To Vore Dignity

The Big Black Car

Through the haze of late evening I can't see where the road ends, or begins. The only markers of distance are my feet. One step after another...

Oily liquid falls from the black sky, like potion escaping a leaky cauldron. It collects as tepid puddles in the pockmarked asphalt. It burns through my shoes when I step in it, then my toes, exposing the white bone; but there's no pain. I decide it isn't rain (not normal rain).

The sound of an old engine rumbles far off, like thunder beyond mountains. It's grown closer over the years.

I don't know that it's been years. Call it a guess.

I wonder, turning my head to stare at where I think I came from -the same uneven road fading away to a prick- how soon will it get here? And who, when (if) it does, will be riding in it?

The road. I hate it like one hates the sun after a long day of working under its glare. Not a real hate. Just something to pass the time.

One step.

Two steps.

One-hundred-ten.

I never slip up or loose count. Sometimes I just stop. There's an eternity following me.

I don't get tired either. I listen to the car. I watch the desert on either side. Scraggly bushes, broken stumps. I never see animals, and I never leave the road.

Three steps.

Four steps.

I never lay down to sleep.

Five, six-hundred, seven-thousand.

Maybe a billion years have passed.

I wish I could go insane.

A black car rolls slowly by, tires crunching, motor like an eldritch beast. Fog swirls behind it, following the helter-skelter sputtering of the exhaust. I never thought it would come, and here it is like it was never not there.

I peer through the window as it passes. It's dark inside, as if a thick smog sleeps over the seats. Among it, I can make out the thin shape of a face staring ahead.

Something inside me stutters when the back lights flicker red. The car stops. Idling, impatient beast.

For the first time in infinity, I stop.

Years waiting, listening to it grow closer. There's no question of should I.

The door creaks when I open it. The black fog fades into the seat. What was the point to all of this?

I walked forever.

I smile, and get in...