It is dark, and it is stormy, and isn’t that a terrible, clichéd way to start this tale? But tonight is both these things, and the weather matches my mood.
These are the thunderstorms of my childhood, of watching the lightning crack atop enormous, ancient trees who laugh at the sky and dare to try their luck against the clouds.
Then, I sat wedged into a windowsill too small for any but a child, safe from the wet and cold, eyes dancing too fast to follow the lightning.
Now, I stand barefoot in the rain, soft grass slick against my feet, dress pressing damply against my body, each step squishing deeper into ever-softening dirt. I hope against hope there will be neither thistles nor rocks, but know the night will end with muddy footprints, smeared with blood.
My path does not remain on a polite, pretentious lawn, but meanders down into deep woods.
Tonight I hunt, in the old ways, the ways of my ancestors. I stalk, and I spin, and seek to find direction. I feel ridiculous.
Inhibition is the first to go. It must, or I will not succeed.
My prey is nebulous, terrifying. Hard enough to pursue the intangible, but to slay it?
My breath quickens at the thought of an unsuccessful hunt, and I pant in rapid, shallow breaths. I reach down and smear mud across my face, wondering briefly how long it will last as the rain smudges it, warm across my cheeks.
Fear of failure keeps me moving, fear of nothing happening, fear of being insufficient, fear of not being enough.
I am melancholy as I wander through the woods, seeking the trail of each memory, confronting each angry voice, each disappointment, each almost enough.
Failure is to admit they are true, to give life to the voices whispering through the woods, lighting-lit and backstopped by memory.
I seek despair, I seek humiliation, I seek confusion.
Each movement firms my resolve, strengthens each step as branches lash with wet venom across my face, and the hunt is all I know.
The moonlight is my sword, rain the chains that bind me to this task, lightning my only guide.
Each step is victory, the path to Valhalla.
I seek annihilation, and this night shall not end without blood.
***
This week’s Odd Prompts challenge was from Cedar Sanderson: You are a big game hunter stalking something. What is it you are in pursuit of, and why is it so terrifying?
My prompt about a widely shared birthday party went to Misha Burnett, and La Vaughn Kemnow also took a whack at it.
