The Town With No Name That Once Had One

Eleanor sat up with a start. She was screaming, screaming as she threw her covers off, a flurry of worn cloth sent flying from her bed. She was fine. Fine, right? She panted long, raspy breaths as she patted her hands up and down her body, as if fearing that she might disappear at any moment. She realized with a sigh of relief that her body, once worn and withered, had returned to something approaching normal. She still didn’t like it, but… It was hers. She was whole again.

This was her home, wasn’t it? No, she didn’t recognize it. Glancing back and forth around the room, however, there was an odd sense of familiarity to the decor. Faded posters and dusty trinkets lay about the room, and though they were clearly laid out by someone who shared her interests, the sense of solidarity that might come from finding another like-minded person was absent. Any color that had once adorned the room had been stolen, like all the life had been sucked out. There was something painfully, utterly wrong about the eerie familiarity, like someone had stolen a piece of herself and plastered it all across the room like some sort of ghoulish caricature.

It was with some trepidation that she slid herself off of the bed, instinctively reaching for the nightstand and the thin silver necklace that lay atop it. As she reached to clasp it around her neck, however, she felt the hard, comforting touch of her necklace already around her. She froze for a moment, then slowly unclasped the object around her neck, bringing them both up to her eyes to inspect them.

The designs were indistinguishable. She held in front of her a copy of her most prized possession, the piece of jewelry with a one-of-a-kind design given to her by…

There were clear differences in the two. The one she had been wearing was in far better condition, sparkling in the light from its carefully polished metal. The other, in comparison, had lost its shine and color, worn away by years of neglect. It was rough along the sides, whereas hers was smooth and comforting. It would be irritating to wear this other necklace, since it would surely chafe over the course of a few days. This couldn’t possibly be hers. She would never be so thoughtless as to keep it in such a condition. This… this forgery looked like it hadn’t been worn in years.

She replaced the necklace on the bedside table and carefully clasped her own back to its rightful place around her neck. She approached the door and reached out a hand, turning the knob with a squeak and stepping out into the hall. The barren gray of the hall stretched forward with its small collection of identical doors, ending in a spiraling flight of stairs that disappeared down to the living room. The hall itself was entirely featureless and colorless; nothing was allowed to interrupt the continuous dull gray of the paint.

She walked across to the other side of the hall, closing the door to her room (someone’s room, she corrected) and opened the door to the bathroom. As she pulled back the door, however, she immediately wished that she hadn’t.

Slick, wet red was strewn about the room like some sort of macabre paint bucket had exploded, mixed in with the harder brown of blood that had congealed and dried long ago. Shards of glass lay in disarray all over the floor, sink, and bathtub, reflecting the brilliant reds in a sickening display of prismatic brilliance. The mirror on the wall had been beaten and cracked to the point where only a few shards along the edges remained, holding out against the onslaught they had endured. Another frame identical to the one on the wall lay in the bath, completely stripped of its glass and laying propped up against the side.

Eleanor shut the door as soon as any sense returned to her head. She wanted to cry. She wanted to vomit. Her head spun with conflicting reactions, none of which had much staying power. She never wanted to look into that room again. She wished she could burn the horrific image out of her mind, the same way it had burned itself in. The reds splashed about, reflecting off of the thousands of tiny shards, an inescapable array of twisted color everywhere.

She shakily pushed herself to her feet again. She didn’t remember when she fell, but clearly it had happened. Suddenly her curiosity regarding the other doors in the hall was absent, and she slowly began moving her body towards the stairs. She knew what would be behind them anyway.

Her hand grasped the metal of the railing with some desperation. It was nice to have something to hold on to that could steady her, and though the white polish had faded away long ago, the railing would have to do. The stairs creaked as one by one she stepped down, the living room coming into view as she did so.

The same gray and featureless color scheme held here as well. The same gray walls. The same gray ceiling. There was a faded gray couch near the window, a window that looked out at the same gray sky to which she’d become accustomed. The softly roiling clouds were all at once comforting and terrifying in their uniformity. She decided to look away, back to the safe, gray interior of the house.

A soft clink of silverware made her snap her attention to the entrance to the kitchen. There wasn’t anybody here. There wasn’t ever anybody here. She was always alone, she always had been. Or, wait, hadn’t there been people before, before she...

She softly made her way forward, her body unsure of what posture to take as she crept closer and closer to the corner. She chided herself for not bringing a weapon, maybe a piece of glass from the bathroom, but quickly shut down that line of thinking. She would never go back in there. She touched a hand to the dividing wall, moving her head forward to peer at the intruder that had found their way into the house. As she turned the corner, however, any thoughts she might have had were shattered when she saw the messy, gray figure hunched over the table, a spoonful of cereal halfway to its mouth. The two of them stared in shock at one another, unable to form words as Eleanor stared back at a twisted version of her own reflection.

The Eleanor that sat before her was worn and withered, a mangled body that had been destroyed by neglect and hardship. There was a gray pallor to the face to match the gray of the rest of the house, a gray that had been meticulously painted on day after day, year after year, until the old color had been all but forgotten by the outside world. A gray coat sat crooked around her frame, as if it had to make an effort not to slide off of the body it lay on, and she wore a pair of jeans that had faded to gray over the years. The spoon dropped to the table with a thud, falling out of the bony hands it had been barely held in.

Eleanor stared at herself for minutes, hours, not a single word passing between them. Words tried to take hold on her mind, but all died before they could make it to her lips. She had nothing to say, nothing she could say, nothing that was possibly worth saying. After what seemed like a lifetime, or at least something approaching one, the Eleanor in front of her slowly stood up with a strength that belied her gaunt body. A single hand reached down to the bottom of her shirt, pulling up to reveal an emaciated, sunken stomach that Eleanor had seen before. But this was different. Thousands of scars, cuts, and slashes cut across the skin mercilessly, the reds and browns a stark contrast to the gray that had covered them moments before. Little flecks of glass dotted several of the wounds, still dripping a bright red that had begun to run down her body.

“It’s all like that,” said the Eleanor in a raspy imitation of her own voice. “It’s gotten harder to hide over the years, but I make do.” Eleanor nodded. She already knew.

Slowly, her mind began to slog through the reality in front of her. Finally, though, the words came to her, shaky and forceless.

“I’m not going to be like you,” she whispered to herself.

The person in front of her nodded. “I know.” She paused. “I wouldn’t want you to,” she added after some consideration.

“I’m going to get out of here. I’m going to find somewhere better.”

The person in front of her laughed, a dry, humorless laugh that morphed into a cough as it dragged itself along.

“I know you’ll try. If anyone could, it’s you. There’s no point though. You’ll be wasting your time.”

Eleanor nodded. She walked to the door, opening it with only a moment of hesitation.

“I don’t care,” she whispered softly, and left.