Ollie's World

Ollie wondered if every other boy his age counted their footfalls as they walked home after school. Or any other boy his age for that matter. He wondered how many times he had walked that same street day after day, year after year and how many more times he would have yet to count the 3,562 steps that separated his house from the bus stop. Despite being a newly 13 year old boy, Ollie had a complete disinterest in high-tech or “smart” gadgets like phones or tablets. Sure, he had seen videos on the phones of classmates - typically from over their shoulder, in secret - but he truly couldn’t understand how someone could handle owning such a raw source of enormous, terrifying stimulation like that of a cell phone, let alone become so hopelessly dependent upon it.

On more than one occasion, as Ollie walked that very same street, he would often find himself slipping into a state of trance. His gaze would quite literally be captured.

By the radiant shades of red, orange, and brown that split the sky as the leaves of fall blew all around his head, each color so sharp that they lit Ollie’s way home on more than one occasion when fall was giving way to winter, stealing the sunlight.

By passing hi-beam headlights that, to Ollie, seemed to burn like the twin suns of a far away solar system.

By snow storms that looked more to Ollie like some sort of impossible mist made of white light being cast off each individual snowflake.

Everyone likes to think that they’re someone special, somehow unique among every other person as if an unseen film director is waiting at a certain crossroad to drop a dramatic adventure in their lap. A quest that will set an otherwise painfully average life on a course to show the world what it’s made of. To bring out the hero within.

Ollie was pretty sure he was right about that.

Not only were his perception and senses heightened to an overwhelming degree, he could feel things. Things that he had no reason to believe anyone else would do anything other than scoff at should he share his bizarre gifts with the kids he went to school with. Ollie could feel a pulse in every living thing. Not a pulse in the biological sense, but more like that of a radio wave, flowing out from the center, from what Ollie had always thought of as the soul. While Ollie was certain it was a feeling that he was perceiving, radiating from people, plants, animals, insects, it was a feeling of such clarity that he could actually see the space around each bit of organic life distort slightly as the waves passed through. It reminded Ollie of the way the air above a blacktop looks on a summer day, that visible distortion branching outward over and over every living thing until that life, the soul dies.

Believe it or not, Ollie felt he had been given a gift. For the most part. But with anything given, there’s something that wants to take. In Ollie’s case, he simply could not handle the stimulation that his abilities made him vulnerable to. So he developed ways of grounding himself, taking things down a notch, so to speak.

And he counted his footsteps.

And made sure to finish an entire measure in every school desk drum beat that he semi-idly tapped out during class, earning him a top spot on a “Top 5 Most Annoying Deskmates” list made by a particularly compassionate group of young teens scattered throughout Ollie's classes.

And trained his mind to let the sound of a dish entering the kitchen sink cut through all the colors and sounds in his mind, shifting his attention back to the mundane as he sprung to empty the sink.

But today, Ollie couldn’t help but get lost in the beauty around him. He basked in the sharpening temperature as winter crept over the fall like an icy comforter. But it wasn’t beauty in the traditional sense, no these were gorgeous muted colors and grey stillness that let Ollie’s mind feel a kind of relaxation that he so rarely got to indulge. To Ollie, it felt similarly to finding shade after being in the 95 degree sun of August. But it wasn’t his body feeling the relief, it was his mind.

Mostly, Ollie loved the intense, almost unnatural beauty he experienced day in and day out while watching the fiery colored fall trees or bathing in the glow of snow flurries that lit the night sky in Ollie’s eyes like an army of dancing fireflies. But with such beauty and sensation constantly being thrust into his workings, a day of such beautiful mundanity felt almost as restful as sleep for Ollie. So he walked on, having lost count of his steps for the first time in as long as he could remember. He walked past his house, past his neighbor’s houses, past the park at the end of the block that hadn’t been safe, let alone maintained since Ollie was a child. He walked in a comfortable stupor with no aim or reason. Just a young boy enjoying a walk.

As he reached the end of his street’s row of houses and stood face to face with the forest that stretched on into the mountains, he started to regain a bit of his head and turned around, content to call it a day and have dinner with his family when he felt a pull. A pull that felt real and tangible in the same way he could see the steady flow of life that he felt in the living world around him. With all of his methods and tricks, Oliver had learned to be careful when he had to be. Which is why, on any other day, such an unprecedented feeling as the one tugging at him then would have been met with real concern, fear even. But today, the pull seemed like just another comforting piece of what may have been the most relaxing and carefree day of Ollie’s life. Even though the peaceful flood of calm had only just started in on Oliver’s senses minutes before,the rarity of it would have this day sticking to Ollie’s memory forever.

