To Hell and Back. The book was the first I had read in some time. I looked at it on the floor, it’s spine demolished after the first readthrough, marred with highlights and underlines throughout. I stared at it, having made up my mind. I knew I needed help and I was going to get it; however, I was still the same stubborn jackass and was determined to do as much as I could by myself.

Emily stared at me with a look of concern, her fingers absentmindedly stroking the handcuffs that she was holding. These were a more industrial pair; one’s they had bought when Greg was first having issues. They were trying out kinks in an effort to reignite his flame and were ultimately unsuccessful. Through her experience over the years with other men, she had selected a pair of soft-lined cuffs that were a better fit for comfort, storing away the industrial cuffs thinking they would never be dragged out again.

“Are you sure this is what you want?”

It was less of a question and more of a plea for me to stop. I had steeled my heart and was ready to go the distance. I took one last look at the book and reminded myself of what I was going to accomplish.

“I’m more certain of this than I have been about anything in a long time. It has to be this way.”

She gave me one final look of pause before walking over to me. I was sitting on the floor with my legs crossed in front of the radiator. It was turned off, and the room had been prepared for what was to come. The windows we sealed with thick construction trash bags. The neighbors who had known of the Pearson’s activities were told that over the next week they may be hearing some louder screams than normal, but that everything was okay.

With a resolute click, the handcuffs were now set, securing my wrist to the radiator. My bucket was next to me, along with towels, cleansing wipes, water, and Gatorade that would be needed. This was going to be Hell.

I had flushed all the alcohol and drugs, my notes guiding me on what I had to do. Audie Murphy was an army soldier, having been rejected from first the Marine Corps then the air force. He had a distinguished career fighting throughout most of WWII with malaria. Having a drug addiction after the war, he locked himself in a hotel room for a week until he had broken the habit, inspiring the book that I would come to love/hate.

I inhaled through my nose, pushing a strong breath of air out of my lungs. I was ready to begin.

Almost immediately I lost my sense of time. The shakes started some time in the night, followed by alternating cold sweats and fever. My body was drenched and my very being longed for the intoxicants that I had been taking for so many years.

After that, it was flashes of scenery that played through my mind. I don’t know what order any of it happened.

The sound of crying was the first thing I noticed. Emily?

“Jesus fucking Christ, we need to take him to the hospital!”

I lost consciousness again, stirring later to a shadowed figure checking my vitals. Shit. I had said no hospital. Blacking out again I woke up and my body was on fire, and the first thing I noticed was screaming. It was primal. Some words were just glossolalia, others, demons from my belly spewing out from the deepest recesses of my mind.

“COVER! COVER!

MEDIC

NO!!!!

YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO ME

NO, NO IT BURNS!”

More crying.

I felt hands and wetness slowly moving around my body, my mind stirring, I could see Greg and Emily washing me. Looking around in a haze I could see the sickening sight around me. This wasn’t pretty, but it also wasn't the hospital. The smell of bleach and ozone surrounded me overtaking my senses. My leg began to shake, the shake moving to my other leg, and up my body, as it dawned on me that I was not in control of my movements. My head went back and strange thoughts entered my head, mixes of senses smell of colors and flashes of color to sounds. Buried memories presented themselves in flashes, and the world felt like a dream or Alice in wonderland. I was having a seizure.

They came in waves of electrical activity in my brain, blacking out, I awoke to blood pouring down to my chest, I had bitten a small piece of my tongue. It would heal, but the veins in your tongue deliver a lot of blood, making it a sight of horror.

Another seizure and I woke again, this time more clearheaded than before. The shakes and cold sweating had stopped. I had a migraine unlike any I had experienced before, what little light that made its way through our seal burning my eyes. The hours went by and the final day had finished and I felt strong in my spirit, though my body was weak.

After the week had passed, I was finally free. The drugs and alcohol were gone from my system, and now any wandering of the mind about them brought me right back to the week of hell and I would retch almost immediately. Emily later explained that she had an old partner that was an MA who agreed to be discreet check me out. He said he wanted to shake my hand if I survived because I was the craziest asshole he had ever heard about.

