Unconsciously, darkness evokes the fear of ultimate separation, of death and the void.
POV Kevin
When I came to, I was in my room beside my mother, who was tenderly stroking my head on my bed. She was lying next to me, brushing my hair aside with her hand, which gave me a pleasant feeling of happiness. Seeing that I had finally opened my eyes, she spoke to me softly.
"You're finally awake, my angel?" my mother said tenderly.
Her voice was a comfort compared to the terrible silence of the void I had faced. Just thinking about it again sent shivers through me, making my whole body tremble.
"Your sister has been terribly worried, you mean a lot to her."
Turning my head the other way, I saw my sister sleeping peacefully, her beautiful face framed by her lovely white hair spread out on the bed. My hand came to tenderly stroke her cheek.
It's true, my sister and I are inseparable: since she was born, she has always been by my side. And I know that whatever happens, like my mother, she will love me and never leave me.
And when a few hours had passed, my sister woke up and hugged me. An embrace so suffocating that it took my breath away, but the feeling was one of the most pleasant.
My mother finally let me rest a few more hours, and once I felt better, I got up to move quietly around the house, and I saw my mother feeding my six-year-old little brother. And when he saw me, he left the table to run to me and snuggle up against me. I picked him up affectionately; he asked me with a worried look if I was feeling better.
"Yes, your big brother is feeling better," I replied.
I put him down and he went back to sit and eat happily with my mother.
"My family is the one place I can always come home to."
And yet someone was still missing, someone who showed up far too rarely.
After that ordeal and a peaceful return, I thought everything would finally stop, but in reality nothing was over yet. Because a horrible fear began to take hold of me when I closed my eyes, when all light faded away. That place where I had been trapped had left its mark on me and bequeathed me a dreadful fear: the fear of the dark.
And it began the night I came back, when my mother, after tucking us in, turned off the light, leaving us alone in the dark. The first few minutes weren't unpleasant, but little by little, I started to grow anxious. Gradually, that anxiety turned into panic, my breathing and heart racing. Sweat was pouring down my face when I saw a frightening shadow in front of me near the desk. I screamed until my vocal cords nearly burst, waking my sister, who was sleeping next to me. My mother suddenly opened the bedroom door and turned on the light.
"Kevin, what's wrong?" she asked in a panic.
I looked at the desk and there was nothing there. I could feel sweat running down my face.
"I'm… I'm afraid of the dark," I replied, frightened.
"Do you want me to leave the light on?"
"Yes, please, Mom."
So she turned on the night-light in the room before quietly closing the door again. With the light now on, my sister, whom I had woken with my screaming, snuggled up against me.
"I'm here, big brother," she said, her body warming me.
Soothed by her presence, I closed my eyelids, and the light faded again. But the feeling of safety my sister gave me vanished in an instant: huge dark eyes were staring at me.
"Ahhhhh!"
I screamed again, again, again and again, no longer able to fall asleep. The dark had become the lair where all my nightmares hid, where I saw all those terrifying and inexplicable things crawling in the shadows, waiting for only one thing: to strangle me in my sleep.
My mother quickly decided to take me to see a doctor after four days without my being able to sleep a wink, she herself staying up all night to be with me. The doctor then diagnosed me with what is called nyctophobia: a pathological and irrational fear of the dark.
"Isn't it just a passing fear?"
"No, it is sometimes reduced to a simple fear of the dark, but it is actually a much deeper fear: the patient dreads imaginary dangers that could arise in the darkness or during the night."
"Can it be treated?"
"First, we need to know what caused this fear. I advise you to see a psychiatrist, who will then give you a treatment."
So we finally went home, with an appointment with the psychiatrist for the next day.
Night fell before the appointment, and once again I was seized with terror because of the darkness. The next day, as planned, I quickly saw a psychiatrist; dark circles were now clearly visible on my face. I was sitting in that nice room with my mother beside me, and in front of me, an elderly man with glasses asked me to tell him what I had been through, as if he could understand it.
