Chapter 5: Alluring Trappings of Beauty

The billowy sky spread blue, verdant grass green, exotic flowers flamed red, sprayed yellow, streaked orange, spotted purple. In a prodigiously lush meadow of the softest, sweetest smelling, most intoxicating fragrance, Charlie had been harmlessly delivered by the water spraying circular downward tunnel landing butt first. No way could he ever have imagined such an irrefutable grandeur.

"Is this heaven?" he wondered? "It's just got to be; I've never seen anything like this before, ever. Talk about spectacular."

He lay perfectly still in the same position as he had tumbled. Not sure how long this particular venture would last; he wanted to indulge every single moment. Whether he'd admire and absorb the immaculate beauty of the apparent surreal surroundings or simply detach himself from it all, he wasn't yet, certain.

Inestimably overwhelmed by the experience of traveling all alone, with a mind stretched to the limits of sanctity's demise, he simply accepted that he had somehow, someway lived through the eye of each vortex of the harrowing episodes. Because he had arrived unscathed, he allowed himself deservedly to dissolve into the field of nature's arresting beauty.

"I'm good. It's all good." Breathing deeply the erotic subduing fragrance of sheer divine bliss, nothing else mattered but the moment.

No other movement or suckling sound, not a bird singing or cricket chirping or a butterfly's wings flapping through the air could be recorded.

"This IS what I'm talking about!" he realized he was alive, unharmed and happy.

"How can my feelings change so fast?" He sat straight up gazed into the wonderment of the experience. Ineffable, silent, painted loveliness surrounded him.

If he could have expressed the immaculate sensations, he would have expressed a unity. Yet, somehow, it didn't matter because there was no one to share it with.

"I've never felt such peace. But, who knows IF what I'm experiencing is real? IF it was real, I should, at least, have had to feel something like this before. But, I haven't, never; why not?"

He tried to think about the irredeemable events of the day. Reconstruct what might have happened. Was it all a dream? Had he gone to sleep and imagined being sent to the office? Had school not let out and he was still in the classroom imagining all of this?

"The whole wild story, is it true or not? Am I experiencing warped reality?" He had to know.

Looking down at his hand again, brought him to a decision; it was no dream. The BRACELET wrapped his right wrist securely. The fact he sat upon the ground, in some strange land, after barely escaping the pangs of death inside the horror castle invaded his senses with full fledged atrocity. Too abruptly, without cause or reason, had he been plopped out onto this unfamiliar place? The only thing he had to remind him of where he had come from was the bracelet...the Mysterious indefinable BRACELET.

"There's so much power locked in this BRACELET. But it's a power I don't understand; power I can't control. What good is that to me?"

For the first time, since Charlie had started this unexpected journey, he pondered why he might have picked up the bracelet in the first place. Of course, it was the genuine Red and White Sandblaster.

Something deep within him pushed him to pursue the board. His uncontrollable desire motivated him to do whatever it took.

"I don't care if I never hear or see the words Genuine Red & White Sandblaster, again." He continued with chastisement's self -talk.

"If I could just be back in school exactly in the moment of time when Mrs. Mason was calling me down... I'd do everything so different. I would pay attention. I wouldn't ..." His thoughts chopped.

Trapped in some unidentified destination and faceless sphere of time; trapped in some other parallel world, some other baffling dimension, some uncanny, energetic life sucking force, lapsed in an unrecoverable dimension which had no intention of releasing him.

He owned neither clues nor ideas as to how to change anything. A powerless pitiful human being unable to convey his thoughts and untangle his disturbed mind; what a state to exist in, he wasn't prepared for any of this bizarre activity.

"What can I do? I'm all alone. And, nobody cares."

He had no shoes; he had no pants. The number 44 yellow and black football jersey was all but in threads because of the flesh burning heat combined with the 'rough and rowdy' mechanical bull-like journey down the water tunnel.(Nothing else to do, except to get up and start walking). Glad and thankful, the underbrush of clover christened soft the bottom of his feet.

