The Color of Insanity | Teen Ink

The Color of Insanity

April 22, 2016
By bodhi227 BRONZE, Ridgewood, New Jersey
bodhi227 BRONZE, Ridgewood, New Jersey
4 articles 0 photos 0 comments

I was only about two blocks away from the place that I meant to destroy.  Only two blocks from the place that keeps me awake at night, shivering and dripping with sweat; a stray lamb in the dark woods.  Weak.  Cold.  Vulnerable.  Just waiting for the voice to devour me like the predator that it is.

I walked casually down Main St.  For one blissful moment, I felt like a normal person.  Wearing my normal outfit of tan pants, tan coat, white shirt, and a black tie, I could’ve passed for an average working class man, even with my unusual frail frame and pale complexion.
Suddenly, I felt it.
What?  How could this happen?  This hasn’t happened before, why now?  Why today? I thought frantically, the panic and fear seeping into my blood like the venom of a snake of pure jet.  The voice was high and shrill, similar to that of a bird from hell.
Hello, Benjamin.  I surprised you, yes?
I felt the voice reverberate through my skull.  I felt it begin to wrap itself around my body, encasing it...in red.  I slammed against the coarse brick wall next to me.  Fighting.
Yes, you do.  I have decided that you owe me, Benjamin.
I felt my face clench.  Contort.  I felt my veins expand and convulse as the voice tried to take me.  My breaths became ragged.  I gasped.  Choked.  Struggling, I managed to stumble down the clean, grey sidewalk towards my goal.
Oh, no.  This simply will not do.  Why are you fighting me, Benjamin?  You know you’re only going to lose.  You feel it this time, no?
“I don’t-t th-think tha-that-” I stammered as I staggered into an alley.  I collapsed from exhaustion.  A shattered mirror on the ground revealed that a pure, bright red color had pierced my prismatic green irises.  I coughed and some blood came up with it.
“Just...keep...g-going…”I stammered as I gasped for breath.  With a gigantic effort, I managed to heave myself into a standing position.
Going to go on?  Let’s see how far you’ll get with that.  Ha!
The harsh criticisms of the damned noise didn’t stop me.  My breaths became nothing but gasps for air, like a fish out of water.  The veins embedded in my arms were turning flame red.  The cool, curved metal of the clock burned against my skin.
I was losing.  I knew that.  I felt the crimson casing around my brain begin to get stronger. 
“GGGAAAHH!” I screamed as I rounded the corner. 
I then saw it.  The place that gave me my misery and the birthplace of the voice.  I managed to stagger toward a mound of bricks but then fell again. 
Alright, that will be enough.  I’m going to kill you now, Benjamin...just like you did to me.
I couldn’t hear anything.  My thoughts, the roar of the traffic on the highway, anything...except red.  I tasted crimson.  I smelled ruby.  The color drowned my senses in its waters of madness.  Another shard of mirror revealed that my green irises had surrendered the majority of it to the cursed color.
Still, I knew I had the strength to push on.  I had come too far and been through too much to give up now.  I couldn’t bear the bone-chilling idea of living-no, not living, only surviving- with this for the rest of my life.
I crawled towards my destination.  Slowly.
Do you even know who I am Benjamin?
My former guards, desperation and determination, were cut down by the deadly blade of the voice.
I shivered and my breaths were no more helpful than shoes on your hands.  I choked.  Coughed.  Everything was now dyed the color of my insanity.  The wind tugged at my now crimson clothes, trying to drag me away from my goal.  But no, no... I was not going to let that happen.
Fifty feet.  That was the distance separating me from my goal.  I could barely function.  The voice with its’ scarlet minions had taken almost everything over.  My heart, my stomach.  The maddening color oozed out of my palms in the place of sweat, sticking my hands to the ground temporarily.
I’m warning you, Benjamin.  Don’t even try, it won’t do you any good.
A hurricane of garnet blended everything together.  The blood of the world began to seep out of its every crack.  I couldn’t take it any more.  No amount of energy was going to propel me any further.  In this last moment of desperation, my convulsing hand jammed into my pocket and ripped out the ‘clock’.  I hurled it towards the house, and was blown back against a wall. 
And then, I remembered.  The flying plates, the screaming...my mother.  Her high, shrill voice piercing the air.  It was then that I realized.  The voice and my mother’s then merged into one...but nothing changed.  The voice didn’t falter in the slightest..
That’s right, Benjamin.  I told you that you owed me something.
And then nothing.


The author's comments:

I wrote this piece for my English class's Suspense Unit.  Wat I did not realize until after I wrote it is that it is most likely the best piece that I have ever written.  I hope that you enjoy it!


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