Entry #53

"We are the Hollow Men"
by Sig H.


You lean back against the line, electricity thrumming under you. A road runs above you, deserted at this time of night.

It's unfair that you still don't know the answer.


You can't remember the details of your death, just that it wasn't unusual. A car accident, your body becoming skin and bones and a heart that kept blood pumping even after the soul had left it. You remember being pulled up, up, thinking you might never stop.

Until you did.


"A new one, eh?" the old man said. "You still look human."

And later, "Our souls were caught by the electricity. Like needles to a magnet-"

"Like bugs on a spider web."

His face wavered, disappeared and reappeared. "No. We're the lucky ones."

"Old man, you call this luck?"

And he snapped, "I'm almost as young as you are."

But he wasn't.


You don't know when you last saw him. Time, memories, slip your grasp. The sky takes them. You're a glitch on the line, a stubborn anomaly. You won't let it take you whole, so it takes you in pieces.


You tried to jump once. Looked down at night, stars and a fraying darkness. The pull filtered through you like light through stained glass, and you swayed towards it, wavered like static. You thought, this is what the stars feel, the universe falling towards the center to disappear into nothing, and it's taking you with it, taking you taking you taking you with.


It's not death you fear.