Winter's Fall

I awoke to my father's rendition of Claude Debussy's Clarie De Lune in my head, and chills filled my body. The sound of a grand piano always had the ability to make me buoyant, like when a bird mates with its calls and gets a response. I sat on the edge of my bed to put on my Gucci flip flops and robe and headed down the staircase to see my own piano empty, hoping that my father was actually here with me rather than in my head. It's been a year since he's gone missing, and I have already assumed the worst has happened to him.

"Father, I'm stuck with no closure knowing what happened to you and your enigmatic personality." I said sadly."There should be some type of guide or message left for me somewhere from you. You went missing at Whitester Lagoon, the place where we always went to for our annual trips. I must know what happened to you, it's only right as your son to uncover the truth of your disappearance!" I shouted in the empty room my father once played his music in.

I decided that today, the day that we were supposed to go to Whitester Lagoon, was the day that I would finally find out what the hell happened to my father. With desperate ambition, I put on a thick t-shirt, cold insulated pants, a winter coat and boots, hoping to discover what had happened to the man who would make me joyful with only the sound of his expert piano playing. I went outside and was instantly met with a harsh flurry of winter. "Goddamn it's cold!" I said as I shivered, hustling to my car outside my mansion. I swiftly got inside my car, started it up, and begun to head out to my final destination of where the truth is.

I drove at what I assumed was at mach 5 speed, and reached the woody entrance of Whitester Lagoon before I knew it. Suddenly as I grew closer to these woods, I felt a dreadful fear and realized my reckless abandonment of my plan. I had no idea what I was truly doing, my perspective of the place I once loved changed and I saw dangers everywhere. I chose to move with cautious faith, that your spirit would keep me safe from the frozen hell disguised as these woods that is embodied by darkness even during the day. I never truly noticed because I had you to guide me and keep me safe all these years. But not anymore.

As the light faded away with each step I took into the entrance of the haunting lagoon, the dying plant life grew more frightening deeper and deeper. I never realized how long it took to get to the halfway point, I knew I still had miles to go as I grew tired and weary and cold. And then from the corner of my eye, I noticed something odd yet hopeful. A single flower, surrounded by nothing but snow and dying trees. It looked mesmerizing.

I decided to rest next to the beautiful flower and I enjoyed the scent while I lit a fire to warm me up and keep it from being completely dark. I wanted to stay up just a bit longer to think about my next course of action, but faster than I drove to get to the lagoon to find my father, I suddenly passed out. I awoke to my father standing in front of me. He looked exactly like the last time I saw him, as if time itself halted only for him. He suddenly spoke in a solemn voice saying, "The place that we both loved led me to my death. I beg of you, my son. Escape here as fast as you can. Because as much as we love this place, it will never love us back." And then my father melted into a devil like creature that was my bête norie as a child and still haunts me on the nights I experience sleep paralysis. I screamed like the night that I had broken my legs trying to jump off the roof thinking I could fly like Superman. I was trying to run away but it felt like I was running in place no matter how fast I moved my legs. I couldn't escape the creature. It grabbed my leg and was dragging me to what I thought was Hell, telling me that I was about to join my father again. Little did I know that it wasn't Hell that I was being dragged into, but my own shallow grave.

I woke up from what I thought was a reality, but instead was a terrible nightmare. I noticed that the flower that brought me hope in this dark path was actually burned from the fire that I made before as I continued through the dark forest once again. I saw from the corner of my eyes, something moving from the shadows. I wasn't sure if it was paranoia from my dream earlier or if the same thing that hunted my father was hunting me. I wanted to run away as soon as possible, but I stood firmly in my resolve to figure out what happened to my father. As I stood and stared at what was approaching me, in the end my fear overtook me and I ran until I stopped at a shocking sight. I would have never been prepared to see what was in front of me. My father's body encased beneath a frozen lake, the very lake that he and I would go and see every year.

I rushed to the icy lake to free my father from its hold. I desperately punched the ice until my hands were bloody and I couldn't feel them anymore. And just as I was about to give up all hope with tears in my eyes, the ice suddenly broke, and my father's lifeless body began to sink. As did mine. I swam after his body as my body became numb from the sub-zero water. As I got closer to him, my consciousness was fading away. And as I was about to see an eternal darkness, I saw that my father's body suddenly disappeared from the water. That was the last thing that I saw. At my final moments I had finally accepted my father's death. And soon I would be joining him.

At least we'll be playing the piano together again...