The Ritual

THE RITUAL

  by Thaddeus Simpson

  Copyright 2015 Thaddeus Simpson

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Part 1

  Part 2

  Part 3

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Part 1

  It was thirty-three minutes past midnight, and I hadn’t slept a wink. A journey was waiting for me the next morning, a car ride to the past, or practically that far. I was restless in bed, alone, with only a heat-drenched blanket to keep me uncomfortable. The summer night was broken outside my window by the orange glow of a familiar streetlight, which could only slightly comfort me.

  I wasn’t tired, which definitely meant I would be the next morning. Sedalia awaited, its tall-grass and old-people haunted me in my head. That’s tomorrow’s problem, not mine I thought silently to myself, my eyes still squinting against the darkness of my room. My old hometown managed to creep into my brain again. I hadn’t been there in years, and yet somehow I knew that nothing would have changed in my absence.

  After all, the town only changes when I’m there, and it has been a long time since my last visit. In bed that night, I could already hear the voices of old neighbors and classmates annoying me, with their dumb grins and dumber stories of our nonexistent good-times. Thinking about it brought up some repressed memories of my college graduation party, which were repressed for a reason. I had longer hair back then, before I was contractually obligated to keep it cut short.

  I wasn’t the only person coming back to Sedalia that weekend, though. The rest of the Brick Clan, including Uncle Marty, Aunt Sheryl, and Cousin Chris, were driving down the same day and God only knows how many other people from out of state would show up. Most of my extended family would be there. Harsh right?

  Thoughts of family and home didn’t comfort me at the time. Years ago, I had left that place because it made me claustrophobic. Everyone I knew was practically sitting in my lap at the dinner-table, listening to my very heartbeat. Nothing like the city, where you can walk the streets for hours and meet a hundred different people, and not a single one of them will remember your name the next day. That kind of anonymity, that’s true freedom.

  I would have guaranteed you that when I went back, someone would try to tell me that the city was too crowded and that I should move back. I could feel it in my bones, like a farmer when he feels a storm coming. Those people from Sedalia wouldn’t ever understand that the more people you have in a room the less often you get your toes stepped on. I had a hunch that Margret would say it. She’d always been such a beggar when it came to men. I was always least comfortable when she was around.

  Back in my apartment, my pillow felt like a sweaty plastic bag, so I turned it over. I said a prayer for Margret, that the Lord would make her life happier, and that she would be too busy in town to attend my homecoming. This would only be the third time I’d been back to Sedalia since I left 13 years ago, and the first since being in space. Back then, my graduation party was a motherfucking fiasco, and I had just hoped that everybody

  would get sick or something while I was in town.

  Because honestly, I wasn’t going back because I wanted to. Oh no, Sedalia was a place I wished I could just leave behind, like a Tee-ball trophy in my dresser drawer. But ever since Facebook and Cell-phones and the God-damned DirectX Internet company arrived in my hometown, nowhere has been far enough away to escape the people that lived there.

  The shining exceptions were my parents, two of the only people I’d ever loved in Sedalia. If the world was a better place, I would have lived

  closer to them. If I was a better person, I would have visited them more often. But I can’t change any of that. I was their only son, and they deserved better out of me. Actually, the whole world deserved better out of me.

  ...

  The alarm clock exploded only inches from my head, filling my small bedroom with the sounds of K-Love. What does the “K” even stand for? Kool maybe? Whatever, it doesn’t matter. I couldn’t deny the trip any longer. My whole body ached, and the cold air tightened my skin when I stood up from my sheets, half naked. My right foot found a slipper, but only one. I started to look for its sibling, but gave up and went for the bathroom.

  My apartment might be cheap, but the hot water is fantastic and remains my favorite part of waking up. The faded-glass shower door was left ajar, so I reached in and cranked the near dial all the way to the right. I stepped in without a second thought, forgetting any kind of towel, and halfway through my shampooing I remembered it. Sorry if I bore you with the details, but I’m a detail oriented person.

  Sedalia was seven hours away if the traffic was light, and nine if there was road work. God I hope there isn’t any construction I remember thinking to myself. While brushing my teeth, I noticed that my brown, short hair was not only starting to gray, but fall away as well. I’m only 31, and now I have to deal with both kinds of male hair issues. Aging is Chinese water torture. I wore an old pair of blue jeans and red flannel shirt that day. But you probably remember that now. If only I had a beard, then I could go through town disguised as a wandering lumberjack I had thought.

  Ever notice how Spring is always so hot and cold here? You can never really tell what the weather will bring. That morning, the clouds hung heavy in sky, but I dismissed them, predicting they would all blow-over in the next hour. I peeled myself away from my window and headed for the door. Next to the cracked, red wooden exit sat my duffel bag, still with the NASA emblem stitched big on the side. I kinda miss that bag, I got it in the gift shop after I passed the selection process, kinda like a trophy.

  I lifted it to my shoulder, just like I used to, turned the locks open, and cracked the door. It all felt so rhythmic, so mechanical, just like the preflight checks I used to do. Granted, Captain Verner handled most of them, but I still had to seal the cabin and turn my “ignition” key.

  I used the same sort of key-movement to lock the apartment behind me, hard and to the right. Fear and procrastination made me look at my watch. It was a quarter past nine.

  “Shitty, shitty.” Is what I mumbled in that empty hallway, before I followed the orange, stained carpet down to the elevator.

  The inside of that metal box looked used, with dirt in the corners and children’s finger prints on the glass. The floor would flex like it was made of a single sheet of aluminum, and I always worried about falling through. That box was nothing compared to the sterilized, pressure-sealed cube we rode up a hundred and sixty feet to our cockpit one year ago. Still, it had buttons, and that’s a good start for any machine. Our “Ground Floor” button always sticks, so I usually tap it twice, which I did while praying nobody else was up this early on a Saturday. I was wrong of course, and my steel death-trap squeaked to a halt at the third floor. But this was one of those occasions where it’s okay to be wrong, because a gorgeous young lady walked in and said “Good morning” to me.

  “It is now.” I whispered, and she chuckled. Look, just let me tell the story okay?

  She seemed ten years younger than me with the smoothest blonde hair I’d ever seen. She must have brushed it a thousand times a night to get it

  that smooth, and it made me think: what I would give to have a shirt made out of that hair--

  “Where are you heading?” She asked, br
eaking me out of an admittedly weird train of thought.

  “A lumberjack convention. And you?” It was the first thing that came to mind. What a dumb, desperate line. She still laughed at me though. The girl was either interested in or really uncomfortable around me, but which was it? Which is it?

  “You’re certainly dressed for it. I’m just on my way to work.” She said with a smile.

  Her eyes were just slightly wider than they should’ve been, and she looked strung out, but she was still smiling. We stood there in a vacuum, waiting for the elevator to finish falling.

  “Maybe after your convention, you and your lumberjack buddies will pay us a visit, hmm?”

  Her question came right before the metal box halted its descent and the doors opened up into our grimy lobby. She was holding a small black card with rosey pink lettering and three capital x’s. I took it without thinking, and punched out a response with my mouth:

  “Awful early for this kind of work isn’t it?” She laughed again, that time more thoroughly, like a cackle.

  “Sure is. But until seven I’m a waitress at the bar down the street. You ever been to Mickey’s?”

  She got halfway out the door before she asked me that, and didn’t slow down to hear my answer. I