The Hidden Music

‘The music.........’
       He didn’t know where it came from, and he didn’t know how something so beautiful could exist.......
       ‘But it must....he was hearing it.....’
       He moved down a very strange, very long hallway, a hallway of solid black stone. It was dark, the only light coming from what appeared to be a door at the far end of .............
       ‘There...’
       He began to run, the unworldly music kept getting louder and louder and louder, and the door kept getting farther and farther and farther away, and he kept running and running and running.....
       And running.....
       Running.....
       Running.....
       Run.
       Suddenly, he was in front of it. He grabbed the round handle and pulled with all his might.......
       He went blind.



       JoJo’s eye’s shot open. He clutched the comforter to his face, taking in air deeply, trying to calm himself. Once he was sure that he wasn’t about to vomit, he sat up.
       ‘5th time this month.....’ he thought to himself.
       Indeed, this dream was not something new to him. He had been having this ever since he had turned 17......
       Three year since the ‘Almost Apocalypse’.
       Yes, the Almost Apocalypse. He still could not rap his head around the whole idea of living on a speck on a clover, having his world almost being burned/drowned in nut oil, and having a giant elephant come to call once and a while using the big Maximumier (a large horn-shaped device used to amplify sounds) his dad had permanently hooked up to the rain pipe outside the deck door.
       JoJo sat up and looked down at himself, at the nasty peach colored pajamas his mother had bought him, then looked up and around his room, as if to make sure both he and everything else was still there, and everything was. The walls were still painted that strange blue-gray color his father had picked out when he was born, the wooden bookshelves were still covered in music-theory books and small musical instruments, the family picture was still pinned up on the wall........
       He checked the clock next to his bead. Seeing that it was 6:00 A.M and knowing that today, being the last day of summer, was the last day for a bit of freedom, he tossed the covers off of himself and got up. Grabbing his normal attire off the top of his dresser, JoJo crept out of his room. The floor boards only creaked once, and after a quick pause to make sure no one had woken up, he kept going. Finally, he got into the bathroom, quietly shut the door, and turned the light on.
       JoJo went over to the little sink, placing his clothes on the counter and taking a
little cup off of it’s little shelf and filled it with water. After he had finished it, he rinsed it out (however well you can rinse out a cup you used to drink water), dried it, and placed it back in it’s proper place.
       JoJo scratched at he back of his neck, the badly treated Trufula fluff bothering him. The scratch dodged his attack, however, and started running around his body. He growled quietly as he scratched and scratched. Then, finally fed up with the damned thing, he undid the 7 buttons that held it together and jumped out of it.            
       Picking it off the floor, he glared at it accusingly, wondering why every major piece of clothing had to be made like a jump suite and who in their right mind would make it out of Trufula tree fluff.
       As JoJo looked up, just about to hang up the torturous attire, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror.
       Sickly. That was one word that came to JoJo’s mind as he stood in the bathroom in nothing but his black boxers looking at his reflection. Another word that followed ‘sickly’ was ‘malnutritioned’.
       JoJo looked basically the same as he had that long ago summer. His black hair swung in front of his mud brown eyes, his skin was still deathly pail, he was still much to skinny........
       And much to short........
       He held his breath and tried to stand up straighter, but the only thing that did was make his ribs stick out like a stray dogs would. Dejected, JoJo fell back into his normal slump and poked one of his ribs, making a face.
       He sighed.
       JoJo hung up the accursed peach pajamas and pulled on his normal sweatshirt and pants. Shutting the light off, he crept out to the kitchen and tried to make breakfast.
       Choosing to keep breakfast simple in the hopes of not destroying it, JoJo decided to make toast. Since the bread was on top of the refrigerator, he took one fo his parents chairs, moved it in front of the icebox, and climbed up. After some digging around, he finally found the bread and, after taking a slice, jumped off the chair and put it back, putting the bread in his mouth so as not to squish it. That being done, he placed the bread in the toaster, turned it on, and set the heat. After that, JoJo opened the drawer that was in the counter top on which the toaster stood and pulled out a pencil and paper. Taking them over to the spot where his parents sat, JoJo wrote them a quick message letting them know where he’d be. It read-

Had breakfast. Went out. Be back soon.
Love, JoJo.
        
