Sakura Sweet Chapter 3 part 1: Fish Sticks

Done. Done with the world. That’s what he was; done. Done with the world. All the way done. Where was he now? All he could see were the trees of the Fangorn Forest. How did he knew which forest it was? He didn’t. But it looks like the Fangorn forest. All creepy and viney and full of Tolkeinesque evils. Like the giant spiders. He hated those giant spiders as they were described in Tolkien’s books. None of them. He didn’t want to see any of them. Any of them—if he were to see them he would crap his pants then, there, no matter where he was; in the bathroom included.

Hah. In the bathroom. As if such pleasures existed in this world. Where was he? He didn’t know.

Grass. Grass everywhere. The Fangorn forest in the distance. Mist. Mist that covered the ground and made his feet hard to see—but it did not go above his ankles—he could still see the tips of the long green shards which he assumed was grass but in reality did not know the true nature of in any conceivable way. He could be hallucinating. Probably was. He decided not to test it.

Bend down. Touch the grass. One, two, three, five and a dime and it’s done. He picked a blade of grass—it separated from its roots and pulled up a clod of dirt up with it. So it was grass after all. It really was grass. Grass was green. This stuff was green. He could touch it, feel it, breathe in its scent—he had it up against his nose. Grassy. The stuff of magic. Of course it would be the stuff of magic—but what did that matter to him? He wasn’t JRR Tolkien. He wasn’t anybody. Nobody at all. Just Johnathan the schizophrenic. No longer loved by Emile. No longer loved by everyone.

He sat down. He looked at his hands. He felt the cold touch of dew grass against his Golutius maximus shumaxiomus. His butt. But he was wearing pants. Was the grass really that wet? He picked another blade and sniffed it.

I should be going now. He got up and looked around. Where should I go from here? Help was probably on the way. Probably. Unless he had entered another universe. From there he could see the stars, see the night sky as it rotated above him. He looked and he sighed at the beauty of it all. Maybe he wasn’t crazy after all. Maybe it was his own fault for doing something so stupid in the first place—did he really do it? Or was it thrust onto him? Maybe both. A little of both.

He didn’t like to think about it hat way. He liked to think about it in his own way. The way that he had always been taught—the way it was supposed to be done, the way that people had always done to him—the way that he hated which included mental hospitals and shock treatment and the stench of grey death on the hardware with which they killed people and treated schizophrenics—all the same chair. Just different doses of electricity. Different doses. Did they kill him? They might have. He might be dead. This might be—

Heaven. Maybe he was in heaven. It certainly looked like heaven. But it was very open, happy, a nice place to be in. Not at all like the heaven he imagined. Full of rude people who thought they deserved to be there. You don’t deserve to be there either. Shut up. No you shut up. Begone.

He listened. Was he gone? The voice in his head? Maybe. I think so. What made him think so? He didn’t know. He didn’t want to know.

Things stayed the same. He had let everything go. Hadn’t he? A long time ago. He had given up. That’s why he didn’t take his medicine. Not because he forgot. But because he was tired. So tired. Tired to the bones—chilled to the bones. All the way down to his innermost being—the marrow, the place where his blood cells were created and the place from which everything else grew, his body, his head, his mind—all of it was blood.

Good going. You got through it. He thought. They were definitely his own thoughts. His own thoughts. He had control. Control over what he would do with his life. Where was he now? Where was this place? What was this place? How did this place come into being? Was it all in his head?

No, it wasn’t. It wasn’t in his head. He could feel the grass. Smell the glue that held the world together—was it the fog? What was it?

“Hello there.” A traveler. Dressed in a black clockwork metal suit with night-like absorptive properties and the sheen of a carrot given all its peel removed. Or something like that. Johnathan had no meter with which to judge this man’s craziness. “Good morning.” The man spoke. He also lifted his arm at the same time with a gun in the palm of his hand. Not aimed at Johnathan. Not aimed at all. Nowhere did Johnathan see any probable thing which might occur at this moment of a consequence of his contact with this man. In other words, he felt as if this man could be given a trusting spirit without the fear of its abusive relationship becoming snarled with hope. Hope was the real word here. Hope was the thing which Jonathan most desired. Did he have hope that this man would be friendly? Would be an ally? He looked at his feet—they were bare. He spoke.

“Who are you?”

The man in the black suit gave no reply for a long moment. Then he moved. Click, clack, his armor went. Clickety clack like an insect train on horse racing day. Shumorse racing day. Who was it? Who could they be? Johnathan needed to find out. He spoke.

“Can you please—“ he was cut off.

“My name is Arl,” said the man in the black armor suit. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

“What do you mean?” Johnathan asked. He continued to stare at the ground on which his feet stood, the place where they resided when he wasn’t looking at them—what kind of a place was that? Was it a good place? Did his feet like it? I think they do. My feel like gold, I don’t want them to fall off. Will they fall off? He shook his head. They wouldn’t. They love me as I love them. Nice feet. He had nice feet. They were very warm and nice feet. Even though it was cold. How could that be?

A sword. The gun in the black suited man’s hand turned into a sword. His name is Arl. His name was Arl.

“Arl?” Johnathan said. “Is that you name?”

Arl simply tilted his head. “It is if you want it to be.”

