Her Name

Her name is The Wind.

She told me it after I ran outside again. I wanted to hear her voice again. I had some meeting today... did I have a meeting today? Fuck, I did... well screw 'em. Fuck them and fuck their Synergy bullshit and fuck their goddamn corporate portfolios, because I experienced heaven today.

She talked with me a while before she showed me the images. She told me her name. Told me she had plans or some shit. Told me that she was going to come back every day to see me. Her voice changed each word, from a man's voice to a woman's voice, all ages, all accents. The only thing that stayed the same was the pain.

Hang on, let me type this shit down from the recorder.

"Help me..."

"What?"

"Help... pain..."

"Who? You okay?"

"Don't leave me..."

"I ain't gonna leave you! W-where are you...?"

"Over... all over..."

"What's all over?"

"The Wind."

"The Wind? That you?"

"...y-y-yesss..."

"Alrighty... I guess... so... why are you here?"

"Ease... the pain for me... please..."

"What do you mean 'ease the pain'?"

"Need... need... I need..."

"What do you need? Jesus fucking Christ, you make no goddamn sense!"

"All... my plans... all my plans..."

"Wh-"

I was about to ask her more questions when the images began flooding my head. It was better than before. This time, I saw patterns. Intricate patterns that changed, added to them when I thought I saw it all. Shapes I thought were impossible. You know how those fiction Discworld books apparently have four-sided triangles? I don't know how the fuck she did it, but she showed me that. It was like... you ever saw those things with the 3D triangle that overlaps on itself? It's like that... but cooler. Because I could solve it. I could solve it and the more I uncovered the more I was lifted into cloud nine.

I have not felt such a rush in eight years.

But I don't know if I should do it again. When I woke up, it was in the middle of the field. At night. When I came home, my wife had a look of both stern anger and silent worry. She had two ideas in her mind and for the first time in my life, I understood her mind like a box of color-coded crayons. In one side of her brain, she believed that I had been out to have a marital affair or perhaps drink and smoke with the guys. But that was clouded almost completely by the other thought- that maybe I had gone back to my old ways again. Maybe I had found Ray again, had bought my original week's worth, and indulged myself.

I didn't want to indulge myself and I do love my wife, stubborn as she sometimes is. No... not indulge myself with drugs or cheap sex, anyways. No... the images.

I need to see more of the images.