . :(
bubba make a funny bout him bein round wen dey dump dat tee ina water cos a dey tax.
guddamn, scroll! i did it agin!
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:29:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I don't follow you...you what?
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:24:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:16:25 (#)
Ranking: 0
Well...I'm not really bothered with the rating, and there's no point that I can discern in getting angry with anything on Ubersite. Why not just relax?
___________________________________________________
Fine. I'll just relax. Too bad guys like you weren't around during the American Revolution.
We would be drinking tea instead of having coffee breaks. . . :(
Submitted by whysenheimer (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:18:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good story.
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:16:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Well...I'm not really bothered with the rating, and there's no point that I can discern in getting angry with anything on Ubersite. Why not just relax?
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 22:05:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Stag, this moron KindaNews did the same to you as he did to Jack, and fucked your rating.
Why not tell him to fuck off and die?
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:59:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:53:30 (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:49:10 (#)
Ranking: 2
Thank god you're back!
http://www.ubersite.com/m/90218
_______________________
Listen, Bitchbite, hitwhore your own stuff. Leave mine alone.
don be shamed, bubba. u rite reel gud.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:53:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:49:10 (#)
Ranking: 2
Thank god you're back!
http://www.ubersite.com/m/90218
_______________________
Listen, Bitchbite, hitwhore your own stuff. Leave mine alone.
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:49:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thank god you're back!
http://www.ubersite.com/m/90218
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 21:29:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Thanks, Bubba.
I've been in Europe the last 5 weeks. Went to the World Cup and then went on a bit of a tour.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-07-11 20:23:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Excellent story, Stag. So where the fuck have you been?
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-07-11 18:43:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Thanks very much, everyone.
Caes: Damn damn DAMN. He was called Leroy and then I changed it to Eli...sadly my Word is broken so I wrote it in notepad...curse the lack of find and replace functions.
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2006-07-11 14:06:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Who's Leroy?
I kid. I assume you meant Eli. The names are weirdly similar.
It's nice to see you writing again! This was a really neat piece, it would serve well as an introductory hook (which is probably your intention). Nice job.
Oh, and I really liked this paragraph: "He can feel every pained flash of her mind, cornered and beaten. He can tell that her whole life has been a race for some time, a pointless and fevered attempt to at outrunning something that has been coming for her all the while, something so prosaic and normal that it is almost laughable: her death. She's been waiting for it and attempting to delay it, but it's on the way, always has been. If not this, then something else: a client who doesn't know when to stop, a drunken cabbie swerving too late as she stumbles home from another night that fills her with shame. A needle laden with both sweet relief and crawling, slow illness."
Reading your stuff makes me want to write something.
Submitted by guiness (user info) at 2006-07-11 13:24:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Excellent
Submitted by Tracer0351 (user info) at 2006-07-11 13:07:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Top notch
Submitted by Ducky (user info) at 2006-07-11 12:04:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Yes, yes, and more yes. Awesome.
Submitted by scourge (user info) at 2006-07-11 09:46:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Welcome back, old man.
Submitted by inion_de_trua (user info) at 2006-07-11 09:42:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i actually get excited to read your stuff.
Submitted by TigerLilly (user info) at 2006-07-11 09:26:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by hour_man (user info) at 2006-07-11 06:32:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good as always
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-07-11 06:30:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't read this until later. I'm just so glad you're back, Stag.
Submitted by DCWoody (user info) at 2006-07-11 05:27:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
The part just after the second ------------ I mean.
Submitted by DCWoody (user info) at 2006-07-11 05:26:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Ah, you're posting again. Good. the middle not as great as the start and the end.