The Abysmal Pit (Part One)

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• (Coraline is a lonely girl. No friends, tough relationship with parents, no good at school... But she has a secret talent. She sees through the masks of other people. She can tell what they´re hiding from others... Then, after an impossible accident, her talent becomes more than a learnt skill. It becomes unbearable...)
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• (Illustration by @irenhorrors on Instagram)
• (I do not own the picture.)

I.

"I´m not stupid."

Rain drops rebounding from the window sounded similar to gossip whispering. Quiet and secret, velvet sound like the one a blanket makes when you pull it over your head to hide yourself from the terrifying world. Monsters hidden behind human masks lurking in the open, softly conveying news to each other; fake, true, it doesn´t matter, monsters feed on them all.

"They´re wrong. I´m not stupid."

Coraline shook her head. Really, has she gone mad? Talking to the mirror? But it wasn´t the mirror she was speaking to, but the person whose face watched her straight in the eyes from the smooth reflective surface. It´s funny, she thought, how the only person whose stare you can never escape from is no one else but your own reflection. No matter what you try to do, when you lift your eyes toward the glass, that bitch will return you the sharp look full of judgment.

Coraline removed her look from the chubby fifteen-year-old girl with short, greassy brown hair, big blue eyes and wrinkles in the mirror, took her bag and headed to the school. The worst possible way to start the day of.

Coraline detested school for three particular reasons. First one, teachers. With their I´m-better-than-you-because-I-finnished-school-and-now-you´re-all-my-minions attitude. They treat every pupil like underclass toddlers they are forced to help rise. However, toddlers having such small brains in comparison to their superiror teachers, this task is mostly impossible to carry out. But from all brainless dumbsters they had to educate, one disgusted them more than the others; Coraline. Which brings her to the second reason for hating school; her classmates. More like class-enemies, she thought. She has no friends. She isn´t attractive like a bunch of other girls, she suckes in sport and struggles with completing every school year. Teachers sighed disaprovingly hadning Coraline her exames which she never managed to pass at first, sometimes she even failed test from a second try. Teachers´s dissatisfaction wasn´t the only humiliation Coraline suffered each and every day at classroom. Other pupils just waited for her to give the wrong answer to a simple question, they spread their legs in the hallways for her to stumble upon or laughed when she got tired during P.E. though everyone else barely noticed exertion. All of this combined in the third reason why she hated school; herself. Years of failing, enduring parents´ desperation while they considered what could be so wrong with their daughter, standing the torment which she went through whenever someone in school noticed her and repeating tests like a rat in the laboratory made her flinch whenever she saw her reflection or was reminded of her name. Coraline. Who is this person, why is she alive? Why can´t she make everyone´s lives easier by disappearing? Psychologist which her parents forced her to talk to tried to turn her thoughts in another direction.

"You have good and bad sides, Coraline", she said. "We must find your qualities and ways to express them. It´s all right not to fit in. You´ll fit in somewhere else."

She was nice enough to fool Coraline for a few days, perhaps even weeks, but nobody seemed to share psychologist´s opinion. It was easier to fold arms and conclude Coraline wasn´t right in the head because she couldn´t remember lessons like others, was weird because she had no friends, and uncapable of doing anything worthy of mention.

"But I´m not stupid", she repeated once again while exiting the house and opening an umbrella. Her parents weren´t at home. Nowadays, she barely ever saw them, and that was fine in her opinion. They worked long shifts and arrived home late. Coraline would lock herself in her room and listen to the music, imagining she was a ghost haunting their house. Disembodied. On weekends she´d take long walks in the forest where they couldn´t find her, escaping uncomfortable conversations about her average grade, plans for the future etc..

"Hay, Cor!"

Not you again, Coraline thought. It was her neighboor, Madeline, too-jolly girl with hair always lifted in a ponytale, wearing short skirts and oversized jumpers. She was the captain of the girls basketball team and one of the rare people who never insulted Coraline. Actually, she generally behaved nice and even went so far as too try and talk with Coraline. Why this girl did this, remained a mystery. Coraline didn´t trust her. People whose company Madeline enjoyed were exactly those bruts who put her into numerous humiliating situations, calling her names, stealing and hiding her books, throwing food at her. Madeline often stopped them. She´d go to where Coraline sat, apologized to her, give her the missing items or helped her clean spilled juice on her bag... She had a good heart. Or not. Coraline saw it all as a part of their master plan; group of bad guys with one sweetheart who sticks out as a good fairy, but later they´re all having a good laugh. "Geez, Madeline, did you really come that close to her? Does she really smell like rotten sausages?"