"I died, that's where it all started. It was dark while I was falling into an endless void. No more sound, no more light, just me and the dark. At first, everything was fine, but as time went by, I started sinking into fear and madness. I don't know how long it lasted."
"Exactly thirteen days between your death and your awakening," the psychiatrist replied.
"No! It was much longer than that! When you find yourself alone in the dark with yourself! When you slowly lose your mind, your sense of time, when you realize you might stay there until the end of your days! With no one but yourself, with no one able to come and save you—I don't call that 13 days, I call it an eternity of torment!"
"So the dark reminds you of the loneliness you went through?"
"Not only that. There are things lurking in the shadows, things no man could bear. I feel like they're watching me, like something is with me in the darkness. And I still think back to that voice, that sinister voice."
"A voice?"
"Yes, a voice that could erase your existence if it wished."
The session ended on those words, the psychiatrist prescribing me antidepressants, anxiety medication and sleeping pills. When night fell, all the lights in the house were on. My mother, my sister, my brother and I were all lying in the same bed, to keep me company when I closed my eyes that night.
I hoped their presence wouldn't vanish the way it had with my sister. After taking my medication, I felt my eyelids grow heavy; it wasn't long before they closed, all images and sounds fading away. Strangely, I heard my mother's voice and opened my eyes again in a barely visible darkness.
"Kevin."
My mother's voice was comforting, but when I saw their faces clearly, it wasn't them. They had their facial features but gaping mouths lined with countless huge teeth, and terrifying whitish eyes. Three monsters in the image of my family began to bite me to devour me whole, tearing pieces of flesh from my arm, my legs, my chest, staining the bedsheets with my blood. My mother's voice slowly changed, becoming sinister and deep while I screamed in pain. That voice was the one I had heard, that terrifying voice that made my body shudder.
"Kevin."
Finally, they went for my face, tearing off my cheeks, my jaw, and finally my eyes.
"Ahhh!" I screamed as the light suddenly came back to me.
I was drenched in sweat, my breathing ragged, my heart pounding against my rib cage as if it wanted to get out. My mother and my sister were already holding me in their arms, and my little brother was holding my hand.
"It's going to be okay, we're here, we're here for you, my love," my mother whispered.
I spent that night in terror too, but I held on until morning. I had slept, of course, but screaming all night, my body convulsing and dripping with sweat. Taking that medication made me sleep, but it trapped me in my nightmares with no way to wake up.
And as if one problem weren't enough, my mother, who was trying to take care of me, also had to face a torrent of media hatred. The press, the media, politicians and believers harassed us without the slightest respite. Pressure that many would never have withstood, but my mother never bent the knee. She came home from work exhausted, but despite the fatigue and the pressure, we were always her priority.
As soon as she got home, she immediately made dinner, cleaned the house, did the laundry, helped my sister with her homework, and tucked my brother in, always telling him a story so he could fall asleep. She did everything that needed doing without ever complaining once, and she always did it with a smile. She always looked at us tenderly, even though her face was exhausted, and the more time passed, the more violent people became toward her.
One evening, while she was once again staying up all night to watch over me, I wanted to apologize to her.
"Mom, I'm sorry for causing you so much trouble. Maybe if I had never been born, you wouldn't have…"
"Stop. You're my son. No matter how much you suffer, it's my role to suffer with you. As a parent, as a mother, despite all the pain and the ordeals, your birth was and is the most beautiful gift I have ever been given. So I forbid you to say you should never have been born," she said, hugging me tenderly.
"I love you, Mom," I replied, sobbing.
"I love you too, Kevin."
The media onslaught grew stronger and stronger, and the brainwashing eventually had its effect: one day, while my mother was making dinner, a man broke into my room, where I was with my sister.
"Oh, at last I can behold you, God's miracle in person. I'm going to get you out of this prison they've locked you in," said the man, tall and thin.
"Mom!" Marie screamed.
My mother came running into our room and found herself face-to-face with the man, who stood two heads taller than her.
"What are you doing here? Get out of my house right now, or I'll call the police!"
"Oh, here's the selfish woman who wants to keep God's miracles for herself!"
