Unwritten

This Is Your Home: Brendan James Johnson

Brendan doesn't like being alone. It's a weird realization to come to, given that he spends most of his free time on his own, avoiding the exuberant crowds that fill London from Heathrow to Piccadilly. His heart's lament for company is a clandestine one, as out of place as the smell of truffles in the house of a dieting twink, but it's undeniable nonetheless. He has learned, during this vacation, that spending time alone isn't half as good as spending time alone with someone else, just two people hiding out from the storm in a bubble that belongs to them and them alone, never to be interrupted by anyone else.

Is there even anyone left on the island? He doesn't know anymore, but he wanders the resort nonetheless, hoping to find he isn't the only soul left. Ever since yesterday, when he felt the waves claim him as their own for a few forbidden moments, Brendan hasn't seen a sign of life in the resort. He's seen proof of some forgotten occupants: empty glasses, sometimes spilt over and over a sticky puddle on the floor, reeking of the morning after a party, when everyone has left and it's the host's duty to clean up, alone and forgotten by the rest. He's craving, more than anything, for someone to appear behind him and wrap his arms around his waist. For someone to help him clean the mess that isn't him in the first place, but that he's been saddled with either way.

But no one shows up.

He waits, still, for a split-second – a single moment's hesitation while he takes in the extremity of the scene before him – then gets to work. He expects plastic to crinkle under his hands as he picks up the first glass, but finds that it is, in fact, breakable. Fragile, even. It shatters in his hand, prompting a scream as Brendan jumps back. It's glass. How, then, did it wind up on the floor so perfectly spilled, waiting to be touched before it fell apart? There's a strange magic in the air, and it makes him shiver. It's the same one that brought Long John to his room, that made the sea speak to him so, that seems to stare over his shoulders at his every movement, waiting for the perfect moment to remind him that he is not, in fact, alone. He just feels it.

When he picks up the second glass, Brendan is more careful. Much more. It complies with his shaky hand, and after a quick wash it's good as new. The process of cleaning is a slow and painful one, more than anyone would think necessary. His hands tremble all the while; he holds his breath with each glass. At any moment, he could trigger something that makes the entire room crumble over him. The thought should unsettle him – terrify him, even – but with the last week in his hindsight it seems habitual. Foolish, even. What's cleaning up a room, compared to offering your body to an oversexed cowboy, or your being to the sea? There's some kind of symbolism there, only he can't be bothered to find it. He's never gotten the point of analyzing his own work: it spoils the fun. What's left for others to say about it, once he's already admitted the meaning? Not that anyone talks about his work – but he likes to think they will, one day. Once he writes something more than Hoe Down. Something real. Something that isn't clouded in his fantasies of lives that never could be.

After a few hours, the bar is spotless again. The smell hasn't left no matter how much spray Brendan spritzes into the air. He found it on abandoned cart full of Pam's supplies, yet another reminder that he's alone in the resort. They must be somewhere, though. Waiting for him, maybe. Maybe this is all an extravagant prank, some kind of treasure hunt that's meant to spark your nerves and peak your adrenaline until you can write even the most harrowing of tensions. Maybe – but even he doesn't believe that.

Curiosity tempts him to ask even more questions, even though there's no one to answer him, but he rejects it. Whatever is happening, it's best he doesn't know. It hits him that he should be looking for a way out – there must be one somewhere, after all, and if the others found danger he's walking right towards that, too – but the thought doesn't stick. There's a shiver that comes with it, as though trying to leave would be more sinister still than whatever's lurking out there. So he closes his eyes, and takes a breath, and

And the door opens with a chill. It beckons him forwards, and even though Brendan's never sat through an entire horror movie he's very much aware that this is never a good sign. The thing they don't show in the movies is the compulsion. The feeling that, no matter how dangerous what lies ahead is, staying back would be worse. Because when the horror wants you to move towards it, it'll make you one way or another. And it tends to be much nicer if you do as your told.

That doesn't mean Brendan feels calm or resolved as he moves forward. Each step is half of one, a hesitation towards the forest that seems to stretch on endlessly before him. Each second comes with a sharp breath, a panicked huff of air as he steps closer towards an unknown yet certain fate. Brendan has never been the type to strive for heroics – even as a kid, he'd rather read about knights slaying dragons than pretend to be one – but somehow this is on his shoulders. Maybe that's why it's on his shoulders. Maybe whatever is out there knows he's the least likely to be any good, and saved him for last because it thought he'd be the easiest to take down.

No. The tide of his thoughts almost never sways in his favour. Usually, they berate him with one insult after another, each one crashing into him like the slowly building wave of his anxieties. Today, however, it finally prompts him. It pushes him forward, lifts his chin, turns his steps into strides, and puts a fire in his eyes. You can do this. People need you to do this.

Be a hero.

But how? What is a hero, even, to one who's only ever dreamed of happiness, and to whom glory is a distant thought, so far away it may as well live in the realm of his novels? Both are illusions, after all, and yet it's in his grasp. Surely, no one will ever hear the story of what happened at Ariston's Writer's Resort, but the others will know. So he pushes forward, though by now there is nothing but forest on every side of him. It wasn't this big, he's sure of it, but suddenly it's engulfed him whole and there's still no soul to be seen. Nothing but him and the rock, gleaming in the darkness.

As he steps closer to the stone, the cliché of it all is almost enough for Brendan to turn around and leave altogether. He can tolerate the idea of being on a probably magic island; he can tolerate cleaning up a magically halted party; he can even tolerate offering himself as a BDSM slave to the sea. But this is too much. Too absurd. There's a sword in the stone before him, so out of the place that it can't possibly be on this island – but it is. And he knows the story, so he steps forwards.

And he grips it.

And he pulls.