Coraline put earphones on. That was enough to show Madeline that she didn´t want to talk.

The only thing Coraline found entertaining when going to school (or anywhere else in public, for that matter) was scrutinizing other people. Spending most of her time alone, Coraline´s only interlocutor became her own self. Both of these persons, which were in fact one and only identity, had lots of fun watching other people.

Coraline started doing it when she was very young. She´d observe her parents moving through the house, then her babysitter, her grandparents in the village... Nothing special, she was a quiet kid who found it easier to listen to others than talk herself.

Except listening wasn´t the only thing she did.

Later, when she became teenager, Coraline figured out her perception differed from other people´s view. While most of them saw either what they wanted to, what they expected or only what they could squint through someone´s personality, Coraline saw the real thing. That´s how she knew that her mother´s nerves jumped whenever she saw her daughter and that her dad wanted to help her, suggest her not to bother with school if that isn´t her thing, but mother would not allow him to mention a posibillity drastic like that. She noticed small, barely visible marks on her dad´s face which revealed he hadn´t been sleeping well. She understood there was a hidden gap behind her mother´s smil, fear for the construction of her life because, even as a kid, Coraline knew her mother to be obsessed with control. If her puzzle lost some of it´s pieces, she´d lose some of herself, too.

This ability Coraline considered to be her only talent. She never mentioned it to anyone.

Coraline thought everybody wears masks. Masks of opinion, masks which allow people to function in society. She came to see through them so well, just a glimpse of their faces was enough.

She arrived at high school. Students were pushing each other at the entrance, endeavoring their ingress through the crowd. Coraline slipped between bodies, incospicuous like a bug, and squized herself in the front row. Holding her umbrella close, she managed to leave dense mass of nervous teenagers.

"You´re late."

She was the last to enter the classroom, but teacher was wrong. There were two minutes left until the beginning of the lesson.

"I´m sorry, but you´re mistaken", Coraline dared to oppose her.

A woman near to retirement, with long, sparse hair badly colored red and provocative round glasses tilted her head and gave Coraline a how-dare-you? look. Policy of the school was clear; in a teacher-student argument, no matter the facts, student can never be right.

It became tense. Troublesome boys in the back of the class were giggling, excited to see their most hated victim expelled from the classroom. Chatty girls who didn´t really care about what happens to her, but were still amused by her misery, used their chance to whisper without being admonished of good behavior. Top students who subconsciously believed in school´s policy of teacher´s infallibility shoot Coraline a critical look of disapproval.

But behind all of that, Coraline saw more.

Thomas, a big guy who was nice only to his dog and couldn´t speak without swearing, was actually relieved that someone else took over teacher´s attention. He did something bad, really bad, and he was scared to shit that his doing was discovered. Selling easy drugs in the toilet, Coraline supposed, or maybe kicking a younger kid. In front of him, Jude was playing with her hands. Extremely nervous, as she had been for a week or so now. Her dad hasn´t come home. Coraline actually heard her talk about it with her mom on the phone, so her view on Jude´s case was even bigger than it would be if she had only her skill to use. Jude´s dad got into some illegal business. Hid daughter was terrified that he was either caught by police or punished by his fellow law-breaking buddies. Then there was Marion, the beloved beauty of their class, volunteer in the asylum for dogs and cookie-seller at festival. But her hair was not clean as it was at the beginning of the year. Marion took a lot of time to take care for her look because she was frightened that she may lose her beauty, and then what would be left of her? But her boyfriend, three-years-older boy, broke up with her. Everybody knew that, but she was playing it cool. Her act wasn´t good enough to fool Coraline who could see through her mask and recognise bulimia, neglected nails and hair. And fright.

"Coraline!"

Ah, and the teacher, old maid who failed to achieve the only thing her mother expected of her; to concieve a child. So strict, so hard-working, yet unable to catch a man. None of her work mattered to her traditional mother who despised her daughter´s books, faculty papers and high hopes for the future. She used to be such a nice teacher, so hopeful and kind. That person has been dead for a long time.

"Coraline, do you hear me?"

She snapped fingers in front of Coraline´s face. For a moment Coraline was out of classroom, somewhere where it was dark, but she could see everything. But now she was back.

"Excuse me?"

Bad move.

"Get... the Hell.. OUT!"

She turned around and left the classroom low-headed, silent. But as soon as she was out, she grinned. It was weird, she felt horrible because of unjust punishment, but something remained funny. They´re so full of secrets, so fake!

A younger student passed her on his way to the toilet. He turned back to look at her. She lifted her head, the grin still on her face. Horror crossed over his face and he hurried away.

II.

Talking.

Her parents were home early.