Johnathan shook his head twice, then three times. “I don’t know. Do you know what I want from life?”

Arl did not respond for a very long time. Then he shifted on his feet. “Come,” he said. “I will show you the true nature of your being.”

Come? What kind of come did this person expect from him? A sexual come? That would have been nice in the moment. Jonathan couldn’t remember the last time he had a sexual come. Was it ten years ago? Twenty? With whom, Emile? Definitely not her. They were all out to get him. All of them. But not. Not anymore. He was safe. How did he know that? He didn’t. Not at all did he know what was going to happen from here on out—but he had the intuitive feeling that he was safe.

I can come out now. I can do this myelf. I no longer need my shield. My shield has come off. It is me. I am this world’s king. Are I not? You are.

“I am,” he said, and looked the black-shouldered man in the eyes. “Arl. You said that was your name, correct?”

Arl simply gave a single nod and did not say a word. “And who are you to say it isn’t?”

“It is.”

“Very well. My name is Arl to you, then.” Arl shifted on his feet again. “And you may still call me what you wish. I will call you master.”

“From now on?”

“From now on until the end of that which has no end. Until the end of time.”

Arl tilted his head to the left. “Will you come?”

“I will come. With you. To wherever you are going, I will come with you.”

Arl bowed his head and his shoulders. “Very well. You may come with me if you wish.”

He didn’t move an inch. Neither did Johnathan. They stayed in that position for a very long eternity momentarily transfixed by each other. Who was he? Thought Johnathan. To himself. No proxies needed. Who was this man who stood in front of him in full black armor, so much armor that he could not see his eyes. Who was he then, that he could imagine someone like Johnathan to be the ruler of the world? Why did Johnathan need to think that way? What happened to his life? His old life? Emile? Where was she? Was she gone? . . . Help me and you will find peace. That is what Gerald said to him as he died in the mental hospital of a drug overdose—they overdosed him with lithium and then as a punishment for an unrelated “crime” put him in solitary with no food or water for three days. And lithium does not play nice with the dehydrated. Not nice at all because of who it is and who it represents. Not that Johnathan knew much about brain chemistry. All he knew is that Gerald had died. All the way. Dead. Never to be seen again. Because he trusted the doctors.

You can’t trust doctors.

And why can’t I?

Johnathan looked the black-suited man in the eyes through his eye slits. He could see them. They were green. Quite feminine as a matter of fact. Why were they feminine? Was there a reason? Or was it just another delusion. Another delusion? Johnathan had had enough of those in his lifetime. Not just one too many but thousands to many. The first one was the worst. The last one was the biggest. And now he was trapped in a strange blank world with a man in a black suit of armor at his side who called himself Arl but whose real name he did not know—perhaps the man really was named Arl. Perhaps. Did it matter—no, it did not. Johnathan took a step forwards. “What are you doing?” He said. The man looking at him bowed his head to the ground. He then looked up from his position and hung his head in a statement of humility.

“You are my king.”

Johnathan said nothing. He only knew in his bones that the man in the black suit was right. Arl. He would be called Arl from now on. “I christen you Arl.” Arl shifted and looked at his hands.

“I suppose you can call me that after all. It’s not what people usually call me but I think it’s worth it to at least try. Keep going with it and you might find something useful to come out of it. Keep going and then you will see what kind of a place you have entered. You do know where are, right?”

Johnathan answered: “No, I don’t.” He really didn’t know where he was. Why was he here? Where was he. He asked that question of himself again, and then again. Where was he?

Arl abruptly turned around. He began to walk away. Johnathan reached out his arm—Arl stopped. He turned around.

“Come. That is all I can tell you at this moment.”

Johnathan began to walk, slowly at first, and then quicker as Arl increased his step.

“Are you okay with an information dump?” Arl said.

“Dump?” Johnathan asked. “What do you mean by that.”

“You’re the king. You need to know some things before you go on your quest.”

Johnathan said: “Quest? What Quest?” He paused and waited for an answer.

The answer came. “You will see.” Arl quickened his pace some more as if he were in a hurry to get to the place he needed to be at that moment. However, Johnathan didn’t sense any impatience seeping out of Arl’s body. He was calm. Strangely calm. As if his armor were blocking Johnathan from getting a read on his emotions. Was it even true? Was it even possible for things to be this way? Arl stopped. Johnathan stopped with him.

“Where are you taking me?” Johnathan asked.

Arl answered: “Your quest begins here.” A door shot up from out of a trench in the ground and filled with a shiny liquid bubble that pulsated orange, red, orange, purple, orange, orange orange and sunshine and little bits of darkness swirling around in their complicated dance patterns—the patterns which for some reason Johnathan found oddly appealing. “I will now let you in. Step forth. Johnathan. I now christen you Christ.”

Johnathan—Christ—stepped forwards. He took off his hat. Had he been wearing a hat before? He didn’t know. Actually, he most likely wasn’t. Because the hat was made of gold and he would have noticed if it were there—gold was heavy. Very heavy.

Arl motioned towards the door. “I am the gatekeeper,” he said. “I will protect you in this realm. I cannot guarantee you anything else. Do you wish to put your life in danger for the sake of an unkown amount of people you have never met?”

Johnathan did not need to think about that one. “Yes.” He stepped through the door.