Charlie was totally lost in a world of what seemed to be 'no return. Reluctantly, he stumbled through the field. The inebriated fragrance of the flowers soothed his present anxieties, somewhat. Still, he didn't care. It made no difference how pretty it all was; he didn't want to be there. He felt out of place. He just didn't fit.

"I want to go back home. Will I ever see my mom and dad, again?" Even his two younger sisters, Sara and Louise with their aggravating him would seem so good. Maybe he was more like, Fred the Head, than he realized.

"I miss mama." He would give anything if she could put her arms around him and tell him she loved him; that everything would be all right. But, it just wasn't to be.

While walking in the clover, he had a lot of time to think about the way his bed room looked. He had never paid that much attention to it, before. He had always compared it to every other kid who had so many other things he couldn't afford. "Sure, it's kind of plain, not a lot of furniture; but, it still has all my personal stuff." He sadly remembers while continuing to stroll aimlessly.

"My 64 Blue Malibu model car, my transformer Helicopter airplane, I got out of that box of Kellogg's' cereal, my 36 x 24 poster of Poison. And, don't forget that invisible dog leash I won at the Hillsdale county fair. What's going to happen to all of that? Nobody's going to take care of it?"

Who was he talking to? No one could hear him. All that he had were his thoughts and more thoughts about his thoughts. Come to think of it, his room was probably more special than rich John Howard's room.

"Anyway who needs a dumb old two story white brick house overlooking the golf course? I don't like golf. Never did. Probably never will." The pummeling sound of his own voice had become his dearest friend.

He actually began to like the tone and flavor of his sonorous voice. While talking aloud, it occurred to him, his house was exactly the way he liked it. He didn't want to change a single thing! It was at that precise moment when he realized, he really loved his life exactly like it was. He desired only what he already had.

"I just want to go back home. Can I please go back home?" But, no such luck. Endless wandering directed his life now. From one crisis to another, one series of unexpected situations followed by another.

"Hey. Wait a minute. Why hasn't anything more occurred? Not that I want it to, but why am I allowed to coast along with no trouble?" More bewildered than ever, he yelled.

"Where am I? What am I doing here? Come out you cowards; show yourself."

Charlie wished he could understand why he was in such a dead-pan mess.

"And, what did wanting a genuine Red and White Sandblaster has to do with anything?" He asked aloud belligerently.

"What's so bad about that?" His psychotic moods shifted nonstop. One moment he was defending his desire the next he was condemning it. Was it all a bad dream? It couldn't be; he hadn't been to sleep.

"It's damn nightmare. I've just got to wake up. Even if I don't' remember going to sleep, I must have. Wake up, Charlie. Wake up." His mother had always told him if he ever got stuck in a dream, just repeat those words over and over, and he would automatically wake up. It didn't work.

Frantically, he walked and walked, not knowing where he was going or why. He didn't even know if walking was making things worse or not but he simply couldn't stand around and do nothing, could he? He thought briefly about what might be the next event he would have to go through.

"As long as it's not that HOT BOILER ROOM," he whimpered, "I can stand it, I guess," he paused "I mean, I hope, I can." The strangest feeling had overtaken him by this point. The soothing sensual beauty covering the earth, as far as he could tell, didn't add or take away from his personal opinions. In fact, he was rather indifferent to it all. Like a numbed kind of mummy feeling of "Who cares?"

"That don't' seem right to me. IF I'm going to be caught up in a situation of which I have no control, the least the 'opponent' could do is give me some clues, signs, omens, anything, to occupy my mind." He grumbled.

But, of course, he had no say so in the matter. He was stuck in a game he couldn't win since the 'other side' held all the cards. He didn't grasp how or why anything had happened like it had since he discovered that pulsating weird BRACELET.

"Get away from me, you stupid thing!"

He yanked on it to pull it off. It would not budge. At that precise moment something ferociously forceful grabbed both feet, snatching them out from beneath him, bringing him to the 'not so' comfortable ground.

Author's Notes: MoonWillow, thank you so much for the use of your picture for Chapter 5 of The Subject of Desire.