The Island

My Dearest Jessica.

Once again I find myself penning the desires inside my mind, screaming and yelling and pounding on their prison bars in a valiant effort to make themselves known. Once again I find myself on the craggy shoreline of the island, where my own footprints and the blowing dust around me are the only entities that keep me company, a stark reminder of the fact that I cannot help myself. I am without pity and mercy when I take these trips, punishing my body as well as my mind in my effort to traverse the depths of the island’s hills and valleys.

I saw the cave again last night, the glowing phosphorous – if that is truly what it is – turning the rocky and scum-slick walls light blue and pulsing in the dim light. I ran my fingers along the edges of this forgotten place, calloused pads and chipped nails glistening with green mucus, a visceral representation of you and I, of us. Here, as always, I am gutted; my soul sliced open and forced to bleed, the walls around me slowly turning the colour of my insides. The fluids that spill from me are acidic, biting; they eat through the rough rocks and leave a musky scent in their wake.

Inside the cave, I am nothing but a broken man, and though there isn’t a single dip or hill on this rock in the middle of the ocean that does not make me feel that way, there is something about being surrounded by the sounds of dripping and the shimmery green of the moss, so alien and foreign in this rocky place, that drives the nail that much further into the palm of my hand. The Island is a giant cross, and the cave is only a step in my crucifixion upon it. I sat cross legged, my bare feet bleeding and wounded, trousers ripped and chest naked, in the midst of it, swayed by it, moved by it. It would be a long time before I left.

On my way back towards the small cabin; its contents including your bed sheets, my tweezers, our books, I was struck and moved by the large rock formations that jutted from the Island’s back, so many quills on this porcupine that I constantly ask myself about. Would this place, where the waves lap against the shores and crash against the crevasses, be where I find my next crucifixion? Would the messages scrawled into the formations of stone, natural erosion having left them blackened and soot-like, contain my name? Would I bring my chisel to the top of the mount and reveal the white chalk beneath the hardened exterior?

No. As always, as ever, no.

Perturbed and disoriented, I did not see the hole in the path until I was halfway up it and my leg had already jutted into the quicksand, the rapidity of my sudden shift into lack of balance jarring me. I felt the bone tweak, give resistance, and finally split beneath my own weight. Though I’ve walked this path many times and I’ve broken my leg many times in the same hole, I can never seem to pull myself out at the last moment. Perhaps I am a glutton for it; the jarring and earth-shattering crack that splits the lapping and crashing waves, interrupts the ocean’s gentle breeze, leaves me breathless and aching and utterly shattered. It reminds me of another time, where the explosion from a cold metal weapon elicited the same reaction from me.

I met the Sheriff last night, and while I can see in his eyes that he believes I still blame him, I can truly say I do no longer. He maintains that he was not drunk, but tired. At this point, at this island, I cannot see any difference between the two. We sat and drank coffee that turned bitter in our mouths, had conversations that died in the distance between us. When I left him, I knew that I had not patched a hole, but had ripped a new one. I fear it.

Gritting my teeth, tasting grainy sand between them and feeling the determination in my jaw, harder than a broadsword, I yank the broken and lifeless limb from the hole in the ground and set it back on the path, where the only way is upwards, onwards. To the cabin; its contents including that magazine that you always wanted me to read. I still haven’t. My many trips to the island, awash and remembering of what you’ve said to me, and I still haven’t got past the article that you meticulously folded and touched. If I press my hand upon the page and close my eyes, I can almost imagine my hand being yours, for the briefest flicker, a fraction of the blink of an eye. As soon as I lift my other hand to clasp yours, as soon as I feel I can sustain the contact, the imagination for the ability to hold your hand in mine once more, the dream fades away and I’m left clasping my own hand on the page of a magazine about nail polish. My body twitches and groans as I drag myself onwards, my motion no longer described as walking or even limping. I am a dog that you’d take out back, a dog that you would need to hit with an axe to put down, to pierce the thickness that is my skull.

I can still feel the jolt in my hand, the brush of a dress against my fingertips. My hand curls tightly around an imagined Smith & Wesson, the hammer biting into my palm. The Sheriff tells me that I imagine it was his hand curled around the weapon, and it was his palm the hammer was biting, but after so many trips to the island now, so many long visits, so many broken legs, I can now see that it was my hand. I can now see my palm being bitten, stung by the harsh metal of the six-shot. I can feel the kick it had against my palm.

Ahead of me, swooping in low, tight circles, there is a gull the colour of periwinkle, following my progress. It reminds me of glistening, calloused pads and chipped nails, green scum that offers a contrast to the pale skin beneath it. My fingers twist anxiously and I step on my leg in a bad way, forcing myself onward and upward, towards the cabin which contains a newspaper article I wrote when I worked freelance, an article that you read and enjoyed immensely. I have not read the article in a long, long time – but I recognize well the way you lit up when we discussed it. Once upon a time, I would’ve given it to you again. Once upon a time, I would’ve wrapped a circle of cold metal with a bright, clear mineral on top into the paper, folded it into the creases, and handed it to you. I can picture the way your eyes, green as the scum on the walls of the cave, smiling up at me. Laughing with me.

When I get to the cabin, as always, I cannot go inside. There are too many contents in there that smell of you, that bring back foul memories and rampant rage. Instead of lingering in this place, I stoop to grab the red bag I stole from the broken trawler on the beach; the bag filled with painkillers, penicillin. One of the islands many mysteries; for I have visited the island many times, taken this bag many times, and yet it is always here and full when I return. It’s as curious as the markings I leave in the forest that are selective, carved in with an axe. The island seems selective of the marks I can leave on her; it’s as if she knows my movements and erases or cherishes the moments I am with her at her whim. It makes me feel in equal measures, loved and abandoned.