So he turned back.

In one fluid motion after turning, Ollie started into the forest, keeping up at a steady rate while stepping over, ducking under, fighting through the confines of the forest. Ollie was certain that his sure footedness and agile movement were being affected and enhanced slightly by his almost zen like mindset since stepping off the bus, but most of it had to do with Ollie’s age and size and familiarity with the land. He often used the forest as an escape of sorts. Despite the heightened sounds of wildlife and nature, there was something about the forest that offered a refuge from the chaos of civilised life.

As if guided by a compass, Ollie let the pull tug him deeper into the forest. It got stronger and stronger the closer he got and for a moment, a surge of fear blossomed up in Ollie’s mind. His concentration buckled momentarily as he considered there might be something wrong happening. Very wrong indeed. But then. The calm, comforting quiet blanketed over him once again and kept him on the path.

The right path.

It had to be.

Even the forest was peaceful and quiet and even that fact, disturbing in any other setting, made Ollie feel inspired and motivated, excited to keep on.

By the time Ollie saw what he thought to be a break in the trees, the caressing hands urging him forward had grown in strength to the point where Oliver could make it out audibly as what reminded him of a vibrating cell phone. Only this cell phone would have had to be the size of a two story building and vibrating in a constant stream. Oliver’s hands were covering his ears by the time he reached the clearing and he almost reconsidered passing through...

His foot crossed the threshold.

Total silence.

Total warmth.

A white light seemed to encompass Ollie’s vision and he shielded his eyes with his hands. As his eyesight adjusted, the first thing he saw was a stone path in front of him, splitting an impossibly open field of green grass that far exceeded the amount of space that should’ve been within the clearing. At the end of the stone lined walkway, Ollie thought he could see what looked like a fireball, suspended and pulsing above the ground. As he got closer, he started to make out that it wasn’t a ball of fire, but a flower.

A marigold.

Almost seeming to flicker like fire with each gust of wind that disturbed it’s stillness, colors flowed through the marigold like a liquid, cascading brilliant reds, oranges, yellows and blacks. Ollie could feel nothing but awe as he approached the flower. As he drifted closer, it became clear that the flower was not the size of any normal one of its kind. The bell of the flower looked to Ollie like an old gramophone speaker that his grandmother used to crank up during Christmas parties, only one big enough that he could nearly fit inside. Ollie stood just feet away from the flower and peered into its ever shifting swirl of fluid color. As he stared he noticed the colors start to move in a rapidly quickening, darkening spiral within the bell of the flower. Before long, the dark center gave way to what appeared to be another place, as if he were looking out through a window into a place that looked and felt to Ollie like a song.

Color and warmth, love and happiness, joy and peace floated in that other place and Ollie decided with no consideration that he would jump through.

Through to that beautiful place that tickled every one of his super senses right in their own personal sweet spot.

As Ollie was about to pick up his leg and step into that beautiful world that just had to have been made just for him, he felt something bump the front of his feet and looked down to see the flower touching his shoes.

Just then, the flower started to liquify and creep, lifelike around his feet. He would have let it consume his entire self with pleasure had he not raised his head for one more peek into the window of his soon to be home.

Only this time, the beauty was gone. Thrust out and replaced by something that looked like a nightmare handmade for Ollie. The comforting colors were replaced by flames, ripping at the air and making whip crack sounds that sent pain spiking through Ollie’s head. The warmth, replaced by searing heat that felt unnatural. Like it would take great pleasure in wrapping Ollie up, hearing him scream as the flames--

Ollie sprung backwards with all the force he could find on such short notice. The now solidifying plant held firm for a moment that lasted too long before stretching to its breaking point, crumbling and sending Ollie flailing backwards onto the forest floor. For longer than he knew, all Ollie could do was sit and stare, stare and think about how he almost just skipped happily into his own personal nightmare. Not only did Ollie feel the tug of the marigold on his feet and ankles as it tried to swallow him up, he felt the marigold wanting him. Wanting whatever special thing shone inside him.

It felt hungry.

Desperate.

When Ollie gathered the strength to stand and make his way out of the forest, slower this time, more carefully, he found his mind clamoring in the quiet around him. He couldn’t wait to reach the road so he could hear the patter of his sneakers on the pavement.