Walking Ghosts

Blue Digital Light in a Black Void

I saw an old friend in the woods. He was standing right in front of me. He tells me to fix his tattoo. I see his skin melting off.

I wake up.

*****

I was walking down by the river. There used to be a lot spots down here before they made the highway. There was a bridge here. The only thing left of it are three massive metal pillars partially sunken into the sandbar.

There used to be well worn roads everywhere around here but they aren't used anymore. The other bridge has been falling into the river for the better part of thirty years. It's private property now.

Used to hunt down there on the tribal side.

Pops built a ghetto tree stand. Used to go down there an hour before the sun came up. The deer were predictable. I'd watch them walk down from over the hill, alongside the fenceline. They'd graze out there in the meadow.

I was an archer for awhile.

My uncles and cousins were archers.

They weren't allowed to shoot guns because they did time.

When I was a boy I'd be at grandma's wondering where everyone went. We had some relatives come down to hunt. All we wanted to do was join them.

I don't regret hunting. I think it made me stronger.

I wish we didn't go with them, though. You weren't supposed to see some stuff. Grandma adopted some of her relatives. They were brothers. I was a few years younger than one of them. I liked him back then.

We grew up and grew apart.

The last time I saw him was in the middle of the night. We were in our twenties at the time. I was hanging out in one of our junked out vehicles. He walked down from the woods. He said he just got out of jail.

Apparently he was living with the medicine man out near Rosebud. He came a long way from grandma's. She was a Christian and wanted us to be Christians too. My cousin wasn't a Christian. He lived with the medicine man and managed to join him around the pow wow trail. All across the country.

He told me about the drugs he took. We call them drugs but they aren't. They were used in ceremony. Told me about peyote and ayuahuasca. Seeing God and learning peyote songs ain't enough to get you in the right mind if you don't want to change and he didn't want to change.

He stole the medicine man's car and drove it until it broke down, some thirty miles west of our hometown. He managed to find a bootlegger out there and drank with 'em for awhile before leaving. He stole a half gallon of whiskey and started walking back towards grandma's.

He blacked out on the way back and came-to in jail.

*****

I must have been around eleven or twelve and he would have been thirteen or fourteen

We went fishing with our uncles and our older cousins. Fishing was an initiation for us. We fish with them all the time then maybe they'll take us out hunting. So we went fishing with them. I went more than him though.

I remember seeing them pull in a catfish as big as my nephew. It went up to my uncle's waist.

We went out fishing with our uncle, his girlfriend, and our older cousins.

Out north about twenty miles.

We weren't supposed to see certain things but we did.

We went and caught minnows with a massive net. There wasn't a lot of them around. Only in one spot and we caught a bunch. We moved closer to the shore on the other end of the river.

You could see a rotting cow under the water.

That's why the minnows were there.

They're all dead now.

I lost my shoes in the muddy river bank and had to walk around barefoot. My feet were covered in small slivers. We sat around a fire while the adults got drunk. They gutted a few fish and cooked them on a stick.

They kept drinking.

My uncle's girlfriend got mad at one of our cousins and splashed beer in his face. My uncle got mad at her and kicked her between the legs. All three of our older cousins immediately jumped in and beat the fuck out of him.

I looked over at my other cousin and we knew to get the fuck out of there.

Problem was there was nowhere for us to go. We were in the middle of the country, in the middle of the night, pre-cellphone era. We didn't even have flashlights. So we just started walking back towards the main road.

The night was beautiful.

The sky was bright blue from a full moon.

The weather was nice because the day time was hot.

We walked all the way back to the main trail before turning around.

We were gone for a good hour and no one cared to wonder where we were.

When we got back they all acted like nothing happened.

********

I learned how to be cold by hunting with them. We'd go out in grandpa's truck. It was a small S-10. There was only enough room in the cab for two people. My cousins always fought over who got shotgun. I didn't mind sitting in the truck bed.

The weather we hunted in varied. Sometimes it was nice. A lot of the time it was cold. A lot colder back in the day. Seems we went through a shift as the years went on. Winters are a lot drier than before. But when I first started it was pretty snowy out.

We were dedicated to it.

We'd go out when it was below zero. The windchill should've taken our ears and fingers. We were determined for some reason. Maybe we had a thirst for blood. Maybe we had pride. Maybe the meat was good.

We'd freeze ass, wrapped up in blankets, over our hunting clothes.

We were no good. If you weren't paying attention, you were probably gonna get a big ol' open handed smack because the cold made it hurt a lot more.