Greg was the first face to greet me upon my mind returning to my body. He looked pale, but he seemed to be getting happier. I looked at his face and really saw him for the first time the slight lines that had imprinted his smile across it. You could see that he had lived a good life with Emily. He looked at me so softly, and with a look, I had been chasing for a long time. Admiration. He was proud of me. I felt my cheeks and realized I had been crying for some time.

Emily followed Greg’s summons to the room and attempted to undo the cuff that had held me fast for those seven days. I looked at my wrist and it was an angry shade of purple. Seeing the cuff in her hand I noticed the metal was warped and bent. She left, returning quickly with bolt cutters and released me. They wrapped me in a cotton cloth and brought me to the garage where I sat on a chair, the cuffs in a vice to hold them steady as Greg dutifully filed away.

We returned to the house and Emily had a bath drawn. They helped me arm in arm get into the tub and the water, though it was just above what I would normally call warm, was scorching to my skin. I laid back as they washed me, and I took them in with now opened eyes.

I also noticed Emily for the first time. It was an unspoken thing in their house that I had noticed when I first moved in. They had no children. I had never asked, and now I was crying for new reasons. She had a few worry lines more than Greg, her face mostly matching his happy one. It had dawned on me that for these few years, in some strange way through all our activities, they had been an almost surrogate family for me. These people were the closest people to me in my life.

They helped me to bed, bringing by small amounts of soft food. I was in bed another three days of rebuilding my strength. Over that total ten-day period, I had lost twelve pounds the rough way. The person in the mirror was starting to look more like the boy I remembered.

"Anything we can do for you, hon?" Emily asked.

"Yeah... Burn that god damn book," I said with a rough chuckle.

I continued to read, gathering knowledge from everywhere. I cracked open a bible for the first time since those long Sundays sitting in pews. I gathered knowledge about mental health and spiritual growth. I sought out everything, with Bruce Lee’s philosophy in mind, Absorb what is useful, discard the rest.

The therapist's appointment had been scheduled. My intake was two weeks after the first call, getting out the reasons for why I was needing to go. I held back, being vague as they would allow. I still left crying. I sat down and took out a black moleskin notebook that I had bought in anticipation of this. I stared at it willing the words to just write themselves. When they did not, I picked up the pen and started at the very beginning. Everything. Everything I had done, everything that had been done to me, everything I had experienced. I had to stop writing every two or three items or so and calm my mind to push away the panic attacks before I could continue writing as my hand would shake to the point that my penmanship was illegible.

The day arrived and I was sitting now across from my therapist. They looked back at me with eyes that at least seemed to care. She was in the right profession.

“I… I don’t really know what to do here,” I said, avoiding eye contact.

“You can talk about anything. We can start anywhere and jump around. You can talk circles around one thing if you want if that helps you get it out. I’m here for you.”

I thought to myself, you don’t get it. I mean, I don’t know. I need directions like a child, but I’m too embarrassed to say it.

I reached into my hand and pulled out the book, holding it in my left hand like a cellphone staring down at it.

“I wrote some stuff down. Well, everything actually.”

“That’s a good place to start.”

“I think I’d like to just say everything. Just get it all out. I haven’t told anyone the entire picture before, just pieces depending on how I crafted my personality and behavior around them.”

“If that’s what you’d like to do, I’ll sit here and listen.”

“Yeah… I think that’s what I want. That way it’s all out and then I can work on it.”

My thumb ran up and down the spine of the black book that I had written in describing all the wretched things I had experienced. I reached my right hand out, pulling at the string that bound the covers together, opening the book.

I took a deep breath and held it as long as I could, exhaling slowly. I stared down at the page and the poisonous words that were there. I needed someone to know.

“When I was eight…” My voice was already starting to crack. I refused to resist it, I needed this release.

“When I was eight, we would be left alone for days. I found out only years later my mother was cheating on my father while he was away. The oldest one in the house was ten and we would drink the lovely fruit drink that mother and father had left in the fridge. I would be sick while drinking that for days on end. My older sister revealed later in life that it was wine coolers we were drinking.”

