This writing was accepted for publication in the 84 page perfect-bound issue... Down in the Dirt magazine (v111) (the October 2012 Issue) You can also order this 5.5" x 8.5" issue as an ISSN# paperback book:

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Waking Up

Jon Brunette

    My eyes opened and my hands twitched like lightning had jabbed me. As I touched the box in which I usually slept, I felt as though I was lying in the dark of night, and didn’t want to get up yet. I couldn’t move, however I tried, and my throat scratched like sandpaper. I drank a lot of liquor, like everyone did out in the West, in the early 1880s, and I never realized what could happen to me in that kind of stupor. Occasionally, the black would wrap me up like an old ratty blanket and my teeth would chatter as loudly as my heart could beat.
    Usually, the dew would chill me to the bone and I would feel that I should have died; usually, I’d wake up by the logs where I would cook rabbit, or deer, and I would feel clammy and uncomfortable, and my wife would haul me back to bed somehow. It would take a moment before I’d realize that I smelled of liquor and I would have to pinch my nose on reflex. It had become habit to drink and fall asleep and have Holly carry me back to bed. I could always wake up, eventually, so no one would ever care.
    Finally, I couldn’t be woken up.
    On the occasion that I realized that Holly hadn’t carried me back to bed, I yelled as loudly as my lungs could call out. Only, the echo didn’t erupt through the canyon, as it should have done, as it always had whenever trouble had come our way, nor did it carry throughout the valley that surrounded the canyon, but exploded inside my head, trapped by the thick wooden bed. Then, it died as quickly as it had come out of me.
    Now, I realized what must have happened—
    My wife probably thought what I would always think whenever bodies were found on the ground that couldn’t be woken anymore—they couldn’t tolerate the West and had drunk themselves to death, like I must have done. As I lay still (the box didn’t allow a lot of movement), I realized that I could die alone and helplessly, yet not by intoxication, but by the fact that I must have been mistaken for such a cause and had been buried alive!
    I prayed for Holly to find me below the mud, realize that I had finally woken up, and haul the box in which I lay back to the surface. And, then, I might not die, after all. I prayed to be able to live with Holly, above ground, as I always have before. Somehow, I couldn’t die; I just couldn’t—not like this, anyway!
    Anyhow, I prayed, and prayed, and prayed some more, but no God, nor Holly, ever came to my rescue. The box would continue to remind me of the tomb in which Holly and whoever else had placed me, by the dull sound of my voice every time I would call out—indeed, no one could hear me anymore!
    I continued to pray, alone and helplessly...
    I continued to pray...

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