I was surrounded by trees, and their canopy bridged through the pitch night sky. There were no stars, only a faint orange glow in the center of a small clearing where I stood. A campfire. A man. He sat, his body blocking my view of the flame, and I could make out his silhouette in the glow.

“Hey.” I said. I walked towards him. My feet were bare, and the clothes I had on . . Nothing. There were no clothes.

This will be awkward.

I cleared my throat as I approached him. “Hey.”

No response. I saw him sat on a stump, hunched over the fire. The back of his head was square, his hair short, neat, and flowing. His clothes . . He wore a black hoodie and blue jeans. One of my old outfits. I stood directly behind him.

“Hey. I guess I lost my clothes-“ I started to say.

“Why did you attempt?” He said, his voice familiar.

“What? What does that even mean?”

His head snapped around to face me, and I saw myself.

“Why did you try to kill yourself?” He asked, almost yelling.

“What the fuck? What is this? Who the fuck-“

He stood and faced me in one movement, and shoved me backwards. I stumbled back but caught my footing.

“Why?” He snarled.

“I- I’ve never- never tried to-“ I stuttered, in shock of seeing myself.

“You know exactly what you did. Two-for-one special right?” He asked.

I froze.

“You get to die, and that worthless fuck gets to rot in prison for murder!” He shouted accusingly. “What about Amanda? Kiya? All the others? Are they not good enough for you? Or are they just bandaids for your misery?”

I scoffed.

“Hmm. Pride.” He said slyly. “You’re fucking pathetic.” He spat at me.

“Fuck you!” I yelled at him.

“Ah. Anger. Your righteous anger. So mad at the world, at me, at everyone and everything. You use it to lift. To punish.”

“To fuck.” He drawled.

I scrunched my face at him.

“How dare the world deal you these cards. HOW DARE THE WORLD MAKE YOU FEEL THIS WAY.” He bellowed.

I flinched.

“Your mother saw it.” He taunted. “You mother knew what festered inside you. Not the only thing you inherited from your father. But the most potent. You can’t ignore it. You can’t hide it from me. She couldn’t love you because she knew.”

I seethed.

“She could see your soul, and she knew your soul was defective.” He whispered.

I snapped my eyes to look at him with hate.

“That’s why she hated you, because you are just like your father!” He yelled.

I lunged towards him. I had never hit anyone in my life, yet I planted my foot, twisted my hips, and used all my force and weight to strike my fist into his face. He fell backwards towards the fire, collapsed, and his head hit the stump with a thud. I leapt onto him, and straddled him as I kept punching his face.

“Fuck you. Fuck you. I fucking hate you.” I hit, hit, hit, over, and over, and over.

He smiled up at me, teeth bloody, red spit dripping out of his mouth. “Do it.”

“I’ll fucking kill you.” I whispered in rage. I wrapped both my hands around his throat and squeezed, feeling his windpipe crush under my strength, and I screamed at him. “I’LL FUCKING KILL-“

My grip loosened and his throat got smaller. Suddenly, I was strangling my fourteen year old self.

“You’re gonna kill me? Like Dad tried to?” He whimpered, his voice cracking.

I recoiled, and hurled myself back from him and onto the ground. I stared, horrified, at him lying on the ground, then at my bloody and bruised hands. Tears streamed down my face.

“Fuck.” I sobbed. “Fuck.”

I wept. There was nothing left of me but sadness. I was hollow. A shell.

“There it is. Sorrow.” My younger self whispered. He sat up and watched me. “Everything you are ends at this. As all roads lead to Rome, all your roads lead to despair. The misery is you, and you are miserable. Do you think it would cease if you ceased?”

“What?” I croaked.

“If you perish . . Like this . . All you burden would bear upon your loved ones. Exponentially.” He stated like it was simple. “Do you wish that for them? Do they deserve such a fate? Did they earn the wretchedness that you have so carefully cultivated?”

“No.” I shook my head hard. “No. They’re not weak but . . That’s not fair. It’s mine. It’s mine to carry.”

I looked at him, broken and bloody. Me.

“How do I move on? I’m broken. I’ve always been broken.” I asked after several minutes.

“So?”

“What do you mean, so?” I asked, annoyed.

“To be broken is to be human. Are you not human?”

“Of course I’m human.” I responded. “I’m supposed to be a man.” I professed pathetically.

