Lonliness
Blood trickled down his wrist slowly from a small wound. He just couldn't do it. It always seemed easy in theory but his pain tolerance was to low. He always only got a small scratch before he gave up, resulting in various small scabs and old scars on his wrists that he explained away with surgery. The knife fell to the floor, being forgotten as soon as the task that it was needed for was abandoned.
Zuriel was only twenty two but he had already had a hard life. He was hardly a large person being just five foot five, he was extremely slim though he had a little muscle from exercising since he did not have a life. Sometimes he was told he was underweight but he just did not feel like eating much, what was the point since there was no one to eat with. Loneliness was an everyday part of his life, constantly depressing him and making him feel consistently empty inside.
Even the loneliness was not enough for him to bare the pain. He was weak, he knew it but it was just so hard to go on with his abysmal life. No one loved him, he had been kicked out of his parents house at sixteen when they found out he was a homosexual. His mother only barely keeping his father from beating him to death. Luckily he had attained a job at McDonalds shortly before so he used what little money he had and found an apartment building that would accept him.
Paying more rent then any of the other tenants was difficult but was worth it to be able to live alone at such a young age. He quickly progressed at work even though he still went to school, getting average grades and graduating with a three point five grade point average. He immediately dismissed the idea of going to college since he would probably be shunned there as well for being gay. As soon as he graduated he was promoted to a management position in the restaurant and he used the excess funds to actually buy himself some furniture for his apartment.
He had only had a bed, a refrigerator, stove and microwave that came with the apartment. Four years pass and he finally has a fully furnished apartment and a new car. Even though it was small, two bedrooms but had a kitchen, living room and bathroom all of moderate size it was perfect for him. Lately he had gotten depressed again since he had no one outside of work. He had known a few people at work but they were not really friends, more just coworkers.
Trying to alleviate the boredom, he had decided to take some classes. Karate was tough and he just could not see himself using it so he dropped the course shortly after joining. He took a class on advanced first-aid that was offered at the local Y. It was more interesting than the karate and he at least finished the course, passing with full marks. He figured at least he would be able to help someone if they were hurt, so he would not be totally useless.
He thought he was just to awful to make any friends. Being gay in itself was a barrier for most people to get close to him anyways. So he had his work cut out for him acting normal, never letting any emotion out at work, playing the part of the distant manager perfectly. Before he had tried the weak efforts of suicide he had tried to contact some of his other relatives, hoping that maybe they would not care that he was different and still love him. But to no avail, those he could contact would have nothing to do with him having already talked to his father.
His mother would drop by every few months trying to tell him how much she still loved him. She would insist that if he would just drop being gay then both her and his father would welcome him back with open arms. He could then find a woman and have a real family that he could be proud of. Disgusted by these remarks he always gave her the same answer, if she couldn't love him for who he was then she really did not love him at all.
Zuriel slowly got to his feet ignoring the small amount of pain that was left from his latest attempt. He did not have to work for seven days, it would be excruciating. The only thing that distracted him from his problems was the long hours he worked. He got paid salary so he usually worked at least twelve hour shifts, six days a week. The day off was not so bad since he usually had to fit all of his errands into it, he had very little time to be depressed. Unfortunately for him this was a mandatory vacation, his boss said he needed it so he couldn't just take the money and continue to work.
Thinking about what he could do was awful, he racked his brain looking for anything that could distract him. Finally he just gave up and grabbed his car keys figuring he would just drive until he was tired. Zuriel packed a small backpack with some clothes and essentials including his small first aid kit. Since he really hated driving he would completely concentrate on it, constantly worrying he was going to wreck, giving him no time to think about himself. He drove with no real destination in mind just driving wherever the road took him.
Zuriel had a full gas tank so he could go pretty far since his car was a four cylinder. Zuriel watched everything pass around him as he continued to drive in a direction he had not driven before. He was not worried about getting lost, he would have six days to find his way home. He eventually got out of the city and continued turning down roads that looked less and less civilized until he was finally on an old dirt road. He was driving through a forest, there was nothing but trees on either side of his car and he had not even seen a building for miles.
He hardly noticed the time as he drove through the forest on the small dirt road, finding it weird that there was no other traffic on the road, even after what seemed like an hour of driving. Suddenly looking around he noticed it was getting dark and he figured he should start to head back, considering he was a little above a half a tank. He figured he had enough gas to get to the closest gas station as soon as he turned around and got out of these woods.
Thinking again he decided against going home tonight, there was nothing there for him right now, and it wouldn't hurt him to sleep in his car one night. So he started looking for a place to park and turned off the road at the first break onto an even smaller road that seemed to be a drive-way of some sort. He hoped that no one would mind him parking on their driveway. He just did not want some people to call the cops on him for trespassing. Suddenly, the road seemed to end and he was forced to slam on the brakes as he was surrounded on three sides by trees.