This almost never occured. Coraline was scared. Did they get a call from school, informing them about their daughter´s insolence that morning? Slowly, she moved toward the kitchen. As she got closer, she was surprised to hear laughter. It was the kind of official, polite laughter people use (literally use because it completely fails to express what they really think) when conducting business. She stood before the door. Three voices. Three people. Who came to visit us?

"Ah, Coraline, you´re home!" Her father softly kissed her forehead, took her bag and left it in a corner on the floor. "Sweety, come, there´s someone you must meet!"

By this time, she was terrified. Her parents worked in a bank. Her mother at the counter, her father taking care for clients´ credits and debts. Nothing big, but quite respectful. If someone important from the bank came to their home, the best thing to do was to send Coraline away, possibly out of the house, which her mother practised for the last two years whenever one of her friends visited. Coraline prefered it that way. She didn´t have to meet new people. However, if her dad won in this argument, they might just have a chair for her at the table at this meeting.

"Coraline", her mother spoke now. Beside her stood a man. He wasn´t dressed fancy like you´d expect from a bank employee (like her parents, always neat and symmetrical). Plaid shirt, black pants with belt, fine shoes. His skin was dark like skin of a field worker and his hair and short black beard were messy. His handswere in pockets of his pants and he was slightly bent back. An average guy.

That´s all she could see.

She frowned. Normally, she´d pick up much more from person´s appearance; love status, family relations, perhaps even some guilty pleasures and traumas, but with this guy it was different. Nothing besides what he wanted her to see.

"Meet Leon", her mother went on, "we´re sorry we forgot to mention his visit to you, he called us a week ago, but we see you so little we didn´t manage to inform you about it!"

"Leon is my cousin", her father said, then moved his eyes towards the man he was talking about. "We were such good pals as kids. Our dads were brothers, but Leon´s father died early, so he spent a lot of time at our place. So different, yet so close, that´s what they used to say about us!"

Coraline shook hands with so called Leo. If Leon was her dad´s cousin, a good childhood friend, why had he never mentioned him? Why haven´t her grandparents mentioned they had siblings who died young?

"And we were friends", her mother added, "when I and your father first met. We spent one summer at Leon´s camping house with some other friends. Leon never went to college, but all of our colleagues adored him. You were always such a fun guy, your parties are legendary!"

Coraline couldn´t imagine her control-freak mum and shy dad taking a part in a legendary party, but Leon sure looked like he´d be up for some mischief.

"And we´re so glad you visited us", her father took over. "We´ve wanted to invite you so many times, but you know, always something..."

"Exactly, but now we´re all here, so let´s eat and enjoy each other´s company!"

Mother led them to the table. Caroline was impressed. Her mother cooked. Three dishes plus dessert surpassed their usual pasta meals by far. Her parents talked more than they ate, remembering amazing adventures they had with Leon, praising his glory days as an open-minded adolescent. During the whole evening, their guest didn´t say a word. Caroline was carefully watched him, not liking his silence at all, while her sober parents acted like a pair of drunks.

She was the first one to leave the table. She remembered to say goodnight to her parents, so she turned with mouth ready to pronounce syllables.

Leon´s stare was fixed on her. Her parents´s voices dropped in the background, the room became oval and surreal. Leon never spoke, but Coraline heared the essential point of his voice, it´s deepness and true meaning. I came because of you, girl, he said without speaking.

She ran to her room.

♦

Saturday. Caroline´s favorite day of the week. No school, no obligations, just enough time to get lost among the trees by the lake. Nobody to remind you of your nuisance existence. It´s almost as if you die for a couple of hours, except tomorrow you´ll be alive again.

Ducks swam in the water. Caroline brought some bread for them and was shreading it and throwing crumbs into the lake. Birds ate as much as they managed to grab. Coraline smiled at them.

Next week will be a tough one. On Monday she has a scheduled meeting with instructor, unemployed teacher her parents pay to help her study. It doesn´t help. Since the first grade, Coraline has never been lazy. She studied, the proof being worn paper in her school books. She never skipped lessons, she listened at class, she was never disruptive... Yet she was a terrible student. She almost failed to follow her class from middle to high school. Naturally, other kids and teachers concluded she had to be either lazy or backward in the mind, but that was one thing Coraline rejected to accept. When she was alone (often) and thought about many things around her, she found her mind being perfectly able to think not only coherently, but even advanced in comparison to how she heard others in her class express themselves. But when it came to school subjects, she was lame as a hurt dog.

She stood out among her contemporaries in more ways than one; she hated modern music, avoided going out and was quite sure boys aren´t her thing. Whether she liked girls or not, she wasn´t sure yet.