We'd break through snow as deep as our thighs through rough woods. We'd have bows in hand moving in spread out groups of four while our uncle and lucky cousin stationed themselves further on up the creek.

I had a cheap 50lb compound bow. There was a 40lb recurve bow used by one of us. Lastly, my uncle's. His was setup to be heavy as shit. 80lb draw weight plus. I think 50's fine. 60's fine. 70 and up is pushing it.

I went when I could but not all the time.

One of our cousins came back with a massive welt across his chest and face. The bow string snapped on him at full draw.

That same cousin went and bought guns after he got a job.

I still remember his 7mm mag. That thing was the strongest gun any of us had at the time. We drove out to a prairie dog town to test it. I watched that recoil knock down one of our older uncles. We weren't too smart about a lot of stuff.

Same cousin shot it too close to the car and the air pressure from the gunshot sent spider cracks through the windshield.

I was a hunter for awhile.

Our family went broke on a regular basis and dad had to sell our guns.

Broadheads cost about twenty five bucks for a four pack, and arrows were around thirty for six. That kind of money ain't much at my age, now. But back then, that fifty bucks was way too expensive, especially since a bad shot meant you'd be out ten to twelve bucks per arrow.

Economy, man.

These days I think about hunting just to get venison. A lot of fucking venison. My city-relatives still go hunting. They do it right. No getting shit faced. No piling into vehicles in zero degree weather. No fighting.

When I went hunting with my dad and uncle, pops and his former ranch hand brother, they'd be drinking forty ounces the entire time. No good. I remember them saying to a game warden once, "ATF. Alcohol, tobacco, firearms". He was showing the guy their forty ounces, a rifle, and his chew.

I liked hunting with a 410. It was pretty versatile. Birdshot and a choke meant that you could shoot small game. If you used slugs you had enough stopping power to take down deer.

I was walking down by the river, not far from home. As I walked I noticed that my brain shut off for once. The only thing that registered to me was my feet moving. All of those intrusive thoughts went away. I had a gun and my legs moved forward. My mind was quiet because it had to be. I was listening for broken branches. Listening for the stomping hooves of deer.

My mind was finally at peace.

It was like a download in my brain. Like a message given to you in a dream that comes all at once. I speak linearly about it but it came in one massive wave.

Somewhere out there I learned about karma and reincarnation. Learned about the grand cycle of rebirth. In one moment out in the woods I realized what it was that I was doing and I didn't like it. I wasn't just getting meat for stew. I wasn't getting backstraps and roasts. I was killing.

A thought came, a voice came, and it said that I would be reborn as everything I ever shot. Every off shot that wounded, every time an animal panicked and tried to escape, every time I put one down.

I'd have to live as that animal, I'd have to feel all of that hurt and terror.

In my own space, cut off from all reality, just a long cycle of me killing me.

I didn't want to hunt anymore.

********

I was walking down by the river several years later. The roads and trails that we used were grown over. I was older now and mostly interested in getting shit faced. Sometimes you couldn't score any booze so you'd be irritated and bored. I figured I'd go check out the old spots instead.

One of my uncles built a sweat lodge near a pond. It hadn't been used in decades. All that was left was a foundation of stones. There was an old rusted car from the 40's somewhere near the bridge. My uncle was a cop way before I was born. He responded to call in the area. They said he saw floating, glowing faces somewhere around here.

There was talk of freak accidents in the woods.

Talk of birds that spoke. Talk of sightings of a woman in the trees. They said her house burned down a long time ago but her ghost was still around.

I never saw anything like that.

Somewhere out there I found a clearing in the woods. It was about eighty feet from the river and something came over me. I walked in circles and stomped on the grass. I walked in circles and cleared a big ol' area out. I walked in circles and made a spot for myself. I cleared a large area out and sat around for a moment.

I rolled heavy rocks over and put 'em where the fire place would be.

I went back home for a pitchfork and started digging.

I tied a rope to a wooden plank and flattened a trail down towards the river.

Lastly, I grabbed some flowers from the trash heap next to the old cemetery and built an alter of sorts. Behind the shed was a coyote and deer skull. I attached them to a pole, and hammered the flowers in, up and around to the top. It was about chest tall.

I don't know why. I guess it felt right. Maybe it'd scare people away.

********

I called a friend and asked him if he could help me haul the post-hole digger and skull pole down to the camping spot. We'd end up spending the next several months there whenever we had booze money. Sat next to the fire and got shitfaced. Talking about the stars and where we'd go in life.

