1917

JESSE

The sun sets way too early for my liking. It becomes dark much too early. I wonder how ship captains feel at this time of night, no lighthouse to guide their way. If it were me, if I had the responsibility of an entire ship and a crew I’d just stay docked the whole time. Why am I going to risk my ship and my crew? I don’t need to get paid. If I’m ever the owner of a boat and can tell people what to do, then obviously I have enough money to not worry.

These are the things I think about sometimes. There isn’t much else to do besides watch TV, and I don’t feel like doing that either. Ugh, everything feels so old, like I’ve done it a million times. I hate being eleven, it’s such a goddamn stupid age. You can’t say goddamn and you can’t go outside without permission. You can’t have a boat and you can’t tell people what to do. I went out with my Dad once when I was five, I loved the open sea. It felt so...right. There was even this time when my sister, Isa, got her little teddy bear snatched up by some starving sea gulls. She cried FOREVER. Of course, my Dad took to yelling at the “damn birds” while my Mom tried to comfort my sister. You see, trying to tell a five year old that she isn’t going to be getting her favorite teddy bear back isn’t the best way to help calm her down about said bear. So, I did what any brother would have. I jumped in after the “damn birds.” Let me tell you, birds are stronger than I imagined. I just thought they stood there and...you know, didn’t really do much. Sea gulls, nah. They’re really territorial over the things they claim as their own, and I learned that the hard way. The “damn birds” all grouped up on me when they felt threatened. I mean, to be fair, I was a relatively fit boy jumping in directly toward them just aside our modest boat.

Anyway, these birds all began pecking and pecking, clawing at me with their talons. I got Isa’s bear back. She called me her hero after that. I ended up in the hospital—the “damn birds” had raked out my right eye and gave me extremely deep gashes in my right arm. You know, having your eye out of your head is a pretty traumatic experience for a kid to go through. I could still see with it—my eye, I mean. It hurt everywhere, and I was awake for the whole thing. The strangest thing happened when I was in the operating room, though. They had me on all kinds of medication, but none of their anesthetics worked. I was awake, constantly awake. They tried everything, but then just gave up when nothing worked. I felt everything, and it wasn’t nice.

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Afterwards, I sat in my hospital room for days on end, everything was so difficult to focus on. My parents would come in and say things, they were blurred out. I couldn’t focus on anything but the feeling of the “damn birds” ripping my eye out. A week later I relearned how to think. I don’t think that I didn’t know beforehand, but every waking second of my existence was reacting to the pain my eye was in. My arm was absolutely nothing compared. It was back in my head and all of that, but the phantom of it remained, and it was ALL I could think about. I begged God to make it stop. I begged him and offered anything, everything. I begged and I begged and for a year I was ignored. I got behind in school, my parents were told I was a lost cause. The physical damage wasn’t enough to warrant such a reaction, the doctors and nurse’s told them. “It must have been worse than we originally thought.” Isa was brought around less. I wanted to see her more, she was the only one I wanted to see. I hated the doctors for making it so she couldn’t come as much, and I hated my parents for listening to them. A year after all of this I finally am allowed to come home, and what happens, but I’m restricted to my room, staring out the window for my own safety. I’ve regained control of my mind—I still feel the pain, but nobody listens to me. They all say I’m cured and that everything feels fine, but how do they know how I feel? I hurt. I feel their talons on my face.

And suddenly as if it were normal, a hole opens in front of me. It has no discernible source—no beginning and no end. A man spoke from the other end of the hole, its pulsating ends waving and shaking before me, “You wish for mercy. Let’s see if you’re willing to earn your keep. I already know your worth, it’s time to show your stuff.” I didn’t know what the voice had meant, originally, but to me it spoke perfect sense.

With absolutely no hesitation I felt a flash in the back of my mind...it was a boy’s face. I did not know the boy, nor did I think the boy was the one who was speaking to me from the other side of the hole...he was much too young and the voice was much too old. I did what I thought most reasonable and I walked over toward the hole and stepped inside. On the other side, the hole closed behind me. I stood looking at a man much taller than my eleven year old self. He wore a nice pinstripe suit and had wire frame glasses held up by his thin nose. He looked down to me like no one else ever had before. I wasn’t someone who couldn’t tell people what to do. He looked at me like I was the captain of a ship. I look toward him, a smile coming across his face. It’s a slight smile—reserved. I wouldn’t see it often, it was almost like a weapon, premeditated and always at the most prime moments.

“Hello, Jesse. My name is Friedrich. Do you want to go to space?”