A large dark field

stretching into thick fog.

The fence – if there is one – lost in the blurry mist.

Heavy dampness pervades the air,

the grass saturated with tiny droplets.

You stand in the soggy mess and sense the quiet of nature all around.

Calm.  Eerie.

Hmmm.

You shuffle you feet to turn a full circle.

It’s all the same, all grey-green shapeless uncertainty.

Fleeting thoughts dart through your mind like frightened rabbits.

Where should you go, what are you supposed to do…

Why don’t you know?

Are you lost?

A niggle of unease gnaws away at your stomach.

This is not what you’re supposed to be doing.

You’re not meant to be here right now.

You should LEAVE!

But you don’t.

You stay rooted to the spot by some inexplicable force.

And when the figure gradually appears, like a ghost out of the mist,

You realize this is where you were meant to be all along.

It was inevitable – already typed in the manuscript of your life.

Fear now has you with its iron fist clamped around your aching throat.

The figure approaches slowly but inevitably.

You couldn’t run even if you tried.

And you could never escape the turn of events that are about to unfold.

You with all your arrogant notions of control

or idiotic assumptions of good and bad.

As if you knew better.

As if you knew anything.

The figure stops right in front of you as your breathing accelerates to such a speed

the green around you starts to spin.

It reaches over and touches you.

And you realize the life you lived was superficial and empty.

Built on a stack of cards of insatiable desire, selfish greed, ignorant stupidity.

But there’s nothing you can do about it now.

As the blackness consumes you

the last thought that flies through your fading mind is

“Why?  Why didn’t I stop and listen?  WHY???”

And then….

nothing.