“What is a man?”

“I don’t know.” I said in truth. My father was an excuse for one. Gordon was a man, I supposed. I didn’t have a real example, I didn’t know what a man was supposed to be.

“Does anyone?” He reasoned.

I didn’t have an answer.

We sat in solemn silence, and years passed in seconds. I watched him age from fourteen to twenty and beyond. He grew a thick beard, sexy gray streaks through his hair, his face chiseled and handsome, his body muscular and proud. Lines etched his face from worry and laughter. He was everything I could hope to be and more.

“What am I supposed to do? Who am I supposed to be?” I asked. I pleaded. I begged my elder self.

“You’re supposed to be alive, Mark, simply because you are alive.” He smiled. “You’re supposed to be yourself, simply because you are you. That’s all.”

I swallowed the sentiment. I looked at him, and he looked at me. I looked at myself, if I survived. This place wasn’t hell, it wasn’t heaven, it wasn’t even purgatory. It was just . .

Me.

“So . . When do we leave this place?” I asked quietly.

He shrugged. “That’s not really up to me.”

I nodded. I stood up, wiped blood and tears off of my face, and sat down next to the fire.

After uncountable eras of gazing into the flames, I noticed a different shade of orange, and it didn’t emanate from the fire. I looked up to the sky, and saw light peeking through the circle of trees.

“Hmm.” He grunted, a faint smile on his lips.

I floated in nothingness. It wasn’t black or white. There was no color. I felt nothing. No sensation on my skin, no sight, no smell . . I was nothing.

Then I heard a melody.

“Life keeps telling me, I need to go

But what if I wanna stay?

‘Cause I’m lost here without you

Without you”

“And I need you now ‘cause it’s killing me

And I wish somehow you were here with me

When I fall asleep, I feel you with me

‘Till I fall asleep and you are with me”

“I found a love I never had before

You changed me

And I will wait however long it takes

You changed me

“You say the words that I’ve been thinking

I’ll never let you go”

I pondered. There was nothing else to do. I was nothing except a consciousness, and barely that.

I realized the song was about a man, waiting for his love. No one would sing that song if they had their love.

Am I waiting for someone? No, I’m nothing.

Then, who is waiting for me?

A?

A.

Am.

Amanda.

AMANDA.

My eyes opened. I was staring at an ugly white drop-down ceiling with a fluorescent light bar. I was acutely aware of a large plastic tube in my throat. I tried to breathe, but wasn’t able to. A machine sounded, it whirred, and oxygen forcefully filled my lungs, and expanded my chest. I reached up to my mouth and grasped the tube. I pulled on it, and it was caught in my throat.

This thing is really in there.

I yanked hard, and slid it out of my throat, and nearly vomited. I took a heaving gasp of air, relieved. I stared at the tube, then dropped it beside me. I looked down at my arms. There were needles protruding from both of my hands, connected with long transparent tubes filled with liquid, hooked up to bags. The machine to my right started beeping. It had numbers, and a yellow co2 marker flashing. I squinted, and saw a small red button that said ‘silence alarms’, and raised my arm with considerable effort to press it. The beeping stopped, thankfully.

I looked over to my left. There was a woman, disheveled, in leggings and a black shirt. She was sitting sideways in a chair, her knees to her chest, her arms wrapped around her legs. She was asleep, snoring softly, and her black hair draped haphazardly down her face. Her head rested on top of her knees, her face pointed at the bed I laid in. She had several gray hairs mixed with the black. Her face was sad, pained, wanting. She was gaunt, her cheekbones sunken, her body at least twenty pounds lighter than she should’ve been.

“Am.” I croaked. “Am.”

Tears flowed down my face.

“Am. Anda.” My voice was raw, and sliced my throat as I attempted to speak.

She spasmed slightly. Like a cat dreaming.

“Am. Anda. Amanda.” My throat was a gravel road, and my voice was barefoot in the stones.

“Amanda. Please-”

Her eyes snapped open.

“Mark. Mark!”

She unfolded, leapt out of the chair and over to my bed.

“Mark- Mark- You’re- awake-” She was sobbing uncontrollably, and spoke through hiccups.

Her face was the most beautiful thing I could even imagine. My heart flooded, and I sobbed with her.

“How- how long-“ I choked.

“Five. Five weeks. You’ve been gone for five weeks.” She cried.

“Oh my god. I can’t- I’m sorry- I’m so sorry- Are you okay?” I stuttered.

She violently shook her head, and awkwardly climbed the rail attached to my bed. She straddled me, dug her arms underneath my chest and buried her face into my neck. I wrapped my arms around her, greedy for her embrace. We wept. Together.

I’m alive. Amanda’s okay.

I’m alive.

I belong to Amanda.

A nurse burst in to find us together. She fetched a doctor, and the doctor asked questions, and gave answers. The doctor tried to get Amanda out of my bed, but she wasn’t going to listen. I scooted over to the other rail, and she laid beside me in the hospital bed.

“You were shot in the chest, and the bullet grazed your lung. Due to the emergency team’s efforts, you never went into full cardiac arrest, but it was close. Your surgery went well with no serious complications, but you’ve remained unconscious all this time.” The doctor stated bluntly.

“You’ll be able to leave the hospital, now that you’re awake, after a week. You have a long recovery ahead, but you should be back to normal, more or less, within several months.”

I nodded, and the doctor left the room.

“Are you okay?” I asked her.

She laughed. “You’re so concerned about me, you’re the one who got shot. I’m fine. Now that you’re back.”

I smiled. “Took me long enough.”

“What was it like?” She asked.

I shook my head slowly. “I don’t know . . It’s so . . Blank.” I cocked my head in thought. “Did you play music for me?”

She nodded. “I played songs I thought you would like.”

“I think they guided me back to you.”

She cupped my face and kissed me softly. She tasted like something I couldn’t live without.

“Did Kanye get the guy?” I asked after the kiss.

She grimaced. “Yes. He . . Well, Kanye is on administrative leave pending an investigation now.”

“Why?”

“When he caught the shooter, he nearly beat him to death. Other officers had to pull him off and arrest the guy.”

“What? Why did he . .” I trailed off.

Amanda shrugged. “Kiya is in a psychology class, she thinks it’s because he felt guilty about how he treated you in school. He took it out on the guy who shot you. His form of recompense.”

“Huh.” I absorbed it. “How is Kiya?”

She paused for a fraction of a second, barely noticeable. Then, she spoke. “She’s great. Well, all things considered. I took a sabbatical, and she became Gordon’s assistant while he’s filling in for me. She’s going to college for business, so it’s working out well.”

“Oh hell yeah. Is she doing as good as I did?”

“Better.” She smiled softly.

I laughed.

“Mark . .” She paused, contemplating how to bring up what she wanted to say. “While you were here, I took care of your mail, and everything with your apartment. I kept your rent up to date.” She hesitated. “Your car is missing. Then . . One day . .”

She gingerly got out of the bed, and gracefully stepped back onto the floor. She walked over to the chair and picked up her purse.

“This came in the mail. I had to sign for it.” She pulled a small, carved ebony box from her purse. “I didn’t open it . .”

“It came!” I exclaimed. “Open it. Please.”

She looked at me with tears in her eyes. She slowly lifted the lid. She burst into tears and covered her mouth with her other hand.

I beamed. “Did it come out good?”

She turned the box to show me. Inside was a large black ring. I had chosen to forgo an expensive diamond, instead using the funds I’d receive from the Corvette to pay for a bespoke jeweler to handcraft the ring. The shape was an intricate, delicate, and elegant crown, with five large rubies completing its geometry. The metal was dipped in black rhodium, and it glimmered, perfectly complimenting Amanda’s hair and aesthetic.

“Do you like it?” I asked.

She nodded fiercely, unable to speak.

The door opened. Kiya entered the room. She was wearing a white blouse, a black business skirt and a matching coat. She was holding a stack of papers, along with a black leather briefcase.

“Hey Amanda, we can’t figure out-“ Her eyes snapped to me where I sat up in the bed.

“Mark?!” She screamed.

“Hey, sweetie. It’s so good to see you.”

“Mark! Amanda-“ Her expression grew panicked, and she looked over to Amanda, who nodded and took a deep breath.

“Kiya. Tell him.” She whispered.

“Tell me what?” I interjected.

“Mark . .” Kiya walked toward me. “I’m pregnant. We’re having a baby.” Happy tears welled in her eyes. “You’re going to be a real Daddy.”

The End of Book One.