Entry #83

I jumped. I decided to just gather what courage--or stupidity, I don't actually know which--and simply walk into his room and jump.

I wasn't so stupid that I didn't gather stuff I thought I would need. After all, it was pitch dark, and windy, so I knew it was going to be deep. So I brought a flashlight, my Swiss Army knife, and a backpack I filled with little snacks. Granola bars, little cereals, stuff like that.

I decided not to tell anyone in my family about this...escapade. They would know I was crazy. Heh, I know I'm crazy. Especially now.

So four days ago, I put the backpack on, walked into his room, opened the closet, and jumped in. I was prepared to break my legs, or at least bump hard and bruise myself. I had closed my eyes, but after a few seconds of falling, I opened them. A sense of peacefulness had come over me, a feeling that I didn't control. In fact, I knew I should have been panicked, but I wasn't.

It was slightly less dark, and it grew brighter the longer I fell. I knew I was falling, I could hear the wind whooshing past my ears. I must have been falling for at least a minute.

Then I saw the ground. It was the same ground I had seen when I had killed the Howler. Except this time it was rushing up to meet me. I didn't even bother bracing myself for impact, I knew I was going too fast to survive. So I just closed my eyes again.

I must have blacked out for a second, because I woke up and I was lying on the ground. Something must have caught me, or something really strange must have happened. HA, "really strange", like none of this is really strange? Impossible, more like. Impossible.

I rolled over and saw the sign. A little wooden sign propped up on a stick, with the cursive engraved on it. "Let's play," it said. A little arrow pointed ahead, with an even smaller word saying "champain". I stood up and saw past the sign. A field of reddish grass stretched before me. There was a severe line, cutting the green grass I was standing on from the crunchy red grass ahead.

I stepped over the little line, and felt a shiver run through my body. I knew I couldn't turn back even if I wanted to. I looked at my watch. The date was 3-17-11.

It took me 3 weeks to walk across that plain. I ran out of food and water by the end of week 1, but every time I sat down, there was an exact clone of my water bottle and a few granola bars when I looked behind me. By the time I got to the playground, I was stumbling badly. My legs were giving out. The watch said 4-7-11.

The playground was a sick, warped vision of a normal playground. The slide stretched up for what must have been 10 stories, the swings covered with spikes. The steps were impossibly tall, and the jungle gym had nettles--red ones--growing and winding over it. The playground endlessly repeated, stretching to each side.

It was a nightmare. I collapsed on the sand in the playground and fell asleep. I hadn't been sleeping well on that plain, I had nightmares every night. But when I fell asleep on that playground, it was the best sleep I had ever had.

When I woke up, there was a black door in front of me. It was perched on the sand. There was a grotesque door handle that looked like it was carved out of part of a bone. Attached to the door was another cursive note.

"Face yourself. Look through the door."

I had to do it. I opened the door quickly. Before me was a pit. The pit was full of motionless bodies, bodies standing completely still, shoulder to shoulder.

All the people in there were me.

They each had some deformity, some part of them twisted, missing, decayed. And they all were staring at me, grinning. I couldn't stand it. I screamed, and slammed the door closed. I turned to grab my backpack, and there was suddenly another door in front of me. It was the same color, same texture as my bedroom door.

I barely read the note on it before I flung myself through the door. It said, "Go back. You aren't ready yet, Rye."

I flew through the door and blacked out again. When I woke up on my bed, the clock by my bed said it was 3-20-11. My watch still said it was 4-7-11.

I know I'm going back. I just don't know when.

R.C.