a disappointed look on his face and sauntered off.
One down. How many more to go?
Someone else began coming forward from the crowd, walking at a faster pace. The young man held his dagger forward, ready for him.
As it turned out, it was a young woman he recognized. She had once been one of his former friends, part of the group that had witnessed his unfortunate meltdown. She stopped back further than Bleeding Hand had and looked him straight in the eyes.
"How long are you going to keep fighting?" she asked him, a little agitated.
"As long as I have to. No one, and I mean NO ONE, is ever going to stick me down there again!"
"Stick you down WHERE again?" she asked exasperatedly.
The young man was a little confused at this.
"What do you mean ‘down where’? You were watching me climb out! You all stuck me in that horrible pit! It's taken me a very long time to get out! I'm tired, I'm aching, I'm wounded, and I just want to rest!"
"Turn around!" she said.
"I will do no such thing!" he said. "The moment I turn around, you will grab me and toss me back down again!"
"Turn around and tell me if that's possible!" she said.
"You're trying to trick me!" he brandished the dagger menacingly.
"No one can toss you back down into the pit! There IS no pit!"
The young man got a disbelieving look on his face.
"What do you mean 'there is no pit?' Just what exactly do you take me for? Are you trying to act like I'm stupid?"
"Just turn around and take a look!"
Holding his dagger in her direction, he carefully, slowly started to turn to take a look. He was watching her out of the corner of his eye for any sudden movement. If she did, he was going to take the dagger and plunge it into her.
However, as his head nearly fully turned, he saw nothing but solid ground, which caused him to whirl around completely as he looked in shock at where the pit had been. It was not there! He suddenly realized that he had let his guard down. He whirled around and saw that the girl had not advanced. He turned back and looked again. No pit. Where had it gone? He looked back at her.
"Where is it? What kind of a trick it this?"
"There never was any pit! The pit was something of your own creation! You put yourself down there! Not us! Not anyone standing here! Just you and you alone!"
"Everyone wanted to save you..." Bleeding Hand said as he started advancing out of the crowd again.
"...but you closed yourself off so much from everyone. We couldn't reach you!"
"There WAS a pit! I had to work very hard to get myself out! There was something down there with me...!"
Another young man was advancing from the audience.
"Get it through your head! You WERE in a pit, but you were the only one who put yourself down there, and you could have just as easily taken yourself out!"
He didn't know this person, but there was something strangely familiar about him.
"Do I know you?"
"I tried to get to know you once, but you wouldn't let me."
"I don't recall ever seeing you before."
"We were much younger than..." Young Man B said.
"It was right after you got bullied by those kids, when you were real young.
Do you remember now?"
It seemed to ring a bell, but he still couldn't quite place him.
"Here, let me show you..." he said, and all of a sudden, everything was fading out, as the young man found himself being transported back into another vision.
'Not again...' he thought, but he was unable to do anything to stop it.
Christian looked upon what he had painted.
The form had started to really come through three fourths of the way. He had found himself painting more fervently than ever before. As the image became clearer in his mind, the form on the canvas had begun to come through with great clarity. Now, he stood looking at the finished work, many thoughts running through his head.
The painting was of the inside of a large pit. There were shadows of people at the top of the pit, about seven, gazing deep down into it. The picture was from the point of view of someone trying to climb out of the pit. His left hand was reaching up, as if desperately wanting to reach out to the people above, but they were still so far off.
He sunk to the ground, not taking his eyes off what he had created.
He couldn't believe he had created something like this without any base inspiration whatsoever, but he also knew this was very different than anything else he had ever tried to paint before. This picture did not come from his imagination, nor was spurned on by any sort of flight of fantasy. This one had been painted from the deepest recesses of his soul.
This painting... he was looking at his life!
An endless pit. Forever trying to climb out of it. Reaching up. Desperately wanting to take someone's hand, have them pull him up, but the exit always seemed so far away...
Even when it seemed he was getting close, it was always still so far off. So far off.
He thought about what his life had been. Everything that had led him up to this point. Everything seemed so meaningless now. What had he been pursuing? Fame? Recognition?
All in the pursuit of what? Love?
His acting had given him something to aspire to. Something to give his life meaning. Meaning to a miserable, wasted life.
So had his art. Though his art had gotten him much farther than anything else had ever before.
Was it really about 'getting far', though? What was it he really wanted? NOT fame. NOT success. NOT lots of money. Those things would have been nice, but...
He reached out in the direction of the painting, hand outstretched just like the painted one before him. Mimicking the hand, also trying to reach out towards the top of the pit.
What was the pit? The pit was despair. His despair. He was so tired of feeling so empty. He couldn't stand it! He couldn't stand feeling so alone anymore!
What if he HAD gotten what he thought he wanted? Made it all the way to the top? Major movie deals, money, success, fame? Would any of it had really mattered? It's not like anyone would still REALLY be a part of his life anyways. People would only 'love' him for his status as a famous actor/artist.
He had never had anyone to whom he really mattered to in his life. Never would. He thought he might have finally found an avenue with the Art League, but he had gone and blown that all apart.
He collapsed onto his side. His breathing became hitched and ragged. He was starting to hyperventilate. The pain in his soul never felt as strong before as it did now. He found himself wishing for blackness. He never wanted to feel again. He wished someone would come along, not to show him love (for such a thing was unattainable for him), but to deliver the final blow.
He wanted someone to finish his destruction on the inside, to finally give him the will to end his life. Freedom from this pain. He needed to have his hurt fully aggravated till he hit the breaking point, where he could find the courage to bring about his own end.
He would put the gun to his head, loaded with real bullets this time...
A fitting end to a pathetic, wasted life. No one would find him. Not for a very long time. No one would care. He would care no longer, either, his soul gone from his body, given over to another world. A world of sweet, blissful darkness.
He lay there for two hours like that. He couldn't will himself to stand. Eventually, he drifted off to sleep. He had a nightmare. He dreamt he was actually in the painting. Trying to climb up out of the pit, reaching out, wanting to desperately for someone to take his hand, but at the same time feeling terrified about what they might do to him.
A loud banging sound echoed around him. He glanced around the pit, confused, but it suddenly started fading away, and the real world began to come back into focus.
He was suddenly in his room again, the morning sun shining brightly through his window and landing on his face. Groggily, he sat up and began to wipe the
sleep away from his eyes.
He realized that it had been just a dream. The banging wasn't, though. He was confused for a second until he realized it was someone knocking on his door.
(19)
Once again, he was looking at himself as a young boy, the vision starting off at the exact same point where he had left it off. His younger self was still kneeling on the ground, sobbing away.
However, the vision continued past the point where it had left off. As his younger self continued to cry, someone came walking up to him. It was another young boy his age. He looked down sadly on the boy sobbing beneath him. He tried to say 'hi', but when his young self realized there was someone else there, he looked up and quickly backed away defensively. The young boy kept advancing on him, trying to talk to him, asking what was wrong, speaking gently to him, but his young self picked up a rock off the ground and began brandishing it in front of him.
The young boy got a little too close, and his young self reared back self-defensively, prepared to throw it. The young boy kept trying to talk to him, but his young self wouldn't respond in any other way than threatening him with the rock, tears still coming from his eyes and a look of anger contorted on his face.
Eventually, the young boy gave up and walked away sadly. When his young self saw that he was really leaving, he put the rock down and breathed a sigh of relief. He pulled his knees close to himself and buried his face in them.
The fog started to dissipate, but only slightly. The young man looked in surprise. Where the fog began to disappear, he could begin to make out the walls of the pit, still spread wide apart, but slowly beginning to