With the red pack on my back, the realizations settling into my skull – it was my hand that held the Smith & Wesson, my palm that was bitten – I leave the cabin, that contains your unfinished memoir that I edited with angry slashes of a red pen and capitalized words in the margins, and begin my trek to the summit of the mount, as I always do. This time, however, I feel it will be different. This time, the painkillers slide down my throat nice and easily, as if they know the hard time ahead of me and wish to make my journey that much easier. This time, I fear, I will not return from the mount.

My path leads me to the grassy slope that leads to the mountain trail, on either side of my path are bottles; thousands upon thousands of all shapes and sizes that litter the ground. I walk up the pathway, leaving the cabin with your hairbrush and perfume nestled inside far, far behind me. I ascend the path of my sin, each bottle a memory, each glass a stark reminder of my own actions. Each one of these bottles is incomplete; for I am not in the bottom of them, and I remember each time I hit that dreadful state. At the time, I knew not how I had come to be at the glass prison, slowly filling with rum and whiskey and rye and red wine. I only knew that I was content to stay there. The Sherriff told me he was not drunk, but tired. Maybe I was drunk and tired when that Smith & Wesson kicked against me, the hammer biting my palm. Maybe I was trying to shoot my way out of the bottle.

The Cliffside comes up to my left, and as I always do, I stare at it. It took six seconds for the figure to fall all the way down, her arms outstretched, hair flying wildly. Six seconds it took for the Sheriff and I to be bitten. Six long seconds of agony as the periwinkle gull fell, in a tight spiral, towards the sea. I remember trying to catch the gull at the last instant, my bitten hand swiping the air in front of the winged beast, but I missed, so absorbed in my glass prison. I stand and stare at the Cliffside, watching with curled hands, as the periwinkle gull flaps around my head. Blood drips from my shattered leg onto the sandy path, and I take it as my cue to leave this place.

The painkillers are numbing the biting stab in my thigh, a line of black infection showing in the veins of the leg. It doesn’t matter. It needs only to carry me on one final journey to the summit of the mount, and I’ll take the weight off of it entirely.

The next step on my ascension is the soaked ground, that makes me curl my fingers against my palms, the drying green scum upon them flaking and peeling with the subtle rubbing of my hands. As the green flecks fall to the rock to be joined with my blackened, infected blood, I continue to walk. Though my feet constantly threaten to slip beneath me on the dark pools, I cannot look down for balance. I have walked this island many times, and I have never been able to see what it is I tread on. The Sheriff theorized, when we were both in this place, drinking bitter coffee and having vile conversation, that it was the blood of myself, mixed with the drink of my glass prison. While I do not hold stock in this theory, it is a solid one.

Finally, it takes me six seconds to walk on top of the craggily and potted mount peak, my feet worn and cracked, my hands dripping scum all over the earth, my leg entirely useless as I crawl on my belly, toes scratching at the rocky and sharp ground, fingers digging deep as I scrape myself – chest, chin, cheek – towards the edge of the mount. In my mind, the Smith & Wesson bites deep, the periwinkle gull flies in tight circles for six seconds as it drops towards the ocean, the feel of a dress brushing my fingertips as I try to catch the winged beast. My mind drifts to the cabin, the cabin filled with you and me and us, and yet you have never been to the island. This island is my island, and though I’ve made the journey to it many times I’ve never seen it through to its final completion. My hand is bitten by the Smith & Wesson, my eyes wide as the gull, periwinkle, falls for six seconds. The Sheriff and I have agreed that in those moments we became separate, we became infinite, WE BECAME A DIFFERENT BEING. I CANNOT WAIT FOR MY PAST TO CATCH TO MY PRESENT; I CANNOT HOLD STOCK IN THE IDEA THAT THE INFECTION, SO MUCH MORE THAN THIS WOUNDED LEG AND CUT UP FEET, WILL FINISH THE JOB FAST ENOUGH. MY FINGERS ARE GLISTENING WITH THE SCUM – RED AND VISCERAL IN THE AIR, CLUTCHED AROUND A DRESS THAT IS PERIWINKLE, SHREDDED FROM YOU AS YOU FELL FOR SIX SECONDS WHILE THE SMITH & WESSON BIT INTO MY PALM, THE KICK OF THE WEAPON AGAINST MY HANDS.

It is over, I tell myself. It is over.

Reaching the edge of the cliff, I don’t hesitate in throwing myself over the side of it. I’ve made the journey to the island many times.

I’ve completed it but once.

Love,

Tycho.

Very, even eerily reminiscent of Dear Esther. I would be dumbfounded if you told me that wasn't your inspiration.

What's different about this piece, though, is that it is much more visceral, more gratuitous, less passive. It works. Your build up is masterful, the release of energy captured in the all-caps is palpable as the revelations start to come together. I actually expected the narrator to be the Sheriff, but maybe having played the game twice now biased my expectations somewhat.

Overall, a fantastic piece of art. There are a few minor mechanical details that need editing, but they aren't really important. More importantly, there are a few places where your language doesn't do justice to the image it is designed to convey: for example, in "My path leads me to the grassy slope that leads to the mountain trail ..." the double use of "leads" could be altered into something more vivid. This is the opening to a paragraph, after all, and you want to reach out and grab the reader. A missed opportunity, but easily fixed with just a few words. A few revisions will go a long way. My suggestion is to go through each sentence and figure out how to make every word more majestic, and never settle for the mundane; that's what made Dear Esther's script so compelling, for me at least.

Well done. Cheers, mate.

:c
>Not commenting on my epilogue.

I'm getting around to it, hold your horses mate :D

>Still haven't commented on my epilogue.

My horses have been held for over a month now. d: