Anamnesis

Peter walked along kicking a rock, first with his right foot and then with his left. His old boots were worn and moth-eaten, weathered like the rock cantering across the dirt road. Behind him the sun was setting, a golden dusk blanketed his back. He felt the light hanging warm and heavy from his shoulders like a cloak. His hands in his pockets moved nervously and his muscles tightened to brace the cold. He disinterred a tender remembrance. He could still feel her small hand against his, still see her green eyes blooming with love; her smile held him hostage. What are you thinking, she would always ask him. Once she'd asked him whether he thought she was weird for always asking him that. She said, isn't it strange that when it rains really hard it sounds like an audience clapping? He'd loved her; still loved her. But she was gone. Ensconced in his heart, her memory made his mind pale and myopic, like a foggy vista.

He couldn't believe it was December already. It had been almost a year since they spent Christmas together. It snowed that night. They sat in front of a window slightly open, little pieces of snow flaked off of the night breeze and melted on their arms while they leaned against the windowsill. A happy silence fell through the air and a gusting wind played in the snow, kicking it from the corners of rooftops and shaking it from trees. Inside, warm in each others' arms, they smiled beneath the multicolored Christmas-lights that hung from the walls. In the next room a candle burned and in the darkness a faint acoustic guitar whispered to gentle vocal melodies. They'd gifted their hearts to one another that night and there was nothing more to want. With her he had proclaimed his love readily, and truly. Perhaps too readily, he thought, as he walked down the road alone beneath a starless sky.

Hey! Look out! Someone yelled from the darkness and a set of headlights swept over his body as the sound of halting brakes rushed at his ears. An incredulous looking woman glared at him from behind the car's windshield. She raised her hands with her palms facing the sky and shook her head from side to side. He'd stepped out into the street, too absorbed in his thoughts to have noticed he was astray. He placed his hand softly against the hood and looked at her apologetically before saying I'm sorry. What are you doing out here with no lights on you, she asked. Trying to get myself killed he said, with a half smile. She reached into the pocket of her military-green jacket and removed a wrinkled piece of paper. Leaning over she handed it to him through the passenger side window. It said St. Michael's Hospital. Do you know how to get to the hospital from here, she asked. I have no idea where the fuck I am, my phone is dead, I need to get to the hospital and all I have is this address. Peter, sensing the urgency in her request, wanted to help her. He asked for a pen and began hurriedly writing the directions on the back of the piece of paper she'd handed him. Anxiously she lit a cigarette and inhaled it impatiently. She took the paper from him and squinted at it under the light. You expect me to read this? Who the fuck taught you to write, she asked. My father; he was a doctor, Peter replied - this time with a full smile. Wait. You walk out in front of my car, give me some tough-guy reply and then after I tell you I'm trying to find a hospital you give me these illegible instructions and another smart-ass reply? What the fuck is wrong with you, really? She cut the wheel and rode off back the way she came. Watching the tail lights trail off, the smell of cigarettes and exhaust still poisoning the air, he remembered Lauren had said the same words to him the last time they spoke.

What the fuck is wrong with me, he thought, as he watched the car vanish into the darkness.

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The sign said anamnesis.

The sheep stood still and hushed. Jane could hear the woods crack and pop. She felt a strange pressure against her left arm but it passed quickly. The dirt they stood on was rust colored and it seemed to glow like a cooling ember. Most of the forest was bare, with gnarled and knotted trees frozen in place like petrified contortionists. Orange leaves the size of hands drifted past aimlessly. A burdensome brume loomed behind her thick as sheep's wool. A page torn from a book fell from the twisted branch of a tree and landed between her and the sheep wearing the sign. She looked at the sheep as if to ask permission and then bent down and picked it up. It said "Setting: a strange forest. A burdensome brume; a page torn from a book fell from the twisted branch of a tree and landed between her and the sheep wearing the sign." Confused Jane began looking around as she staggered back a few feet closer to the fog. As she did, a loud humming sound stung her ears and sheets of smoke swirled around her. The sheep began bleating and Jane's ears began to ring. She stepped forward toward the sheep, trying to escape the mist but tripped over a root. Disoriented, she looked around as she lie on the ground and saw a pair of legs treading toward her, dark and dripping with shadow. They moved as though through propulsion, like expanding inkblots discharged from a squid, diffusing through the mist. With every step the humming became louder and she could feel her insides being pulled toward the approaching blackness as though she'd swallowed a handful of magnets.

The sheep's head burst through the clouds and grabbed hold of her collar, pulling her out of the fog and away from the heavy inky boots. Gasping, Jane asked, what was that?

An inkubus, the sheep said without speaking.

Where am I?