Dead End

Life Could be a Dream

       Apollo wakes to a blinding light right in his face. He peeks open an eye and squints against sun light. Why is he outside? Oh, right. He's having that weird dream. He looks down. Bad idea. He is flying 100 feet over the ocean and feels like he is going to throw up. A seagull flies in the opposite direction far below him. He must still be dreaming. Sure enough, his fingers are transparent. Apollo squeezes his eyes closed again and waits for the nightmare to pass.

       Apollo is still spinning away over the ocean. Is this what Hell is like? The sun has risen and is level to Apollo's altitude. He feels emotionally wrecked, as if his fall not only injured his body. I really am dead. I'm going to spend eternity orbiting earth.

       Unable to fall back to sleep, Apollo thinks on everything that had happened so far and his anger against Jayden solidifies. He passes several types of birds, a few boats, and an island. The sun is now directly above Apollo and every time he looks at himself he has a heart attack when he can't see his body. Then he remembers that he's a ghost or something.

∞

       The sun is setting over the horizon and Apollo has passed the day in bitter and half-conscious awareness of the disappearing sun. He's gazing at the horizon as he has been for the past few hours, when he sees something in the distance that looks distinctly like land. Finally.

       Pretty soon, he is flying over a beach city with neat shops and little cafes, that looks sort of English. He waves and screams and shouts. No one can see him. He is completely invisible. He watches the town fly by in weary resignation. Then another town. Then a forest. He begins to slow down and nears the ground. He is alert and on edge after having spent so long flying. Dark castle battlements rise over the tree tops ahead of him. As he grows closer he begins to see a rough stone wall and big mosaic windows. A high arch looms over a towering wooden door with metal rivets and a large metal knocker. He lands in a clearing and, if it weren't for his ghost like properties, he probably would have fallen over with dizziness. The castle is enormous, its wings extending far to the left and right, with towers at the corners of the building. He looks around. Dark, shady forests to his left and right.

       And behind him... Cars? They are parked in a parking lot not far behind him. Black Cadillacs, a pristine white limousine, stark Mercedes. All parked neatly on a grassy stone lot. Huh. Strange.

       He turns back to the grey stone castle, it's solemn countenance uninviting. He tries to walk in the other direction but is unrelentingly swept to the walls. He yells in surprise as he is about to flatten into the building, but passes through, as if he were a ghost. A light, tinkling laughter rings from a near by room and Apollo looks in just in time to see a long dining table, rich people, an enormous fireplace, and then is swept past. It's like their English royalty. He glides down an ancient looking hallway with open archways on either side revealing luscious, colorful gardens and trees to the left and right. He passes through a wooden door and continues down another hallway with rusty torch holders set into the walls on either side. Though this hallway looks exactly like the others, this one is completely enclosed and is dark and feels unused. He reaches the end of the hallway and the current fades away. He is now lost and completely alone.

       "Hello?" His voice does not echo, but seems as if it is entirely in his head. Like if he had just plugged his ears and spoke.

       "Nothing to lose, right? Just a dream..." Apollo continues down the corridor. Rough stone curve around smooth stone benches set into the walls in even intervals. Everything is coated in dust. His feet leave no footprints on the floor behind him. Nobody has been here for a very long time. Another old wooden door is partly opened at the end of the hallway. He passes through it and into a large, spacious room. It is a commons area that looks as if it hasn't been used in a hundred years, with dusty, faded red couches lining the walls and large archways leading into rooms spaced evenly around the curved wall. A thick dark carpet obscured in dust covers the floor. Dirty mosaic windows curve along the circular walls high toward the top of the ceiling. The room extends high above Apollo like a tower, coming to a point.

       "Why was I brought here?" Apollo yells. Nobody answers.

∞

       Apollo first starts off by exploring the three rooms connected to the commons. There is a drawing room directly to the right of the door he came in from, with a study room directly to the left and a master bedroom right across. The drawing room has rough grey stone walls like that of the entire North wing in which he is in. The drawing room is furnished in a very stylish manner, with paintings hung up between the colorful mosaic windows and a decaying, wooden piano in front of a large, curved window. There is a fire place on the right wall of the room, with sofas and couches set around the fireplace.

       In the study room, though it is really more of a library, the curved walls are covered in wooden shelves, which contain volumes and volumes of faded, dusty books of all colors and sizes. Who even reads all those? In the middle of the room is a desk with an old, sturdy lamp on one corner and a few open books spread across its surface. Apollo walks to the desk, his feet not even making footprints in the layer of dust coating the floor, and sees that it is a family album, all in black and white. Apollo curiously sits in the plush sofa and begins flipping through the album's dusty pages. In the very front of the book, most of the pictures are paintings of serious looking people in very old style clothing, nothing he really cares about. The most recent picture is of a man in a suit, eye glass perched on his nose. He has sharp features, with a very delicate pointed mustache and an even sharper nose. The guy's name is apparently Bindly Cooring Armingham. And he's the owner of this place. Apollo learns that the north wing has been entirely uninhabited since, what the family album had said, 1830.

       He wanders to the grand master bedroom, with plush red velvet bed covers and long thick curtains draping the walls. Stout wooden furniture is set against the walls with a little plaque on the bedside table. Apollo crosses the room and as he nears the golden plaque, can just make out the dusty letters;

       Though thou art not beside us in this life, we shall see the again in the life to come. Be not troubled, and rest in peace.

      In honor and respect for his great service in the Irish Arsitocracy and ownership of his Majesty's castle, we pronounce him forever patron to this country. The West Wing of Cowekirnum Castle shall be preserved in memory of Bindly Cooring Armingham. Bindly Cooring Armingham will forever remain here.

       Apollo could hardly read the cursive and when he did, it made no sense. Bindley Cooring Armingham will forever remain here? Apollo looks to the bed. No dead man there. I guess he isn't literally here. That's a good thing.

∞

       Apollo wanders back the way he came, through the halls and to the big room with all the people that he had seen earlier. It is now completely silent, the feast having ended. The huge clock above the mantel at the end of the room says 9:37 p.m. A conversation echoes down the hallway and Apollo ducks back out of the room. A mother in a long flowing purple dress is scolding her son, who is wearing overalls and a neat bow tie. A brown cap is placed atop his perfectly combed brown hair. The mother looks around, looking right through Apollo, and bends into a crouch. She begins dusting off the little boy's fingers and Apollo sees clear finger prints on one of the dusty windows in the hallway. The boy looks up and stares directly at Apollo. Apollo freezes. He can see me.

       The mother is saying, "You can't touch anything. This place is a family heirloom and we could be responsible for breaking anything. If we –"

       "Look mommy, stranger." The boy points directly to Apollo. But Apollo doesn't move. Part of him wishes to be seen.

       The mother looks directly through him and stands up, taking the boy's hand as she walks back toward Apollo but heads off to the left up some sweeping stairs. The boy twists to watch Apollo. Apollo wakes from his stupor and follows the pair up the stairs after they are out of sight. Down the hallway, guest bedroom doors extend down either side and end at a curved wall with a window overlooking the nighttime forest. The mother and son open room 11 and close the door behind them. Apollo pauses outside of the door, strangely lonely. He goes to the end of the hallway and looks at the moon and the stars. Just a dream, just a dream. He closes his eyes and descends into sleep.