On the Run by M Zeigler (short story to read TXT) 📖

you. But your place in heaven will not be secure, you would have time to mess up.” The man who woke me gives a sorrowing explanation.

“Clyde Barrow is nothing but trouble, but you still searched for him. I understand now.” I breathe out closing my eyes, it’s becoming hard to focus on what is happening right now, like some outside force is trying to eliminate this moment. When my eyes re-open I’m standing back on highway one fifty four watching Bonnie and Clyde’s car be shot up, the world spins quickly now threatening to knock me over, when it stops I can see a phantasmal version of my own grandmother running through tall grass thrashing at the green fauna screaming for Clyde.

“He’s nothing but trouble but he’s the best thing to ever happen to me, I loved him.” I hear my grandmother whisper into my ear. “Understanding, let go of the past, trust, love.” My grandfather’s voice whispers in my ear as the ground below me vanishes I fall for a short spell until I am standing on the water of Hidden Pass Lake watching myself.

Standing outside the cabin by the edge of the water pulling my shirt and pants off, Barrette stands back at the porch averting his gaze, respectfully, something that any other man would forget about. Then he looks directly at me making his snarky remark. I was so ignorant to how he was reacting to me; I’ve never viewed myself as anything other than average.  

My vision of the lake fades, I’m now suddenly feeling cramped in the backseat of a vintage car looking at a bloody mess before me. My grandmother has umpteen bullets holes going through her in every direction, Clyde is slumped over the steering wheel barely hanging on to life as he reaches out for my grandmother. “I’m sorry Bonnie, I never meant for this to happen.” Clyde speaks taking his last breath.

“Barrette!” I scream out when the vision starts to fade away just as I’m trying to reach into the driver’s seat as if I could do something to save him.

My hands never reach the seat though, the world around me is just a hazy black fog, I can hear music playing, and it’s a familiar tune, Aint no grave, Johnny cash. But I can’t feel anything, the lyrics make feel as if I’m already doomed to die even though I’ve change my mind and want to return to Barrette.

“Barrette where are you!” I scream trying to move my feet to run but I am not on the ground so I cannot move, in fact my limbs are not moving at all.

“Barrette!” Another scream leaves my lungs as I try to claw at the black haze closing in on me, what is this and why won’t it leave me?! I shriek in my mind, I can hear cemetery bells gonging all around me, am I already dead? Am I hearing my funeral?

“Bonnie Elizabeth Parker.” I hear my full name being spoken in a deep monotone voice all around me. After hearing this voice my feet finally touch ground, the black haze starts to clear out but does not entirely vanish.

I’m standing in a very cold, dark, yet grand and glorious room, almost designed like a Roman Gothic Cathedral with a Greek stone touch. The floor below me is entirely made up of black polished granite; the walls are made of the same material only they lack the sparkling touch the floor has. Before me are two massive spiraling pillars with an arch way door between the two, I cannot see what lies within the hall, the haze seems to flowing from within the said hall which blocks my view. Above the hall’s arch is a window that seems to arc with the flow of the hall, the glass standing in the window depicts a tall shrouded form holding a staff of some sort. There is a beige horse standing behind, the horse is merely a skeleton, nothing more. I can see the entirely of the detailed glass even though no light shines in and no light shines out.

“And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts, I looked and behold, a pale horse, and its name it said on him was death. And hell followed with him.”  The same deep monotone voice quotes the closing for the Johnny cash song ‘When the man comes around’ following this mysterious voice comes the sound of tapping, left, right, staff. The sound repeats over and over until the same gloomy form in the arch way window can be seen standing before me, he is well shadowed but is what one might call, death.

His height is no more than six foot one, a slender yet muscular build whose eyes show years of death, anguish, pain, and suffering but his smile shows knowledge and peace. His hair is darker than mine, almost as if it was grown from the darkest, shadowed pit of hell, and spiked out to a point that the slight illumination that is now shining down from the window makes him look as if he were a monster.

His face is contorted to a menacing smirk; he almost seems pleased that I stand before him, his hand that does not hold the bone made staff reaches up rubbing at the stubble of a beard on his chin. A deep rumbling growl emanates from deep within his chest before he speaks again.