We blacked out down there once. We had a six pack of Joose and some vodka. At some point he wanted to go back home and I figured I could bum him a ride so we started walking. About five minutes into the walk back he passed out in the grass.

I time traveled forward and found myself being pepper sprayed by the police. Apparently I wasn't too keen on living, even back then. I came to, walking in circles with a burning face and chest. Freezing ass in the drunk tank. Not the first and not the last. By the end of my drinking days I'd have gotten pepper sprayed at least four times.

I've never blacked out with my shoes on.

It's always a long ass walk back on the highway barefoot.

Never once did I think about sobering up.

Why should I.

My friend was a good guy. I'll always feel bad about the way things went because I pressured him into drinking. Pressured him into smoking. He was the last one to join us. He got caught like I got caught. When he started drinking, we started drinking. We drank every time we had money.

If he didn't have booze to split, he'd have smoke. That was the friendship. I had booze and he had smoke and we had a place to get drunk.

One night we were drinking at my house. He asked if he could drive the car and I didn't see a problem with that. We were pretty fucked up at the time. We drove out into the country and on the way home he started to speed.

We went from sixty, to eighty, to a hundred.

He pulled over and got out along the highway and said he was gonna walk home.

I didn't see a problem with any of it and drove back to the house.

As I walked inside a rag on the stove burst into flames.

I don't think any of us really wanted to live.

Towards the fall my city-cousin stopped down for the weekend. He wanted to shoot some pheasants and grouse. I said yeah, fuck it. We drove out there towards Wood, SD. Drove all the way back on the backroads.

He looked in the rearview and said, "Hey man. Doesn't that car look familiar to you?"

I turned around, and sure enough.

It looked just like my drinking buddy's car. Flipped over about three hundred feet into a field.

I called him up and asked how he was doing and he didn't sound any different.

*****

We were still drinking at the campsite deep into winter. I met a personal goal of mine. Our beer got so cold that it turned to slush. I remember pops and my uncle talking about that happening to them back when my uncle lived outside in a van.

My friend tells me that it was his car in that field and it wasn't an accident. He said he drank a jug of vodka and said fuck it. He flew full speed and let God decide what was gonna happen.

Walking ghosts.

We were getting older now and everyone was leaving. There wasn't really anyone left in town. Just us. He was like me. He wasn't book smart but he wasn't stupid. He had a natural curiosity in him and that wasn't at all common, it'd get increasingly rare the longer I drank. Alcoholics have a circular thought pattern that shows up all the time.

I watched once bright people devolve. Drinking buddies that used to have interests got stuck in loops. All they cared about was shit that happened years ago or what they drank the night before. The booze took our individuality from us and I hated being around that. Finding people who could still think and imagine was difficult.

I blacked out one time with him. I tried walking home from uptown barefoot in the snow. I think I saw something that most don't get to see. I think I saw reality for it really is. And reality ain't what you think. Reality is a black void. It's a black void and the people around you are made of digital lines, chaotically created.

Thought and soul projected into empty black space.

Blue digital light.

A coworker saw me staggering home and gave me a ride. I remember her face in the void, painted in blue lines and scribbles in pure blackness.

Christmas twenty-thirteen. I was gifted two bottles of wine. I called my buddy up and asked him if he wanted to drink 'em with me. He said he'd meet me in about twenty so I walked up into the woods.

There used to be a road here before the highway was made. It was the main road but it hadn't been maintained in a long time. The creek next to it had grown exponentially since I was a kid. One of my neighbors vehicle was stuck in the washout. The crack was neck deep at that point. I walked up through the woods to go to work in the mornings.

You can't trust no one.

Over three days that vehicle lost every bit of glass it had. Windows, light covers, mirrors. Give bored people something to break and they'll break it.

I met my buddy in the woods and we went for a walk down towards the river. Near a pond. Behind that pond some feet back was the foundation stones of a sweat lodge that my uncle made a long time ago.

We were talking and he said that he was going to go to a party on New Years Eve. Said it was gonna be a big one and he was excited about it. I told him "fuck that" and said we could get sloshed at the old campsite.

He wasn't interested and I had to work anyway.

We got as much of a buzz as we could and headed out. I didn't have anything going on so I walked with him back to his street. It was freezing ass but that's just how it is. We walked by his house and he left. I didn't know that that would be the last I'd talk to him.

Mom and dad used to talk about something that happened back in the day. You see, my friend's dad and my dad were friends. Friend's dad lived out west in one of those isolated rez communities. They say he was hitchhiking to town and he never made it. He got hit by a car.

