Life Beyond the Trees

Chapter One

Life Beyond the Trees

Chapter One

°•°•°•°•°

Darkness: Tell a Lie

°•°•°•°•°

David:

There is a man sitting on a bench made of golden rust. A wiry figure wearing a hat that has been on his head so long the feeling of its presence has long since gone. He has a cup with nothing in it held tightly in his right hand, his other is playing the ivory keys of a piano softly. He has no rhythm, pushing random keys as he tries to remember who he was before.

He sighs and looks at the old copper piano covered in a thin layer of dust. How long has he been here? How long has he been the victim of his own crime?

The clock's hands tick at a painfully slow pace, but time doesn't seem to matter as he sets there, uncomfortable with his own presence.

He pushed another key, the deep tone resounding throughout the darkness that surrounded his body and thoughts. His eyes began to droop slightly but it didn't affect him. Nothing did anymore.

°•°•°•°•°

The man began to wonder. He closed his eyes, his thoughts coming back ever so slightly. He was chasing them, and he managed to catch a piece, a glimpse into the life of himself, a stranger, but the moment was gone all too quickly and soon he was back to the blankness that overtook his new life.

He opened his eyes, ready to give up on regaining his memories, the thought of them not coming back plaguing his thoughts, but instead of seeing the rotting piano in front of him, he saw the trunks of trees and the greens of the grass beneath his feet. He scanned his new surroundings, his eyes having a hard time adjusting. He looked up hoping to see the pale blue of the sky, only to be disappointed by the canopy of blackness created by the trees that towered over him. No matter where he looked he felt as if he was trapped. Trapped in the never-ending wonder as to what was beyond the trees.

What was beyond life itself? He looked up further to see more of the achromatic sky that peeked out of the dark greens of the leaves, just out of his reach.

How did he get here?

"It doesn't feel nice does it? The feeling of being trapped? Not having the power to be able to stop anything that's happening to you?" The voice traveled throughout the abyss of emptiness surrounding him. He turned as the voice began to thin out through the trees until nothing could be heard.

"Hello? Who's there, what's that supposed to mean?" He called. Spinning around in search of the owner of the voice, but every way he turned looked the same as the last.

"You'll know the full meaning soon enough." The voice laughed, a truly angelic sound that projected through the trees and cascaded all around him.

A sensation of numbness coursed through his veins, leaving a feeling of a thousand small pins and needles poking the inside of his body. Just moments before he was setting and wasting away in the way of all flesh at a piano and now, in a split second, he was in the middle of a forest, he corrected himself, the middle of nowhere. All he could think about was the voice, and how it struck such a strong sense of familiarity in him.

He knew her voice. He could feel the memories surfacing, but when he tried to reach for them, they only drifted further into the depths of his mind, where the rest of his life remained. He knew nothing of himself, and no matter how hard he tried or how many times he sat at the piano, playing random notes, he just couldn't can't seem to remember.

All he wanted to do was remember. To know why he felt such a weight on his chest. Or why the voice was so enthralling. He wanted to know why his entire existence felt like a lie. Everything about him seemed like a lie.

"And I'm glad to have a front row seat."

°•°•°•°•°