He takes a few more steps closer to me so that we are no more than six feet apart, he then speaks to me, though his voice is low, and void of emotion I still sense that this person is of no harm to me. “Bonnie Elizabeth Parker, you are almost the spitting image of your grandmother as I remember her. Though you bare her soul within your heart you are nothing like her, yet your persona does match hers. You are quite the combination of conflicting elements, you are but you are not.” He says using one hand to now adjust his shroud like suit.

“I am death.” He says simply suddenly turning his palm up and beckoning for me to look around as if it should be entirely obvious who he is. “I am not going with you.” I warn taking a step back, death laughs hysterically at my step back daring him to try and take me with him. “Bonnie, you can run from me but you will never get away. No one escapes death as you so well know, but you can escape if I so let you, and I have many times already.” Death replies reaching a hand out to me.

“I am not taking you to the grave just yet, I do however wish for you to walk with me.” Death says, I sense that somehow I can trust the man before me so I accept his outstretched hand. He tugs me in to link elbows with me before leading me into the darkened hallway which suddenly illuminates living portraits on the wall that are brightened by lights shining down. The walls behind the pictures look like something from a French brothel, the golden frames further push the vibe.

Each portrait I pass is a different year in my life, the earlier ones are blurry and hazed as if I’m not supposed to focus on these particular images. After the longest time of walking in silence, Death stops and invites my attention to my fifteenth maybe sixteenth year, I’d even go as late as seventeen. I was probably at my worst in that time, as most teens are at that age, I was lost, more so than most, I was scared, confused, and angry. I wanted to die more times in those years than any other point in my life, which was another suicide attempt that was ended by…well I don’t even know what to call it. The things that happened on those nights, my defective computer failing, my radio failing on a secondary occasion it’s all so bizarre and unexplainable.

This photo however shows me running through the night like I always had, my step father had done something to me, what he did I cannot recall. But I was hurting worse than I ever had before, and I just wanted to die, so I wanted to go out the way my idol had almost died on many occasion, in a drug overdose. It’s peaceful, a single prick, some burning and then nothing but a permanent deep sleep.

I had been running for hours trying to get to the meeting place, I was getting a free grab from one of the local druggies whose car I’d fixed a few months prior. Of course I never made it that far, the sun rose up above and I needed to find a way home. At least, I think that’s what happened, I could be mistaken, I was well beyond drunk that night. The last thing I remember after finding out I had already missed my dead line by hours was wandering through the public library with tears in my eyes blurring my vision and making the snap decision I’d just stab myself in the heart. The instant that thought passed through my head I tripped over a book cart causing it to knock a book off the top shelf, or as I call it, the forgotten shelf. That’s where the religious book keepers put the books they deem too sinful for public use.

As of now I cannot remember the book title but it was written by my rock star idol, I read the darn thing cover to cover that day, then rented the book and never returned it. That simple binding is what got me through high school and brought me to be stable enough to at least get to the age of nineteen. At nineteen I fell off the band wagon and picked up drinking again, I drank like a fish until my attempted suicide at my mother’s that barrette’s songs detoured me from.

“It’s a pleasant thing for me that you listen only to lyrics instead of people talking at you. That’s why it was so easy to save you, detour you down the path you were destined for. I took a special liking to you on the day you were born, you should have died at birth but your father took one look at you and refused to believe you weren’t going to make it. And so you lived and I took you under my wing as one of my children.” Death explains as he waves his hand in front of the portrait, images flash by quickly of every single time I thought about wanting to die, and every time I’d come close to dying or ending my own life.

“As my childhood God instructed me to put you through certain trials, I of course made them more difficult for you than I did for most because you have a lot to live for young woman. Sure, you have to finish this trial, but after Devon Morgan is chained in hell, you have much more to do. You must learn to laugh, love, and be free of your burdens, then you must teach as many people as you can about what you have learned. It’s a heavy burden to carry, but only your damaged soul can handle it without breaking.” Death says as the last image clicks to a stop, the moment I realized Michael had mortally wounded me, Barrette standing behind looking at my bladed side with agony written in his eyes.

“I must go now Bonnie; there are other souls ready to cross over. I will leave you here at this forked road, should you stray to the right. You will return to earth and finish what you were created to do. Should you go left, you will return to your