A trail of tears started to form starting down my noise, riding along my mouth and down my lower cheek.

“My father threatened to break my fingers with a hammer. He made me bring him the hammer that was in the kitchen drawer. All because I gave someone the middle finger. He held the hammer there playing like he was actually going to do it before stopping after I begged through gasping tears. We would be disciplined, but it would be with whatever was available. I ‘broke’ hairbrushes with my backside as I was being spanked and then I would be spanked again with a new object because of the sin of breaking the hairbrush. 

My mom and dad began smoking and drinking in front of us, something they had warned us so much about we now had to see. It was such a small thing but traumatizing to see my heroes falling. They separated, eventually divorcing, and moved us all hours away from our home where I was bullied, beaten, and called faggot on a daily basis.

I was ten the first time I tried to [redacted] …” I was sobbing hysterically now, “but my little ten-year-old arms weren’t strong enough, so I put it down, a small scar over my heart showing my crime. This was the first mark on my body. Oh god… There are so many. The first was from that, some from being poked with cigarettes, the other all from [redacted.] Now my body has my entire childhood written on it, each one a memory of exactly what happened, when, where, who, and I’m left with no reason as to why.”

I looked up to grab a tissue to clear my nose and saw that the therapist was also crying, lightly dabbing away her tears with her own tissue.

“Every one of my pets ended up getting run over, one by one, because of the heavier traffic. No one ever stopped, neighbors would scoop them up in their arms and bring them to us, comforting us and crying with us that some monster could just kill an animal and not have the guts to own up to it.

My mother, my older sister were both [redacted] … I was just a kid; I couldn’t stop it.

I grew up in a cult, something I only realized later in life. Everything was tightly controlled from what we wore to how we were 'supposed' to think. Sex education was off the table for everyone because sex was a sin, and something only to be done with heterosexual married couples. The paster was well-intentioned, but indoctrinated in the same lies he spouted from the pulpit every week. I thought this was how every church was, people twisting around the floor in 'religious ecstasy' while they spouted off gibberish. People would lay their hands all over you while shouting commands or praying for the sins that you hadn't even committed.

I was bisexual and all the things I was told in church twisted me inside. I liked girls and would openly pursue them, but boys I would just look at longingly unable to do anything about it because that would send me to hell… Oh god, I’ve done so much though… Whenever I did some up some little courage I would be called a fag. Eventually, I learned to be careful, hiding who I was and suppressing it all down with my will.

I stopped sleeping at ten, staying up typically until 3:00 AM to watch Adult Swim before going to school at 7:30. Sometimes I would stay up to watch the sunrise, sneaking in naps at school. I only attended for the free meals, reading the workbooks the day I got them so that I would easily pass any test.

My mother put me in the boy scouts where [redacted] happened ... It... I couldn't... I spit the rest of it out; words that I will not write here.

After the [redacted] when I was ten there were many more attempts. I only stopped after being sent to live with other family members.”

Tears flowed heavily as the weight of my soul began to lift. This tightness that I held in my chest all these years was starting to loosen ever so slightly.

“We lived in bad neighborhoods. I saw four of my friends die, none of them older than sixteen. I saw a street of adults gather around an alcohol-poisoned teen debating whether they should leave him to avoid getting busted themselves, or someone take one for the team. One woman stepped forward and took him to the hospital. She had been a drunk herself. I looked her up a few years ago and she had cleaned her life up not long after that.

I would fight almost daily at school. The only times I ever lost where when there were more than three, or one sucker-punched me.

I never thought I’d live to see twenty, and I promised myself I wouldn’t live past twenty-five. I'm older than I ever thought I would be.

I fell in love with a girl with green eyes and raven hair and spilled most of this to her. I withheld some of the more gruesome details. She was the only one that had seen that much. I pushed her away and fought love with all my being. I think... I thought I wasn't worthy of love. I broke up with her because I couldn't handle it, all the emotions.

