Burning Tables

Screams. I heard screams before I died that night. “Screams?” yeah, definitely screams.

“Oh, sweet screams.. and so bare of agony and despair!” the voice viciously uttered, swelling and falling with every other word.

A red glow crept through a crack in my cell's door, “Fire?” An interesting question. But the urge to snigger and giggle was stronger than answering. I tittered and sniggered and giggled and snickered, writhing on the floor.

Calming just a little, I stood up and backed against the wall opposing the door.

“Jesus, save me!” the voice inside my head cried out. Through clenched teeth I hissed, “Tis the gate to hell! God ain't here wit' us t'night!” The heavy door bulged under the fire's siege. Smoke squeezed through the cracks. Time froze.

“Come with me!”

A new voice. I was becoming insane.

“Cometh!”

Deep, demanding, devouring. The door opened, slammed against the wall. But no one was there.

“Come! He does not like waiting.”

I followed. No, we followed. Like a lover the flames caressed our body as we stepped into them.

I screamed that night.

___________________


My tongue ejected blisters from the burning. There was laughter around us. They were laughing at us.
“It hurts so much!” the voice cried. Another match flamed up. I flinched, shrieking.

“Hold still you freak!” one of the orderlies demanded with his fist. The blisters spit out black venom while my bladder emptied. They were laughing louder now.

Dooooooooong!

The orderlies fell silent, balefully looking at me. “They are going to kill us!” the voice informed me. My feet were wet now.

Dooooooooong!

They now got to their feet. 7 eyes glared at me. I was dead silent.

Dooooooooong!

I chuckled to myself. The orderlies' eyes burned me as the voice chanted inside my head: “They are gonna leeeave us, leave us!” it sung as a few shrugged and went through the door. “Ding dang dong! Ding dang dong!” only one was left now.

He grinned viciously at us. We shrunk and tried to hide behind the chair. I whimpered. Another tormentor came back and whispered into the still grinning man's ear. Slowly, he turned around and left the room, not losing that grin on his face. The door slammed shut.

“He crazy!” the voice concluded.

My tongue did not regret its sins yet, so my mouth was purgatory. Little demons swept over it, stinging the blisters with tiny tridents.

“They will repent, they will repent,” the voice repeated and repeated inside my head. It was dark now. I stuck my tongue out to use it as a torch, but it was dead.

I looked around. There were shapes around me. A desk, a chair, a bookshelf and something small. I crawled towards it. Grinning, I discovered it was a pack of matches. “They will repent, they will repent!” the voice iterated. “Tey will,” I agreed.

I started singing:

“Moths to flames,
Tey will stop calling us names!
Moths to flames,
Tey will stop calling us names!”

I found my way out of purgatory. The moths will eventually burn! “Wings to ashes,” I pondered.

“They will repent! They will repent! In the end, they all will repent!”

I screamed that night.