He thought about how weird that was for the road to suddenly stop in the middle of no where. He ran his fingers through his shoulder length, raven-black hair, scrunching up his green eyes in thought. Shrugging to himself, he figured that this would be as good as any place to crash for the night so he turned off the car and climbed into the backseat. Zuriel kept an afghan on the back of his seat just for decoration but it was handy when he got cold. He pulled it down to cover himself incase it got chilly and just stared out his windows watching the starlight as he slowly drifted off to a sweet slumber.
Gently waking assumedly a few hours later Zuriel looked around to see that it was still dark out, but the sun was slowly starting to rise. He gently got up and refolded the afghan back on the backseat. He jumped up into the drivers seat and tried to start his car. Unfortunately, his car would not start. The car acted like it had a dead battery but Zuriel had not left anything on and there should be no reason for the battery to be dead. Knowing nothing about cars, Zuriel sighed then climbed out of the car and grabbed his backpack preparing to walk back to civilization.
He grabbed a water bottle he had in his trunk and decided to make a trip of it and head further into the woods. Besides, he did not have anything better to do, a hike might even be a little fun. Hiking for about thirty minutes, Zuriel started to hear some weird noises coming from behind him. He kept looking back but he could not find anything. Shrugging, he decided he was just imaging things and he should just get back to his hike.
Another few minutes passed before he heard a howl. Knowing that wolves usually do not attack a person unless they are hungry or severely outnumber them he felt reassured. That is until, he heard an answering howl, followed by about three more all sounding very close.
"Shit!", Zuriel swore.
Deciding the howls were a little to close for comfort, Zuriel took his hiking up a few paces going through the forest at quite a clip. Unfortunately for him, the wolves sensed his speed increase and increased their own speed. He continued to hear them behind him, starting with a few barks and snarls and ending with growls. All the time they grew closer and closer to Zuriel while he frantically looked for a place where he could hide from the predators.
Sweat was running down his face as he decided to all out run and hope that the wolves would give up the chase if it got to challenging. The wolves, who were very hungry, decided they were not going to skip this meal and just increased their speed as well. They matched his speed as to let him wear himself out and to not put forth any extra effort on the hunt. Zuriel thought this was strange that they were not just jumping in and tearing his body apart at the first chance but then decided not to question it.
Zuriel was getting desperate now that he was starting to lose steam. He knew he would not be able to keep this pace up for very much longer and the wolves could probably go on forever. He frantically looked back and forth for anywhere he might use as a shelter. Finally after another two minutes he spied a blue light.
"Blue?", thought Zuriel.
Blue, not being a natural light color in nature immediately grabbed Zuriel's attention. He decided he might have run across someone's cabin or something and he might very well find refuge after all. He used the last of his energy and sprinted toward the light with everything he had. He just cleared the forest into the clearing the light was coming from a few seconds before the first of the wolves did.
He looked back dumbfounded as to the reason he would appeal so much to the wolves, but he guessed that even someone as pathetic as him would make a decent meal. There seemed to be about seven wolves, they slowed immediately upon reaching the clearing spreading out to the reverse of a bird flying formation. At the point of the v was a wolf that dwarfed all the others by at least three times. He had blood drying on his jowls and the look in the animal's eyes was so cold that Zuriel almost froze at that point. Of course this would be the alpha, pack leader, and he would most definitely take Zuriel down.
Deciding he wasted enough time with the single glance he spurted further toward the light. He almost stopped dead in his tracks noticing what the light was coming from, until he remember the wolves, especially since they seemed to have confidently slowed down and started stalking him, emitting deep, threatening growls. The blue light was coming from a doorway, yes just a doorway in the middle of the clearing.
There was nothing else there except a door, he was confused at first as to why there would be a door in the middle of a clearing but deciding it did not matter he jumped the last few feet through the doorway. Immediately, getting on the other side he reached back to close the door hoping that would buy him sometime to get further away.
He twisted around his foot caught on something as he fell face first into the ground. He immediately felt pain in his ankle, assuming he had twisted it he ignored the pain for now, knowing there were more important things to do. He remember why he had turned around in the first place and got on his knees and scooted forward and reached to where the doorknob would be.
In front of him instead of a doorway was the largest tree he had ever seen. There was no door, no wolves just a tree, being totally confused at this point, he sat down. He leaned back against the tree figuring he was delirious and he would fall back through to get eaten by the wolves. No, the tree was as solid as...wood.
