Souls - XXVIII

Driving my car towards Arizona feels wrong. It’s not that I have a hole in my head covered by a paper chef hat, though I’m sure that isn’t helping any, it’s not even that my daughter seemed to have blown herself up beyond repair. No, I think what feels so wrong is the rules I’ve been playing by have no meaning anymore. I’m playing a game that had the rulebook thrown out a long time ago. I can pass “Go” as many times as I want, I’m not getting that two-hundred dollars. 

I rub my face with my left hand as the right hand agrees to keep the steering wheel where it belongs. 

I am so tired. 

I probably haven’t slept for the equivalent of two days. I can’t be sure. Again, hard to tell when nothing is around to hint at time passing.

A highway sign for Santa Rosa, New Mexico creeps up over the horizon. Another, larger sign looms directly behind it and reads:

“Home of the Blue Hole!”

Well that sounds tempting. 

I take the exit, not because I need gas, not because I need a restroom break, not even because I want to see the blue hole, but just because driving feels so damn wrong. My entire being is just itchy and hot to get out of that driver seat.

As I drive closer, and the signs get more frequent, I learn that the blue hole is famous for being a deep hole of water in the middle of a desert. Lots of billboards of smiling divers and swimmers taunting the arid surroundings with their blue hole. 

I park and walk the rest of the way, the sandy dirt crunching under my feet. An old wooden board, put there to hold announcements and more pictures of pretty people in a blue hole, greets me with bold baldness. Only a few ripped pieces of paper dangle from its once proud display. One of those pieces of paper is part of a travel brochure. I pick it up and find the blue hole is actually part of a series of sinkholes, leading to underwater caverns ideal for scuba diving. I feign real interest to support my alibi that I’m hear to see this blue hole and not to just avoid my car and my assignment.  

As I approach the edge of the blue hole I find that is has become a desperate resort for those who are trying to survive in this new world. It looks like a normal day at the beach, but attended by tired and worn refugees. Hundreds of people sit on towels, rusted lawn-chairs, and other reclaimed pieces of junk that could double as a chair. They’re all just staring at the water.

A young dirty teen girl, probably sixteen or seventeen, spots me and shuffles over. 

“You need a chair? I can get you a chair for a dollar.”

I shake my head, trying not to let my eyes show the pity that the rest of my body feels. She glances up to my paper chef hat and quickly looks back down, trying not to show me the judgment in her eyes that the rest of her body is permeating. We are at a stalemate. 

She nods, and backs away. “Let me know if you change your mind. It shouldn’t be long now.”

My eyes can’t hide the curiosity. “Long?”

The girl cocks her head, “Yeah…till she shows again. Last time she took my Uncle. Hoping she sticks in the family and takes me next.”

Forcing a smile, I nod sympathetically. “Good luck.”

I should have known better than to stop. Desperate people seek out desperate solutions, and there isn’t a human around who isn’t at least a little desperate anymore.

I begin to back away, hoping to avoid whatever sacrificial post-apocalyptic-religion that was burgeoning here. 

Before I get back to the wooden board, I hear the murmur of excitement grow from whispers to a full roar. I turn back and see the blue hole bubbling. The light blue is now a darker color of blue, quickly turning to black. The shadows, the ones that I thought were afraid of me, swirl directly under the surface. They are creating some sort of whirlpool. No-one around the hole is sitting any longer. Good thing I didn’t bother with buying a chair.

Then I see what the dirty teen was talking about. Hair, the hair of a woman breaches the surface of the water. I can’t help it, I move closer. I have to see this. I don’t know why, but I have to see this. 

The hair rises until we see the forehead attached to it, and then the eyebrows. And then the eyes. They are green.

I know those green eyes, they are mine.