Salt

It had been harsh, it hurt, it stung.  He wasn't sure what he'd done wrong.  It was like the wounds were open and had been rubbed raw.  They bled profusely just like they had way back when.

There was a tangible scream ready to part way from his lips, but it never did.  He never could quite part with the scream all too ready to tear away from him.

The gasps of breath, the gasps of pain, they were all there just under that surface ready to come forth.  He wasn't ready to reveal their presence quite yet though.  He was quite attached to the pain now.  He and the pain were like one in the same.

Even for him it was hard to tell the difference anymore.  All he knew was the waking world that he walked through and his immediate surroundings.  The interior was harder, tricky to discern.

When he walked from place to place, he heard the whispers.  They were talking about him; he knew that much.  He didn't pay any attention to what they were saying, not that they would ever allow him to overhear them, not that he would care if he did.

It was probably concern, overwhelming concern.  They were worried about him and his mental health.  They didn't think that he was even marginally all right.  He wouldn't disagree with them.  He wasn't all right, he was hardly up to par with a mentality that could ever be considered 'sane'.

Salt, it felt like salt.  Salt rubbed in broken, bleeding wounds.  Salt with its bitter taste that lasted in your mouth and stung like a wound freshly made.

It felt like salt, tasted like metal, and left a cold, dark, black licorice in its place.  Wait, no, that wasn't right, not right at all.

He didn't feel good anymore.  His head hurt, he felt hot, and he was certainly nauseated.  A scream wanted to leave his lips but he refused to let it pass.  He couldn't part with it now!

They were still whispering, he could hear it.  They were getting louder, the entire room was getting louder.  They were nearly shouting, shouting now.  Nope, no scream, don't let it out now, the caged scream is your only friend in this place forsaken by God.

Desert, desert and salt, that's what it was now.  It was getting hotter now, their whispers had nearly risen to screams themselves.  Why wouldn't they just cease? He could taste the salt, bitter on his tongue.  The harsh, yellow sand shifted violently under his feet.

He was spinning, tilting, no, he was falling.  Falling down into that harsh sand.  The sand would soon fill his mouth, clog his nose, restrict his already blinded sight.  He hoped it would drown out that terrible taste of salt in his mouth, this sand pulling him down, down into it.  Salt lingered on his tongue. 

Still, the glorious reprieve, the nothingness, the end of the line.  Voices were dead, scream quiet behind his lips, still his only companion even in the dark.  Then why did he still taste salt?