Mythos- Shadows Fall

“The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient reason for remaining ashore.”
-Vincent Van Gogh, 1875

This cruise was an attempt to rediscover the love in a marriage Gregory knew had already vanished into an empty abyss of broken promises, evenings of working “late”, colossal disappointments, and sexless nights. As contrived as it all seemed, he took the therapist's advice, talked mary into packing some bags, and they were off to sail for seven nights around the bahaman islands on the crown jewel of carnival's fleet, the proud victory, complete with seven restaurants, b level celebrity shows, three swimming pools, and romantic strolls on a moon washed upper deck. Gregory thought of the money he was wasting on the therapist, known to be a forerunner in the field of marital revitalization, which he found laughable at best. Mary and he could barely stand the thought of remaining in the same room for fifteen seconds, why not spend seven days and nights trapped together in a tiny cabin on a boat hundreds of miles from the main land? That was all the therapist could conjure. “go on a cruise,” he said, “spend time together, look into her eyes, remember why you got married in the first place, find the love you have lost.” Bullshit, to gregory it was all bullshit. He remembered why they got married. Mary needed someone to help her pay down her student loans, and he was sick of doing his own laundry. Certainly, at first the sex was wild and passionate, but when it became apparent to gregory that mary simply felt obligated to blow him on his birthday or after he had bought her a new car, it took the fun out of not having to separate darks from lights anymore. And here they were, ten years later, the wrinkles falling across his face, her hips stretching the taxed fabric of her armani track pants, no children, a house bought and paid for in a neighborhood she had chosen, miserable. How did the therapist think going on a cruise would be beneficial, in the very least fun? How enjoyable would it be for gregory to watch his wife stuff her face with anything coated in butter or for mary to watch him as he gave his liver a run for its money? During the first night, at dinner, it was so hard for gregory not to say, “my god, mary, have you tried the king prawn? Of course you have. This cruise was such a good idea, it will give us the time to talk about so much. Like, for instance, i really appreciated it the other night when i came home and you had fifteen of those disgusting vanilla cookie candles burning in our bedroom to rid the room of the smell of whatever landscaper's sweaty balls you had been gurgling earlier in the day. You are TOO good to me.”
it was only the second night and they both already were finding excuses to not be around one another. She went to do laps in the olympic sized middle deck pool and he sat at the bar slamming down shot after shot of expensive whiskey. Now he was standing on the top observation deck, nursing a jack and coke, chain smoking. Gregory stepped to the railing and looked out at the expanse of crystal blue water in front of him, wishing he was anywhere but there. The moonlight undulated with the tide, cohesion, in tune, the titan of a boat quietlessly stabbing its way to some other island full of people who hated every tourist that set foot on their shores to buy cheap knickknacks and laugh at the simple way island people live. Gregory flicked his cigarette and stared at the water. He closed his eyes for a moment, and as he opened them, he swore he saw a large dark shape pass underneath the boat.


“There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them.”
-Andre Gide, 1947

“throw me the lime green.”
Johnny did as he was told, retrieving the can of green from his backpack, gave it a few good shakes and tossed the can to where Jose stood above him, on the ledge just below the street level. It was just after three in the morning, and jose was putting the finishing touches on his new tag, a sprawling, jagged rendering of fidel castro. Johnny was happy to be doing this with his cousin, getting to know what colors contrasted with one another, where the best places were to tag, how to make your name jump right off the wall.
“think about it, bro, thousands of people will be riding the train into the city tomorrow and they will be looking out their windows, dreading the fact that they have to spend one more day snapping numbers and figures onto a keyboard in their cubicle, and they will look out and see this. They will wonder who did it, how they had done it, why they had done it. I will take their mind off of their boring lives for only a moment, but i will force them to think. It's crazy, really.”
Jose was kind of a big deal in the grafitti community. He was fearless, he was smart, and he was GOOD. His mural of the battle of little big horn along the crumbling east wall of the R5 station was legendary. Johnny was so excited when jose asked him to be his lookout, his pack mule, his apprentice.
Johnny caught something out of the corner of his eyes. He whispered up.
“we got headlights, jose, right above you. Oh fuck, blue and reds. Get down, we gotta split into the tunnel.”
Jose jumped down and they sprinted into the subway tunnel. They were safe there for at least two more hours, until the morning commute began. They hunkered down, slithered behind a filthy support pillar, cautiously looked to the ledge where they just had been. From street level, two flashlight's beams swept the area. They could hear the buzzing of the cops' walkie talkies. After a few minutes, they were gone. Johnny stood up, but jose pulled him right back down. He whispered.
“that's an old trick they use. The wave their flashlights around, make you think they gone, and when you pop out, they still there waitin. Just chill we got some time.”
johnny sunk down and took his phone out of his pocket. Jose snatched it up.
“damn, son, is that the new erickson? This shit is fly, dude. How'd you afford this?”
johnny was beaming, jose thought something he had was cool.
“ oh, i used the money from my birthday and my paper route and saved for like, a year to get it. Check this out.”
johnny took the phone back, flipped it open, pushed some buttons, and handed it back to jose.
“it has a built in mini cam. And if you push this button,” johnny leaned over, “boom, night vision.”
Jose looked at the screen and said, “hmm.”
johnny leaned back, closed his eyes. Somewhere down the tunnel, a sound made his eyes snap open, got his full attention. It was faint, but it sounded as if something had clinked against the tracks about a hundred feet from where they were sitting.
Jose piped up. “yo man, you hear about the severed hand they found down at the lombard south stop? Just sitting there, plain as day, a severed hand. Rings still on it, the news said it looked as if something had bit it off. It's funny, you know, anytime someone finds a severed body part, and you hear about it on the news, they never give out information as to where whoever's leg or hand or whatever they found, like where this handless person can come and pick up their hand. Why? They know that person's most likely dead. Fucked up, really.”
johnny muttered something, but kept his attention on the dark subway tunnel. He strained his eyes, swore he saw something move. He tugged at jose's jacket and whispered.
“can we go out there yet, jose, i think we should be going home now.”
jose batted at his hand.
“naw, johnny, i can't catch another jacket, i may do some time. I'm too pretty for jail, b, shit, they eat me alive in dere.”
Johnny shook his head, but jose couldn't see him, he was so preoccupied with the camera phone. Johnny leaned forward, and something did move, and is was big, but too quiet to be moving and not making any noise. It stopped some fifty feet from where they sat, and fear gripped johnny, prevented him from moving. Just then, there was a great expulsion of air. It spiraled at johnny, was hot and wretched, got jose's attention. Johnny, without looking, took the phone from jose.
Jose stiffened up, looked down the tunnel also.
“what the fuck was that, johnny?”
Johnny slowly brought the phone to his face, using buttons on the side to focus. There was another rush of air, a bellow, and his phone focused.
“it's, it's...” and it was upon them.