My parents were driving out that way, towards Rapid City on highway 44. One of their tires flew off and into the ditch. Dad went down there and brought it back. They said while they were tightening the lug nuts they could hear dad's friend calling his name from the field. The tire fell off right where the dude died.

Around the 27th or 28th I had a dream. In the dream I was walking in the woods towards town. Where that vehicle got stuck was a hole in the ground and I fell into it. I could hear something calling me to the back of this cave so I followed.

There was a rattle. A shaman's rattle. I saw what was making the noise.

It was a snake. A snake made of neon pinks, greens, and yellows. It's scales were made of crystal or glass and it started chasing me.

I ran as fast as I could but couldn't escape. I tried climbing up and out but it bit me. It bit me and bam.

I was in a massive room. It felt like I was inside of a tipi. The room was lit by holes in the ceiling. I could see sunbeams from floating dust. I looked up and saw these figures standing in front of me. They were as tall as electrical poles.

They had antlers and wore cloaks.

The one in front of me showed me a dead infant. I instinctually started to stomp on it, over and over and over. When I was done I found myself crying to this thing. I cried and asked, "Are they going to kill me? Are they going to kill me? Are they going to kill me?"

I woke up knowing that something happened. I ran through the scenes as much as I could to commit 'em to memory.

Something felt wrong.

I was pissed off on New Years Eve. I wanted to get shitfaced but I had to work. That night I stayed in and painted instead. I painted and listened to a lecture by Manly P Hall. It was about white and black magic. Hall says that prayer works and that you shoud only ever pray for good things.

I made a post online. I said, "I hope you end up in jail or in a ditch." It wasn't directed at anyone specifically. It was me being bitter about not being able to drink. Pops gave me a bottle of champagne at midnight and that was that.

I got off of work at nine-ten in the morning. On the ride home I saw another friend. My drinking buddy's older brother. I ask him if he wanted a ride and he hopped in. He said he wasn't feeling good after the party, luckily he had a hangover cure.

He pulled out a jug of 80 proof vodka. I asked him for a pull and he passed it over. I dropped him off at the grocery store and before he leaves, he asks me if I heard from his brother. I tell him no. He says the guy left early last night and to let me know if I hear anything from him.

The guy's younger brother stopped by our house after my evening shift. He was with two tribal cops and they asked if we saw him anywhere. We said no, and he asked if I thought he'd be at the campsite. I said it wouldn't hurt to check.

A big ol' storm hit that night. It snowed for a few days. My White buddy asked us if we wanted to go with him out that way in the morning and we agreed but the snow got too bad. Got too bad and the cops were already looking.

January 4th came. Days later. My ma said that they found him. I figured he was in jail.

I hadn't seen him since Christmas. She says, "No son, they found him."

I knew what she meant that time.

I did what I usually do. I walked down to the old campsite and drank a jug of vodka. Periodically pouring some out for my friend. I remember something catching my eye so I looked up. Up there in the tree there was a face made of branches and leaves. It's eyebrows pointed up, looking sad, looking down on me.

I spoke to it as though it were my friend and he was still here.

I offered him another shot before finishing my jug.

I told him that I'm sure he has more important people to see before he leaves.

I drank a lot before he died. I drank more after he left. There wasn't anything going on around here so why should I stay sober? Fuck it. I drank more and more. If I could afford a bottle I'd drink. If I had to sell shit I owned to get shitfaced I would.

I've only ever seen a funeral like that once before. That was my dad's dad. When grandpa left the streets were packed every day.

Same thing happened for my friend.

Guess dying young will do that.

He was a good guy too.

Bit of a drinker but we all were.

The trails that we made and the campsite are all grown over now. They haven't been used in forever.

I would occasionally see my friend in dreams.

In one dream I see him in the woods, near where we used to drink. He tells me to fix his tattoo. I watch as his skin melts.

About a year later I had another dream.

I was looking at the road leading out to where that New Years party was. It was a birds eye view. High up in the sky. Staring out at that country road, a massive sweep of information comes through me at once.

The dream told me that his soul was still out there.

It told me that I had to go out with bundles of sage.

That I should burn 'em and lead his soul back to his grave.

I never did.

It's been a little over a decade since the dream and I never did.

I don't think I'm a good friend.

****

I'm a moron who has chosen to write over paint. There's no money in writing. Please support my delusions by making a donation to paypal.me/sblackwolf, or buy a painting from my shop. I owe back rent. Amen.