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"SCC 20 - Driving Home"

I'm a little rusty, forgive me

I'm in a car with my family, watching snow fall, and the radio is finishing my sentences.

It's done it a few times now. Twice I think. The first time it said 'speeding' then it said about 'mad dogs and Englishmen'.

This is terrifying me. I'm thinking clearly, I'm sure I'm not hallucinating and I'm afraid to ask anyway. I don't want to think the radio is reading my mind but it's hard not to.

I have to think about this logically. I'm just being paranoid, this is impossible (Not impossible) it's.. it's just there to drive me mad, there's no other reason. This is just me driving myself insane. Maybe it's someone else trying to make me insane, and I'm not thinking this but it's being put into me, to make me feel this way.

A musician is explaining scales to the radio DJ.

I can't get rid of this feeling.

It's like someone shining a light in your eyes. It doesn't matter if you close your eyes, or if you turn away or move, the light is still there. It's following you, it knows your every movement and you can't escape. All you can do is try to relax.

Then everything becomes louder. The light always finds new ways to get in. If you try to ignore it, it will become more powerful. It will burn brighter and eventually you will have nowhere left to hide. And if you fight it, it will SCREAM at you. A light you do not simple see, but you feel, you taste and hear.

My mind feels like an ocean. Every single sound, every sight, every smell in the air is rippling the surface. I can feel my bones rubbing against each other, but there is no pain. Only the words in my mind and the world that is affecting me.

And by the beauty of it all, the strange magnificence to it, this is mine. Purely my own, my true world, where I live, where I breathe, my heaven. My own world that I know will last seconds before the silence breaks and the voices begin.

When from silence becomes white noise, then noise becomes conversation, become voices become the inner workings of your mind, cogs turning without you ever noticing. And you find it so easy to listen, that you begin to hear sounds that no-one should ever be able to notice. The soft whispers of information in your mind, the pulse of a nerve, your memory shouting out everything just after it happens, telling you over and over what you've seen, like some deja vu script of things that haven't happened anyway.

You wonder if they're really there, if you're just imagining it, or if you're hearing them from somewhere else, from the radio, from your father driving the car, from your nephew sleeping in the back seat, your mother sitting back there with him, holding his toy lorry and spinning the wheels.

The radio re-tunes itself.

I know the reason, I know the reason for all of this, why everything turns away, why I cannot have my peace, why my mind must always be talking, it's... pressure

Pressure. I realise again, it was the radio who finished my sentence.

I can't cope with this. I can't cope with these noises, these voices, these words telling me what to do, what to think, making me paranoid, making me believe the radio is talking to me, I'm insane, I must be, these words are KILLING me. I can't switch off my mind. There has to be a way. Relax. relax.

A MOTORBIKE SCRRREEEEEEEAAAAAMMMSS PAST THE WINDOW

Every single moment becomes too fast

My memory is faultering, unable to hold this, I know I'll forget it, later, when I calm down, when everything becomes dull again

I know I'll forget it because I know what I'm about to think, I know what's coming, what I dread each time, why I have to pretend this is someone else, so I have no memory of it

If I knew

If I knew maybe I wouldn't cope

But it's the truth

The truth being it's them

It's all their fault

I can't cope with this, the voices, every moment, in weights and measures, from silent to loud, ever changing and destructive, so out of balance, overloaded..

All the pressure, the pressure to eat, to look smart, to be well, to smile and be friendly, please thank you look after talk to eat well drink now don't get drunk don't do drugs don't stay up late get up early THAT'S WHAT EVERYBODY ELSE DOES WHY CAN'T YOU

To never EXPERIMENT, to never adventure, to hold me back, afraid, afraid of ever being hurt

It was their fault and they deserve to die

No.. that's not true

But I know, deep down, if I could kill them, then I could kill the voices.. then the voices would die

Maybe the voices would die

I could be in peace, they would leave me alone, stop TORMENTING me and driving ME INSANE

every moment their voices PIERCING me, FILLING my minds and my thoughts, controlling me, and they KNOW IT, they USE it, they take advantage

it IS their fault

they have DESTROYED ME, they HAVE TAKEN AWAY MY SOUL

they must die

there's a lorry driving towards us

There's a lorry driving towards us

Think

Is this what you want?

Is this what you want?

Kill us all

look quickly

My nephew is asleep

He won't feel a thing

I could undo my dad's seatbelt

Just before

no

Maybe we won't all die

It'll flatten us

I have to die

So do they

No

I can't do this

Now would be the time

Take the steering wheel

TAKE THE STEERING WHEEL

No

It's gone

The lorry is gone

It's too late now

Forget about it

Breathe

Breathe slower

Deep

QUIET

They put words into your mind

They're controlling you

They're paranoid

They're afraid

You just need to break free

Forget about this

What's inside doesn't matter

Forget it all

You can kill them another time

Find the justice we deserve

Weigh it out

No

There's no need

I deserve to die

You won't kill them

And I deserve to die

No.

What's inside doesn't matter

What is inside does not matter.

It's stopped snowing.

I wonder when that happened.

Grix Thraves wrote:
> I'm a little rusty, forgive me

Sigh :(

Rusty he says. You have no idea how hard I'd have to work to match this. I wish I could be this rusty.

Loved it. The lack of background means my imagination went into freefall. I even saw the lorry - it was a Stobbart one. Big thing it was too. Glad we didn't drive into it :D

Grix Thraves wrote:
> What is inside does not matter.
>
> It's stopped snowing.
>
> I wonder when that happened.

Impressive recapture and wrap.

[S](pop with the rest)

I liked it. The speed-up of the manic thoughts and paranoias, etc. It seemed very visual, even though there was almost no description.

Any particular reason?

Nah, didn't like that.

Thanks again.. beginning to realise I'm a massive fan of leaving things to the imagination, instead of this over-done detail thing. When it's done well, it's excellent and can be beautiful, but it always tends to lack real atmosphere.

I don't know. I think I'll play around with my next stories, experiment a bit.

Enjoyed that, put us right inside the head to the point where had he have forced the crash it would have been understandable.

Aye, like matteh said - the lack of detail let you build up your own picture of things and it worked really well for the story.
Enjoyable, yus.

Yeah, wasn't entirely sure how to do that bit. Never mind. :)

Thanks.