The musician

Sitting alone in the dark of the stadium, a young man runs his hands along a cheap guitar. Glittering motes of light ride the sky, and in their infinite brightness are impossible to see. He realizes that they are stars, but he refuses to label them, doing so would alter them beyond comprehension, and forever destroy their light. He strums softly on his guitar, but even in its isolation in silence, it is too loud to hear.


Instead, overwhelming the spectrum of sound, it swells over into that of light, sending spasms of stuttering flashes around him, and with each note and tone a new color takes hold. This is irrelevant to the man however, as he is blind. Instead he feels the light, pulsating with it, his heart beating in complicated, intricate, irregular rhythmics to mimic it as closely as possible, and his lungs follow suit in their exchange, altering the air as much as it alters him. His instrument alters itself as well, no longer a thing of music but that of a flood, and its waters wrap knee deep around him, forcing him to remain in place.


A silent reflection falls upon him, and scatters his thoughts like dust before a breeze. All consuming it devours him, dragging him into a comatose state within himself, and becoming its own very being. Softly it runs its rot infested hands along his face and at their touch he moves closer, enthralled by the smell of decay and the soft, sighing breath falling from the beast’s lips. It has the head of a young girl, which only adds to its disgusting nature, a complete corruption of what innocence should be. Its lips flicker softly and a scratched, broken voice escapes them, or perhaps it just emanates from the aura around it.


“It is something else altogether, being a blind man who sees more than the rest of eyes combined.”


The man is confused, and asks a question aloud, a statement uttered looking for an answer, even if it does not come in the form of an inquiry.


“I don’t understand.”


Thin wisps of the light from the music fallen pull suddenly up from the sodden ground and flash rapidly through the sheens and contrasts of colors, before each settles on their own distinct shade of gray, each exactly the same, but in their unity, different. The stench of rot grows stronger, and he breathes deeper, savoring the smell. The song wraps closer, obscuring the girls face, and pulling parts it away, and in some bizarre twist of fate, her mutilation removes some of her juxtaposition, resulting in a twisted mess of veins and sinew. No longer bound by pretense, it shifts ever so softly in stance, drawing a thin meat skewer with barbed hooks from among the folds of its shadow. Stepping closer it presses it’s face softly to his, and whispers in a child’s voice.


“Not all understanding is easy once discovered.”


Momentarily it leans against him, and for what could be an eternity it runs its gnarled hand along the hook of steel, the other across his cheek.
Suddenly, it draws up to full height, and silently rams the rod of metal violently through them mans chest, filling him with the music he created. He smiles a grimace, pain becomes pleasure, the music becomes steel, and in the ultimate betrayal, life becomes death and death life. Amidst all of this metamorphosis, his sightless eyes roll to the back of his head, and softly fade from blue to gray.


The man is found next morning, with guitar held softly in cold fingers, fingers roughly tangled through it’s strings, in a macabre facade of life.