What the heck had just happened? Was he still asleep? Was this all just some weird nightmare? He continued to ask himself these questions, he hoped he was not going crazy. That is all he needed now, to be mentally unstable on top of all of his other problems. He remembered his ankle as throbbing started in his left leg. He was in luck, as he looked he spied a fallen branch that looked like it would support his weight. He grabbed it and stood up, leaning heavily on the tree behind him and the new walking stick he had found. It was very nice, just long enough that he did not have to stoop, yet it seemed solid enough that he could put a bit of weight on it and not have to worry about it breaking.
Deciding that it would be a good idea to start moving he slowly got walking. Civilization is what was needed now, he could always come back for his car later once he had found a town. It should not be to hard to find something around here, he was at most a couple of days away from where he lived. He stumbled along in the forest for about an hour before coming along a hidden game trail. This was a good sign, he thought he even saw a few boot prints which was a good sign.
Zuriel was starting to get tired. He had already walked a ways and his ankle was not helping anything. He knew he had not broken anything but he had still sprung it pretty bad. The more he walked on it, even only putting a little pressure by using the walking stick, the more likely he could damage it more. It was just so hard to not try to get to a town. Considering he could not be that far away, that thought was urging him on all the more.
After a few more miles Zuriel decided to take a break. He could not go forever and his ankle was swelling nicely and would be all bruised by the end of the day. He sat down on the side of the trail on a nice soft spot of soil. Pulling out a granola bar and his water bottle he had a light snack. It was a good thing he packed a few things to snack on since all of this happened to him. Still thinking that half of what happened was a mental delusion did not help matters much either. After a few minutes, forging on was really the only option.
Without getting some directions it would be really hard to get home. He was not sure exactly where he was but he knew he was not much more than a twelve hours away from his apartment. After what seemed like hours Zuriel's trail converged with a dirt road. He was so excited that he finally had a sign of civilization that he did not care that it was only a dirt road. It looked recently used, so that meant that someone needed to be nearby to be able to use it.
Nearby on a post was a noticeable wooden sign that seemed to point down both ways of the road naming off two different towns. To the left was Fursala and to the right was Durming, neither of which seemed familiar to Zuriel but he did not care. Besides, he had never been this way before so there were bound to be some towns he had not heard of before. Playing ene mene mini mo Fursala was the choice that he ended up with.
Figuring one was as good as the other Zuriel started walking down the side of that road. Hoping that a car would come by that would be willing to pick up a hitchhiker he kept his eyes and ears open. He took swigs from his water bottle every now and then to try to keep hydrated but he was running low on water. It seemed to be getting warmer so he assumed it was getting closer to noon. Zuriel looked up for the sun to see how close it was to noon and gasped.
"What in the blazes?", he stammered.
Looking up toward where the sun would be he saw a noticeable difference. Instead of the normal yellow sun there was a whitish-blue star. Was he going nuts? Rubbing his eyes he waited a second and took another quick glance, so as to not hurt his eyes. Yes... The sun was still a weird color. What the heck was happening to him? Was he still asleep or did he get some weird eye disease that cause him to mix up colors? Dismissing the thoughts from his head he continued walking down the dirt road, hoping he would find someplace to rest and evidently get better soon.
He maybe had two more sips left when he started to hear a noise coming from behind him. Looking back he did not see anything but then again sound probably traveled farther then he could see. It probably did not help that the road had started to slant downwards a little ways back either. Stopping and looking back, a pair of horses appeared at the edge of his vision. Curious, he continued to watch, seeing a carriage come into sight not much longer.
It was kind of strange to see a horse-drawn carriage now a days but it was not unheard of. Checking his wallet he saw that he had maybe a few hundred bucks. That was more than enough for a taxi he hoped with enough left over to get a ride in the carriage to town. His thoughts strayed as the carriage drew all the more closer. Snapping back into focus he stepped toward the carriage holding his hand over his eyes because the sun was blocking him from seeing the carriage, or it's driver clearly.
"Excuse me, do you think there would be any way for me to purchase a ride to...Fursala?", he said as the carriage approached. The carriage slowed down and then came to an abrupt stop as the driver pulled on the reigns. There was silence for a minute before a slight thud snapped Zuriel to attention. Faster than he expected the driver had jumped down from the carriage and was standing right in front of him. Without the sun in his eyes he could finally see him fully.
"What the...", he stammered as he fell backwards surprised. The person standing in front of him had paws instead of hands and an animal face. His eyes bulged slightly as he saw that he had a cheetah head, but right between his ears was a swath of short blond hair. Zuriel stumbled backwards and fell on his rear. His mouth was agape as he tried to scoot backwards but ran into a tree on the side of the road.
"Are you ok?", questioned a young sounding voice.
"Uh... I do not kn..o..ow yet, I think I am seeing things", stammered Zuriel.
"Your hallucinating? What of?", replied the cheetah boy.
"I could swear you look just like a cheetah", laughed Zuriel. He had finally realized that he must just be really tired from the ordeal he had went though. There was no way there was a talking cheetah in front of him, he was just not completely there.
"You would probably see a cheetah, because I am a cheetah. Are cheetah's rare where you come from? Maybe you see some of the other cats more often? Like a cougar or lion? I wouldn't be surprised because I have never seen someone that looked like you. What race are you? You have no fur, scales or feathers.", the cheetah boy stated.
"You must be kidding", laughed Zuriel. He finally got it now, this must be a practical joke, someone was hiding in a mascot costume and giving carriage rides. Maybe it was some kind of stunt to draw attention.
"Whew you really had me going there for a minute.", sighed Zuriel. He visibly relaxed as he finally figured out what was going on. He got up slowly and walked forward holding out his hand. He clasped hands with the stranger and felt something odd. The other person's hand did not feel like something you would make a mascot costume out of it felt real. Wow, they must have spent a fortune on it for it to be so real looking and feeling.
"You really did a great job on your costume it almost looks real", commented Zuriel. The cheetah boy gave him a strange look and cocked his head to the side examining him closely.
"I don't know what you talking about, I'm not currently wearing a costume, just my regular clothes.", the boy responded. He was wearing a bland looking tunic with a pair of rough looking trousers. The clothes were so old looking that Zuriel was surprised he had ever thought it was real before he noticed that when the cheetah talked his mouth opened and there was a throat. Oh my god, this costume was not a costume, it was real.
Where in the world had that strange bluish doorway lead him? Could he possibly have been transported to some far away planet? Or was he just hallucinating or in a comma and dreaming? His face went though a few quick emotional changes from confusion to fear and finally back to a goofy grin. The cheetah boy continued to watch him closely wondering what this weird being was thinking. Zuriel finally figured this was a dream and he must be in a coma so he decided he might as well live it up and see where it takes him. Besides, this is much more interesting than his regular old life anyways.
"I'm sorry about the way I acted before, my name is Zuriel, but you can call me Zuri. So.. Do you think you could give me a ride to Fursala?", Zuri said shyly.
"My name is Tavi, and sure I will give you a ride, I am heading that way anyways so it will not be out of my way", replied the cheetah happily.
The cheetah easily jumped back up into the driver's seat of the carriage turning around to help the human up. Zuri had some trouble since the carriage was quite high and didn't seem to have a step up ladder or anything really but with Tavi's help he got up there and sat down next to him on the bench. Tavi grabbed the reigns and started the horses down the road at a steady pace, the ride was not as bumpy as Zuri expected but still slightly uncomfortable.
Intrigued by the cheetah boy sitting beside him he kept taking glances at him through his peripheral vision. The cheetah boy was slightly taller than him, maybe five foot seven inches or so, and was extremely lean as expected of a cheetah. He wondered how fast he could run? Would he be exactly like a real cheetah in that respect or would he have a human's top speed?
"I have a few dollars to give to you for the ride.. I don't feel like mooching off of you or anything.", stated Zuri as he pulled out a twenty.
"What is that?", replied Tavi as he grabbed the bill and examined it.
"Money of course, you know currency...", Zuri said confused.
"This is money", stated Tavi as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver coin. It had a face stamped on one side and some weird language on the coin. Zuri couldn't make out what it said but it looked like real silver.
"This is trash, it is not even good paper because it has already been used", Tavi said as he threw the twenty off of the carriage nonchalantly. Zuri was shocked, but figured it was for the best. If money wasn't money in his dream, then it was ok with him. He wondered for a minute where his subconscious was pulling the information for this dream from before he pushed the thought out of his mind. It really did not matter as long as he continued to have fun.
"Oh, well.. It is money where I come from so I guess I have nothing to pay you with." Zuri looked down ashamed by the fact he could not give Tavi anything for the ride.
"No problem. As I had said before I was already heading this way so it is not out of my way. Plus your kind of interesting, especially since I have never seen anyone like you before. Besides it is not that much father we should be there in an hour or so", replied Tavi.
"Ok, I was just worried. I guess I should just quit worrying and see if I can at least keep you company", smiled Zuri.
"That sounds great", enthusiastically replied Tavi.
They continued on down the road making conversation as they traveled. Though they did not notice the pair of eyes watching them from back in the woods. The watcher was wearing a dark green robe with a hood that completely covered his face and the sleeves of the robe completely covered his arms so it would be impossible to tell what race he was. The observer seemed to stare at Zuri very intensely contemplating on something only he would know. The watcher slowly turned around and pulled his robe tight around himself before heading further back into the woods.