1.2 One Inch at a Time

Michael did not know for how long he wept, but he had only so much tears. Eventually, his weeping subsided into mere hiccups.

Once he calmed himself, he opened and closed his eyes every few minutes, hoping to adjust them to the blinding light.

As he worked on his eyes, he only now noticed the sounds—sounds of the wild, ruffling of foliage, chirping of birds and insects, the occasional howling wind, and that constant whooshing sound could only belong to a river. The brook had to be close by for him to hear it so loudly.

The thought of the river reminded of him off his dry throat and his empty stomach growled at him, demanding sustenance.

Hours passed before he could open his eyes without closing them shut in reflex. The light was still blindingly painful, but he could keep them open even if it resulted in a pounding headache.

Back home, a headache like this would have been a perfect excuse for him not to go to school and stay at home watching TV all day long. Watching TV never worsened his headache. It was the thought of school and incomplete assignments that elevated the pulsing pain in his head.

Michael turned here and there, trying to make sense of the room, but everything was a blur. Tears stung his eyes at the effort of keeping them open. He had to close them again to relieve the burning pain.

Overtime the pain of opening his eyes diminished, returning with it his vision. The first thing he noticed was the slime he was covered in.

It was brown, or was it yellow—somewhere in between—he decided.

The substance did not sit well with Michael. He felt as if he was covered in poop. Yes, it smelled sweet, yet he could not shake the thought. Sweet poop. Now, that was a thought to give him nightmares.

Enough about excrements.

He looked around. The egg-shaped thing next to him was indeed twice as large as him. Its smooth black surface reflected the sunlight with a metallic sheen.

He eyed the object. There was something familiar about it. Had he seen it somewhere before? He thought he did, but he could not for the life of him remember where.

The room was small and wooden. That had to be bad news for him. Dust and mould covered every surface and vines invaded the walls and the floor closer to the door after who knew how many years of disuse. He even found that hole in the wall and the cobweb covered shuttered window. The room was almost exactly as he had imagined.

A certain light flashed at the corner of his eyes. No, it did not flash; it grew ever brighter.

Michael turned.

Something inside the large egg glowed bright Crimson. Then the egg itself glowed. The intensity of its light increased every second. The egg melted into a molten light that glowed with the intensity that should have burned his eyes to ashes. But somehow it did not hurt.

Something dropped from the light, but Michael had no time for it. The Crimson light, that was once the egg thing, was hovering in the air in front of him. The ball of light broke into two and hurtled forward. He screamed and tried to duck, but it was too late. Both lights slammed into his face.

The gold earrings that he always wore in both his ears hummed for a second and then went still. Michael looked around wildly. There was nothing out of the ordinary aside from the disappearing egg.

Something deep within him. Something primal, a fear that came from the soul itself, urged him to run. And run he did. Out of the door, blind to everything else, he ran.

His sprint did not last longer than a few seconds, for the ground vanished beneath him.

He yelped, falling.

Everything was a blur of green, blue, and brown. Wind howled in his ears. He flailed about wildly with both his hands and legs, trying to find anything to grab a hold to. Anything. There had to be something. His hands found something to grab onto, and he clung to it like a lifeline. And it was a lifeline indeed.

His heart beat could have produced an earthquake. "Oh my God, Oh my God, I'm Dead. I am dead. I'm fucking dead."

He stayed there, clinging, cursing, weeping, trembling for his life.

Drops of water pelted him. Was it raining? But no, that constant roar… He had to be near a waterfall.

"Ever since I woke up in this place, things have not gone my way. What a disaster. Why did it have to be me? Why not Nairobi?"

The morbid woman would have loved all this. Revelled in it even. In any case, she would have done far better than me—were she in my situation.

The thought bothered him more than anything else. Yet, it was true she would have found a way to have fun.

"And what have I done? Sauntered about the room with eyes closed like a madman? And then jumped off a Cliff. Useless. Utterly useless."

He stopped trembling. Those thoughts had helped him somehow.

After a while, the muscles in his arms began to ache. Now, he was trembling for a different reason. He could not hold on to it much longer. He had to find something or fall off and die. And he had yet to open his eyes. He may have stopped trembling, but fear was still there, looming like a mountain.

He yanked at his courage from deep within him, like a dog on a leash, and forced himself to open his eyes. Whatever he was holding on to moved, it swayed at the wind that came from his left. He clamped his eyes shut harder.

"Oh God, oh God. This can't be happening."

Once, his lifeline stopped swinging. He opened his eyes again. The first thing he saw was a thick rope he was grabbing hold of. The cascading waterfall left to him wasn't too far. He looked up, and he only saw the Cliff's face and the rope he was clinging to. The rope had thick bulging knots separated at an equal interval. He looked down to see something like a small lake that broke into a stream of water that wound out of his sight.

"What kind of insanity possesses someone to build a cabin next to a Cliff? The fuck is wrong with them?"

"OK, OK, calm down. All you need to do is climb down the rope and everything should be fine."

Climbing up the rope was out of the question. His arms were already too weak from hanging on the rope for far too long. And if he did not climb soon enough, he would fall to his death or a painful injury. He did not know which would be worse, death or injuries in a place where there was no one to help him.

He decided not to open his eyes as he slithered down the rope one inch at a time. It was an arduous process and his forearm burned.

One inch at a time. One inch at a time.

Eyes closed, Michael used those words like a mantra as he descended the rope.

One inch at a time.

His feet touched the ground.