A New Type of Realism

(17) The Pretender

I hopped inside the vehicle, started the engine and began the short journey 'home', though if home is where the heart is, I'd left it far behind me, in the middle of that forest.

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"Hey! Can you open the gate?" I tried to get Slade's attention, but the mad man just continued to lounge against the inner fence. His eyes were closed as his face lifted towards the sky. I knew he had heard me, so he was just blatantly ignoring me. "Slade! For Christ's sake!" I must have been yelling for nearly twenty minutes, but to no avail. I'd only managed to make him wave his hand in my general direction, as if he was swatting a fly.

I'd given up trying to shake the walls of the outer fence to make him notice me, and I'd stopped trying to throw things over to land near him to get his attention. Eventually, I stopped shouting, and decided to wait for one of the other members of the group to step out from inside the bunker. There was no way on earth that Slade was going to let me in. Most likely, he knew how I felt about him, and treated me with what he felt like I 'deserved'.

I slumped down onto the ground with my back resting on the fence and my feet pressed against the side of the truck. I'd already tried to honk the horn to make him turn around and face me. Predictably, that hadn't worked either. He really was useless. He was the worst guard I'd ever come across.

I looked around to see if the area was safe, before closing my eyes and catching a few moments of sleep that I'd lost so far today. At least I tried to anyway, but the emotional scars of what had happened earlier had kept captive those moments that I wanted, and I ended up just staring up at the clouded, night sky, my mind blank, as it engaged in war with the scars it had made its enemies.

A while later, I was pulled from my comatose-like state by the sound of soft footsteps. I rubbed my eyes and turned my head to the side to catch a glimpse of Maggie walking towards Slade with what looked like a large pot of noodles. My stomach growled unintentionally. I guess I'd forgotten just how hungry I'd been, now, it was like there was a small baby monster in me, instead of a stomach, that constantly needed feeding to grow into a big, strong adult monster.

I slapped my monster stomach and slowly stood up. My legs were numb, as the position that I'd been sitting in had cut off some of the circulation to them. The inevitable 'pins and needles' feeling stabbed me from the knees down, though they felt much more like 'knives and swords'. I gripped onto the fence to hold myself up.

Maggie now stood next to Slade and easily managed to gain his attention by a simple whisper; 'Slade, I've got some food for you.' Damn. Why hadn't I thought of that? Slade, being Slade though, it wouldn't have worked on him if the words had come from me.

"Thanks Mags." He smiled at her, and she smiled back, though I could see the nervousness in her expression. Perhaps it was because she didn't know Slade, and was wary of his character, or perhaps I was being paranoid and was seeing things that weren't there. Maybe she was just concerned over me and my friend?

I found my voice as she was about to turn away, and shouted for her. She heard me, unlike the deaf Slade, and quickly ran to the entrance of the compound. She grabbed the small, black box from out of Slade's grasp and opened the gates for me.

"Dile! You're okay. God, you look awful." She spoke quickly, and once I was inside the compound, she refrained from welcoming me back with a hug, and instead, just patted a clean part of my shoulder affectionately. "How long were you waiting?" She asked with concern.

"Oh, not long." I smiled, I didn't want to cause another confrontation. She asked me something else, but I didn't hear her fully, and instead just walked up to Slade, giving him a nice, big bear-hug. I tousled his hair and then walked off to the bunker to see Cooper and Martin. I could feel Slade glaring at my retreating form, I had just covered him with mud, blood and other suspect things that I didn't particularly want to think about, after all.

"Hey guys." I smiled as I entered the bunker.

"Dile!" Martin said happily. He started to run towards me, but stopped when he realised the dirt filled state I was in. I walked towards him with my arms spread out, offering him a large hug, but he ran away. I started to chase him around, and through his laughter, I felt the joys of what normality we had left, coming back to me.

"You need a wash, you stink, mate." Cooper stated from where he was, with his face buried in a book with many mechanical diagrams that I didn't even attempt to interpret. Maggie smiled and nodded in agreement. She held her wooden spoon in one hand, and tried to swat me towards the washroom.

"Guys, it's the new fashion! I call it 'Apocalyp-esque'. I did a little spin to show them my outfit, earning a few laughs from Cooper and Martin.

"Seriously, though, go and wash before those half evolved creatures grow legs." Cooper said with a raised eyebrow and waved his hand to gesture to the state that I was in. I gave him a thumbs up before I started to walk away towards the washroom. True, the showers didn't work anymore, but we had a more than sufficient supply of clean water that I could use.

As I was walking away, I heard Maggie ask me that same question that she'd asked before, though my brain chose not to decipher its meaning and therefore failed to come up with an answer. The overall effect meant that I didn't fully hear what she had asked, and didn't ask for clarification.

As I entered the washroom, I was confronted with an image I had dreaded to see; my own reflection. I had caught a glimpse of myself back in the nightmarish public toilets, but the person I had seen then, barely resembled the individual stood in front of me.

That person had been young and relatively carefree. This stranger in the mirror was completely different. I had aged considerably since that moment, and the lines of stress echoed over my face as they were emphasised by the dirt that had scrabbled deep into every pore and every crevice. The once dull eyes would have seemed vibrant in comparison to the soulless windows that stared out at me.

I smiled to try and seek some sort of familiarity with who I was facing, but this was in vain.

Suddenly, I turned to face the door as a large knock resounded through the room.

"Hey, Dile, less festering, more sterilizing, are you trying to grow a colony in there?! Oh, and try not to take too long, Maggie's making you a welcome back meal," Cooper's voice rang across the room. He added as an afterthought in hushed tones, "I really do hope you're hungry..." I couldn't help but smile at this.

When I turned back to my reflection, I instantly recognized the person staring back at me. I wasn't lost after all. Satisfied that nothing had changed, I began to clean myself up.

When I had finally finished, I took a deep breath and smiled at myself once more in the mirror, though I was interrupted by the loud growling of my stomach. It really couldn't wait much longer, which was understandable, considering that I hadn't eaten throughout the entire day. I brushed myself down one last time, and opened the door to reveal the room full of expectant faces.

I breathed in, hoping to smell the oddly sweet aromas of Maggie's famous soup surprise. My stomach growl once more at the thought.

Yet when I properly took the time to survey the room around me, I was not greeted with a row of smiling faces, awaiting to tuck into a massive feast, like I had hoped. On the contrary, I saw solemn expectancy and grim determination. They were all sitting down, though they were obviously not comfortable, as many of them fidgeted when my gaze fell upon them.

Maggie motioned me to sit on the empty chair set out beside them, which I graciously accepted, hoping to lighten the mood with blissful ignorance. I ended up just adding tension to the atmosphere.

Once I was sitting down comfortably, half expecting everyone to suddenly smile and shout 'surprise', and Maggie to present me with the biggest cup of soup, she instead looked at me with a gaze of such emotion, that it would have made an excellent poker face.

"Devyn, where's Kyle?"

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Re-written: 28th May 2016