The man was suddenly right in front of my mother without my having seen him move. He lifted my mother by the neck; she clung to his hands, trying to resist.
"If I wanted to, I could break your neck right now, but count yourself lucky that I'm not here today to punish your selfishness."
He hurled my mother against the wall, which she hit violently, the back of her head striking it. My mother was not awakened: as her body slowly slid down the wall, her head left a trail of blood on it.
"Mom!"
I rushed toward her, but the man knocked my sister and me out, and the world went black.
I was pulled out of unconsciousness by a new nightmare, in which I saw that same man break my mother's neck before my eyes. I found myself in a dark place, bound hand and foot, my sister beside me.
"Marie, Marie!" I called.
My voice reached her, and she finally regained consciousness, her face swollen and her voice weak.
"Where are we, big brother?"
"It's going to be okay, don't worry!"
"Oh, our little ones are awake," said a man standing over my head.
"Why did you kidnap us?" I asked, looking the man straight in the eye.
"To save you!" another man replied.
Looking around, I could see about fifteen men.
"Yes, to save you, to tear you from the clutches of your mother, who was keeping you prisoner," said the man who had kidnapped us.
"Prisoner? You're completely insane!" I replied.
"Insane? No! It's this world that's completely insane, and you are the light in this world that proves there is a higher power, that God exists!"
"God? What has God ever done for my brother? God doesn't exist, He's only in your imagination! God is a creation, an excuse, humanity's great scam!" my sister retorted, exploding with anger.
The more she spoke, the more I felt the men's anger growing dangerously, but my sister didn't notice.
"Look at you: grown men who still believe in fairy tales!"
The man walked over to my sister and slapped her violently, blood spattering the floor.
"You're very badly brought up. It looks like we're going to have to take care of your upbringing."
My sister fell silent, her mouth bleeding, drops slowly dripping down, while I screamed with all my strength.
"Bastard! How dare you do that?" I screamed in rage.
A violent blow to the stomach tore a cry of pain from me.
"You're both very badly brought up. It looks like we're going to have to deal with that."
The men deprived us of water and food while explaining to us why I was the chosen one, talking to us about the greatness of God and the light I would bring to this world. Marie, weakened and pale, whispered in an audible, sarcastic tone:
"Look at you, pathetic, miserable things talking about a God who has never done anything for you, kidnapping and locking up children in God's name. The truth is, you're nothing but pieces of shit incapable of living for yourselves."
"Looks like you didn't learn your lesson, and this time I'm going to make sure it sinks in."
"Marie, stop!" I said as the man moved closer to her.
"Your God can go to hell!" she added again.
"Marie, please!" I cried out now, the man standing in front of her.
"Go on, hit me in the name of your shitty God."
"Hey, guys, do we really need the girl?" another asked, looking very annoyed.
A silence hung in the air, a silence that was itself the answer. So the man smiled, calmly moving closer to her. I struggled with all my strength, unable to loosen my bonds. The man now towered over her.
"I spit on your God, you son of a bitch!" she said, spitting on the floor.
"I'm going to drag this out so that in the end, you'll beg for forgiveness."
The man rained blows on her, each one making her body twist. Her blood gradually spattered the floor, and only cries of helplessness came out of my mouth as I struggled.
"Ahh! Ahh! I'm going to bleed you, you filthy pig! I'll send you to join your shitty God!" I howled, thrashing in my bonds.
Even so, the man didn't stop hitting her, even when she collapsed on the floor; he simply spoke to one of his comrades.
"Shut him up, he's a little too noisy."
I took a blow to the head that made my consciousness waver, my eyes slowly closing on the sight of my sister being beaten to death. A single thought crossed my mind:
"I'm going to kill you! Bleed you! Tear off every one of your limbs!"
I sank into the darkness, obsessed by these thoughts, and when I woke up, everything around me was in ruins. The men's corpses were scattered in various places, their shredded bodies spread out over several meters. There, I saw my father take my unconscious sister in his arms; she seemed to have been healed. Then I collapsed to the ground again in that place that was now nothing but a pile of ruins.