An Announcement chapter8

Story about Jack's pilgrim

I walked for twenty or thirty minute. While I kept on walking, no sounds could be heard except for my footsteps. I followed what the older man, my lost memory, told me to do. I never looked back, but kept on looking straight forward. In the long distance, I barely saw the lights. It might be a reflection of the drip of water on the leaves. Strangely, as long as I walked, that lights never came close. The path of greenwood seemed that it would continue forever till I died. The sweat was pouring off from my back. I even felt cold. Suddenly, in front of me, someone crossed. It seemed to be a child, whose age might be about 8, or so. He went into the bush in to the side of me. I spontaneously chased him. I didn't know whether he was an opponent or an adversary to me. However, I don't want to miss any opportunities to meet someone like the older man. If he was my lost memory, I want to know what he signified. Now I craved for myself, like I once had. I plowed my way through the bush. He ran so fast. I almost suffocated. When I was a child, I couldn't run so fast like him. Always I had envied fast runners in my childhood. I hadn't wanted to disappoint my parents, so I ran everyday to overtake everyone, everything. However, they didn't like me. I can't remember their smile. Do I hate them? Actually, I don't. Nonetheless, I had a sense of guilty. I couldn't reward their expectations.
AS I ran, gradually the distance between him and me was extended. Then, no sooner could I run anymore that I reached a vacant space. Some trees were standing around. And the season there seemed to be fall. At that time I noticed seasons had passed since I came here. At first, when I entered through the door of the information center, this world was spring. And while I was with the older man, the season might have been summer. Now this place seemed to be fall. The leaves of trees were red and yellow. Scattered leaves on the ground were like a carpet. I looked around, but the boy I chased wasn't there. However, I found one thing at the vacant space, which turned out to not be vacant. One bench was there. Surrounded by trees, the bench was like a forgotten legacy of history. It seemed a long time had passed since it had been forgotten, but the chair was in beautiful condition as if it were painted the day before. The bench had a rusty long pole on its right side, like a chimney of a devastated factory. I got closer to the bench. As I headed for, the leaves around there abruptly rustled so loud. I couldn't help but stop my steps. I looked around, of course I obeyed what the older man had said to me, trying not to look back, if something wrong had happened. The time limit the older man mentioned was until I arrived at the vacant space, I couldn't certify where the sun was. As a result, I couldn't guess what time it was, too. I found the sun was definitely about to sink. Maybe it was about 3 pm or 4 pm. The time remaining for me was about 2 hours at most. To make matters worse, I still hadn't find my children. Just 2 hours! What a little time! I wanted to wail. The situation was desperate. I even felt dizzy. I pressed forehead with thumbs and forefinger. With my eyes closed, I sat down on the bench. Once I sat down, nothing could be heard except for rustling of the leaves. It made me feel as if I were the only human being surviving in the world. I thought that wasn't saying too much because I was uncertain if there were others. It even doubted that my children were. The world where I was was too inorganic. Everything I saw seemed to be rusty. And everything was too vivid, too. It's like an overly emphasized outline. I couldn't know why I felt like that, but it was what I perceived. Everything in that world now reminded me of a melody of Gymnopedies, composed by Erik Satie. It was consummated beautifully and perfectly, but it simultaneously disregards or dispenses with tonality. I thought the world I was in belonged to an aggregation, an aggregation which was constituted of lives, time and memories. It resembles one big tower, and we are the corkscrew staircase. That tower will continue forever until all of us living in the world are extinct. I'm a member of that sequence. Everyone is a member of that sequence. Unchanged truth, it is. And, my children, White and Bella are a sequence, too. The sequence continued from me and my wife. The sequence, my family was in that sequence. And there was someone who broke it. That was me. Did I cherish them? Have I ever shown gratitude to them? No, I haven't. I always regarded them as a nuisance. At first when I found my wife had become pregnant, was I happy? Did I want to be a parent? Such questions popped up, then popped away in mind. I thought about my parents. Were they happy with me? I always failed to reciprocate to their expectation. I always did my best. However the results were always miserable. My first failure was when I was 6 years old. At that age, I took an examination to enter into a famous elementary school. I studied hard and my parents supported me so much, I wanted to pass it at any costs. But the results was contrast to our expectation. From then, no matter how hard I tried my best, I couldn't be earnest. I was afraid of making mistakes. Gradually, our relationship deteriorated. Eventually, I came to regard myself as a failure. "Sorry." I uttered, not intending to tell anybody. At that time, I heard someone's steps were approaching me.