       Well, it’s not like anyone expected him to be great at words.
       Suddenly, JoJo smelled something burning. Quickly dashing over to the toaster, JoJo confirmed his guess when he saw smoke rising out of the toaster in lazy circles. He quickly hit the eject button and caught the blackened toast as it popped out of the toaster. However, it was much to hot and as soon as JoJo caught hold of it, he let it go with a small gasp of pain and a muttered “damn!”. The toast hit the counter top with a ‘crunch’ and small crumbs flew everywhere like shrapnel. With a quick sweep of his hands, JoJo pushed aside the offending piece of breakfast and scooped up the crumbs, which he disposed of in the sink. JoJo blew on the toast (which was still lay on the counter) slightly, before picking it up carefully. He took a bite out of it, the nasty burnt-ness coating his mouth and causing him to make a face.
       “..........bleh......”
       He quickly shoved the rest into his mouth and chewed, getting it over with. While he chewed, he grabbed a glass out of one of the cupboards and filled it with water, which he quickly drank to rid himself of the unpleasant taste. After washing out the cup, he dried it off, put it back, and turned to leave.
       JoJo walked out the front door, gently shutting it behind him. With shoulder hunched and eyes down, he quietly walked towards the abandoned observation tower. Finding and kicking a stone in front of him, he couldn’t help but lament the fact that this was the last day of summer, the last day to be free.
       ‘Better make the most of it,’ JoJo thought.
       The overcast sky hovered above him, thin patches of moonlight seeping through. The crickets serenaded quietly in the long grass, their euphonic chirps soothing his soul. The wind accompanied on the branches of the Coofnaught trees, whistling in harmony with the small black-suited fiddlers. JoJo had found years ago that, if you listened closely, it sounded like waltz music. And he listened closely tonight, finding himself bobbing in time as he walked
1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3
Chirp, chirp, swosh, chirp, chirp, swosh, chirp, chirp, swosh-
“OOF!”
       JoJo froze. Something was wrong. ‘Oof’? That wasn’t a night time sound....
Unless.......
       JoJo’s head whipped around in all directions, looking for the maker of the sound. ‘Oof’ only happened when someone hurt themselves, or got hit in the gut,
or when they fell....
Which, if you think about it, happens quite often in the dark.
       Suddenly, their was a groan to his left. JoJo turned his head in the direction and, after several words of questionable origin, saw someone...or something...stand up and totter around a bit before falling down again, this time with and audible, “Ack! mmMMPH! Hell’s bells, you’d think the ground was after me!”
       The voice sounded strangely feminine.
       The figure stood up again and this time kept their balance. JoJo watched as the person dusted themselves off with one hand while the other hand was held out of the way, something clutched tightly in it.
       JoJo took a step away from the thing-
       “Cr-Ack!”
       and happened to step on a twig.
       The figure whipped around and hollered “Who’s there!?”
       JoJo said nothing.
       “I see you!” the figure cried, “I see you! State you business or suffer the conciquences! I’m warning you!!!”
       JoJo swallowed and, after a long hesitation, said “My name is JoJo McDodd, please don’t kill me.”
       ‘Please don’t kill me?!?!’ JoJo thought, making a face, ‘How stupid am I?!?’
       Had the situation been different, he probably would have smacked himself, but the situation wasn’t different, it was what it was (whatever it was).
       There was a pause.
       “Well,” said the figure, “I didn’t ask for you name, but I guess that’s a start.”
       There was another pause.
       “.....you seriously thought I was gonna kill you?” the person said.
       “I dunno....” mumbled JoJo, “S’ not like I can see you to tell...”
       “Would that have made a difference?”
       “Would what have made a difference?”
       “If you could see me, would that have made a difference?”
       “I dunno.”
       Pause.
       “......you don’t know much, do you.”
       JoJo was insulted.
       “What kinda comment is that!!”
       The person laughed.
       “An honest one!”
       JoJo snorted in indignation.
       “Yeah, and I guess it’ad be honest to say that you’re a stalker.”
       “Ah, no. No that is not true because I ran into you, not after you. BIIIG difference man, don’t go blow’in your head up thinking that your someone worth stalki’n.”
       “I was NOT being ‘big’!
       “You keep tell’in yourself that, hot stuff.”
       “Don’t call me that.”
       “Hoooooooot stuuuuuuff.”
       “Will you just-!”
       “Just what! JUST...WHAT!!”
       “WILL you just STOP BEING a DAMN BACKBITE!!”
       “Oh REALLY!? Well would YOU just stop being an insufferable little nag!!”
       JoJo could have screamed. Was this person so inconsiderate that they found in tormenting people?!?!
       “What’s WRONG with you!?!”
       “What are you implying!?”
       Oh NOW she was going to use fancy smanshy words and try to make him feel stupid?
       JoJo was officially pissed.
       “I MEAN are you so ignorantly inconsiderate and abrasive on PURPOSE or are you just so damn nasty to everyone who crosses your path! I MEAN do you actually LIKE to act like a total ASS or were you just born that way! I MEAN were you born with a mental handy-cap causing you to be this way or did you mother DROP YOU!! You horrible little-!”
       The moon came out.
       JoJo froze mid insult.
       The figure that stood across the way was indeed a woman.
       A woman who was terribly wrong in all senses of the matter.
       On first glance she would have looked Who enough. Her skin was, as JoJo could see (which wasn’t well) the color of sand. She didn’t where normal clothes made of Truffula tree fluff, rather, they were made of cloth, and they looked like they had seen better days. The baise shirt she wore looked like the color of vomit, and her jeans had more patches than original material. However, it was none of these facts that caused him to stop in horror.
       It was her hair and her eyes.
       Her hair was a curly tangled mass of slim green, held on the edge of normality by a wearing-thin braid. Her eyes were a sickly puss yellow.
       Both traits only able to be possessed by a Grinch.
       JoJo almost screamed.
       He did not notice the hurtful look on her face, the kind that lets you know that the person is just about to break down and cry but refuses to. He did not notice that in her hand she was only holding a jam-jar full of bent spoons and shards of glass and discarded glistening plastic snowflakes.
       What he did see was all in he imagination. He saw a look of anger and malice, her teeth clentched, her eyes wide in rage. He saw in her hand sharp objects; knives, sharp infected bits of glass, trash.
       ALL signs of a true Grinch.
       The scream finally made it’s way past his lips.
       He ran, all the way home.