"Damn them all", she whispered. "Their lies, fake gestures of kindness or desperate measures of cruelty to attract attention. Better not to fit among them. I wouldn´t want to assimilate among such people."

She found a spot where she liked to lay down, head on the roots of an oak, and watch clouds. Although she hated to admit it, being able to see people in whole was sometimes overwhelming and looking at faceless, blank clouds relaxed her. No fake attitudes behind that white folk, no opinions, no lies hidden in their foggy non-existing bodies.

I came for you, girl. Now you come after me.

She jumped like a grasshopper. The voice again, the unhearable voice sneaking into her mind. It spoke once again, repeating the same words of command. Somehow she knew where was it coming from. Reluctant, but curious, Coraline followed it in the forest, away from the pond.

Branches of many trees overlaped in front of her. Roots mingled and looked blurry to her. She walked in a frenzy of confusion, mechanically skipping wooden obstacles, until her normal sight returned; she saw Leon standing by the tree.

Actually, there was a tree, but it was of no importance whatsoever. What Leon was showing her with his all-knowing grin was a pit. Surrounded by roots and high grass, a gap in the ground black as coal called her. Her father´s apparent cousin rolled his eyes and fixed them on her. They were red, surrounded by dark circles.

Then he jumped and disappeared in the blackness.

Coraline rushed and kneeled beside the hole. No sound, nothing indicated that Leon fell somewhere beneath the surface. She looked around for help, but realized she was completely alone. And this was not the forest in which she took her walks.

Come after me.

Commanding voice again. Fear held it´s grip over Coraline, but she was unable to resist strange attraction which pushed her to repeat what Leaon did. Thinking how crazy her behavior is, she stood up and prepared to jump. Like freaking Alice, she thought, first talkng to the mirror, now this. I´m losing it. She thought a bit more about her decision. Then she figgured out the essential thing; Actually, I have nothing to lose.

And she was gone.

♦

She didn´t fall and break her legs and spin like the pessimistic part of her supposed she might. She didn´t fall at all, but simply reappeared in the pitch black room. It was warm and air was heavy to breathe. She called Leon, but got no answer except for her own echo.

In the darkness, a sphere of light emerged out of nowhere. It floathed. Coraline followed its path. Then it disappeared and she lowered her gaze.

She was alone no more.

Figures walked around her. One of them walked right through her, leaving her with her hair rised and aroused nerves. Light silhouettes of all shapes promenaded around without finish line. Thousands and thousands of them, and Coraline lost among them.

She recognized one of them! she was unsure how she really knew it, but there was no way she mistook it for someone else. It was her neighboor, Madeline! She never saw her like this, with her hair down, wearing something like a night gown, but she knew it was her.

She recognized the feeling her personality affected her with.

Coraline came closer, fearing Madeline might feel her presence, too, but silhouttes didn´t seem to notice anything. She reached for her neighboor´s shadow. Her arm went through Madeline.

Caroline shivered and saw images in her mind. Well, some were images. Others were just colours, impacts of understanding Madeline´s essence. Her kindness, Coraline understood for the first time, was genuine. What was feigned was her affection towards her so-called friends. She hated all of them and she hated her elite family. But there was also fear of being rejected, so she never stood up to them. Madeline was scared of losing comfort, but didn´t know for how long shall she manage to keep her mask on.

While comprehension was sinking in Coraline´s mind, Madeline´s shadow continued in her random direction. The line of Coraline´s thoughts broke. She was left with the impossible knowledge no human should posses; the knowledge of someone´s soul.

She was still calming down when another shadow accidentally went through her. The effect was instant; pictures, memories, thoughts, truth behind lies and secrets. Unknown identity became familiar as if she created it.

It repeated and repeated, strangers becoming the complete opposite, until she met another person she knew. It was the teacher who suspended her from yesterday´s class, educated woman whose mother wanted her to be a housewife with kids.

But, oh my, that was only the surface.

Teacher´s whole history sipped into Coraline´s mind, overwhelming and full of regrets. Drug addiction no one knew about, self-punishing she was liable to since her teenage years, horrible past and yet more horrible present. And her character, her real self, lost in a storm of masquerade which kept her self-collected.

Suddenly, Coraline woke up. Still lying beneath the oak tree, comfortably situated beside lake. Duck croaked and grunted, water sibilated. She remained there for another couple of minutes, digesting all the knowledge she gathered. Knowledge which didn´t belong to her.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Written: 25th August 2021

Submitted: 3rd February 2023

• ©Copyright 2023 Anakronizam aka Arijana Grginčić. All rights reserved.