The Dreich

Dreich is borrowed from Scots dreich (“hard to bear, dreary, tedious, wearisome; interminable, long-winded; dull, uninteresting; slow, tardy; doleful, gloomy; baffling, difficult; difficult to reach, inaccessible”), from Middle English dregh, dri, drie (“burdensome; depressing, dismal; large, tall; lasting, long; long-suffering, patient; tedious; of blows: hard, heavy; of the face: unchanging, unmoved; of a person: strong, valorous”)

The Dreich

It felt like it had always been there, but I don't think it was there last week, I may be wrong, but I can't remember it.

It appeared on the common land outside the village, like a cloud of cold premanent drizzle and mist. The grass in immediate proximity was not wet though, you would have expected it to be sodden and mussdy but it wasn't.

If you looked for long enough, you could see shadowy forms moving within what had been christened "The Dreich" . Every so often there was a gold or red glow, like a ray from a lighthouse , but no one I asked was any the wiser. It was just there.

This was an enigma, a mystery but no one could tell me anything about it, but I was feeling more drawn to it every day, but resisted the temptation, which is unusual for me. The thing is not everyone could see it, and I asked one person who came out of it what was in there, but he looked at me as though I were insane.

For some it appeared and disappeared, and when questioned they said "It's just the Dreich"

There were rumours that some went in and were never seen again, but we couldn't ask them about it.

Every day I went.

Every day it was there.

The temptation to enter was getting almost impossible to resist.

There were some who seemed to go in and come out but they seemed blissfully unaware of it.

I don't know if it is was my ludicrous curiosity, or just that I so often give in to temptation, but I had to go in and find out.

I walked through the cloud and rain wall into a world of grey mist. I wasn't sure this was right, so I turned back, but all I saw was rain and mist. I had only taken three or four steps, but three or four steps back I was in a world of grey swirling fog.

I saw a figure, and called out but it drifted away, like a grey ghost. I saw more but didn't know whether they were passing though or were permanent residents like I had seemed to become.

Towards what I assumed to be the centre was the odd flash, sometimes red, sometimes gold.

The cold drilled into my bones and the mist was soaking my clothes, there was no way to warm up, there was no sun, just a permanent grey, not darkness, but not light either.

The next figure I saw I made a grab for when it did not acknowledge me but it disintegrated into a million pieces then reformed in front of me and said these words:

"Do you not realise? This is your purgatory, your Limbo. You will stay here until your door opens. Red will take you to the flames of Hell, Gold to the Gates of Heaven."

Me: "I need to get home, my family are waiting for me. I also have a job to go to"

"There is no going back. You made the choice. You are gone from that world. Your door will open and you will depart from this to whatever fate your have built for yourself in your life"

I was in shock.

I would never see my family or friends again, and they would think I had just run off. There would not even be a body.

Then the RED DOOR appeared and opened ......