I let another friend in too. I fell in love and gave him my heart only to break his by cheating on him with my ex. I poisoned their friendship with my selfishness. They were friends before I had known them and I destroyed that without a second thought.

In my teen years, I started abusing alcohol and drugs. I lied to enter the military, withholding any information that would stand in my way. I continued this habit while serving and that eventually cost me my career.

I’ve abused my body. I have done everything with just about everyone. I’m lucky I’ve gotten through all this without catching anything.

The only family I now have is the couple I have sex with, but looking at them now after cleaning myself up I’ve started seeing them in a different light. They have taken care of me in ways I cannot express.”

I explained the time in the military. What I had seen. What I had done. The uncertainty I was left with after an ambush. There was one enemy down and I still don’t know who did it. The depraved sexual life I had thrown myself into was another form of self-abuse, worse than the drugs and alcohol.

I looked down at the book. It was all now out of me and I felt lighter. It took a half a box of tissues to get cleaned up. The therapist had been crying throughout and had to clean up as well.

“I want to see you twice a week if you can. Once a week if you can’t. Every two weeks if you don’t really want to get through this quickly,” she joked at the end. I laughed and it felt good. It felt genuine.

We would continue to see each other twice a week for months as I worked through each of those issues, rehashing them over and over sometimes until it no longer bothered me as much.

The therapist had recommended a sex therapist as well to treat my issues there. I had, over the years, formed so many unhealthy ideas and it was time to regain my ability to be intimate.

I arrived at their office, a space that had a reception area out front, but a couch, chair, and bed, in the back where the office was located. Tom and Angela had been assigned to help me. They were a couple that got into sex therapy, having been trained as regular therapists first. They found a field where not a lot of people where getting the assistance they need and the nature of their relationship made it easy for them to help those who needed their help.

The first few sessions were mainly discussions about sex itself, what had brought me there and why I felt I needed a sex therapist. They helped to establish a baseline for where I was and to set goals for where I wanted to be. I told them about my issues in gaining and maintaining an erection, and they asked questions to find out more about the situation.

In another session after the discussions were had, they sat me down on the couch and faced each other. Talking through what they were doing while they began to slowly undress one another, carefully placing their clothes into a neat pile beside the bed. They got down to their underwear and kissed each other tenderly. They explained that they were not going to be jumping directly into sex, progressing through phases to help reset my sex drive.

Other times, they would have me watch educational videos or read some erotica. Pornography was forbidden as it was an unhealthy and unrealistic depiction of what sex was and should be. I was reestablishing an appropriate sexual baseline, learning to stop seeing myself and others as these objects to be used in pursuit of vain pleasure, and learning to make a spiritual connection.

They would remove my clothes down to my underwear, staying clothed themselves, and would establish touch, moving their hands slowly and applying pressure throughout my body. This felt nice, comforting, and reassuring almost a massage more than anything. I was now beginning to gain soft erections during our sessions.

One hurdle I wanted to overcome was my inability to allow someone else to remove my underwear, a mental block that had been born from being treated the way I had been when I was a kid. 

After I was able to achieve and maintain an erection, they began our first sexual session. I watched as they stripped each other of clothing, kissing and touching passionately before beginning a slow sex demonstration for me. They talked through what they were doing, pausing to let one another know they loved their partner, reassuring one another and complimenting their body. Listening and getting in tune with what they each wanted. I remained fully clothed, instructed not to release myself rather to passively watch, taking mental notes of what I was seeing. This wasn't sex in the way I had been having it for the last several years. This was right.

We progressed to explicit touching. First with Tom, Angela taking notes and making recommendations from the chair. He would remove my shirt, running the backs of his fingers up and down my chest and stomach, placing them between my pelvis and pants, tickling me slightly just below my underwear line. This was as close to having someone take off my underwear as I felt comfortable at the time. Next was Angela. She instructed me on how to touch her, paying attention to our eye contact, helping me relearn how to be present with someone.

Once I was finally able to permit them to remove my underwear enough times that it no longer bothered me, we progressed to having sex, slowly building up to the moment and denying release. This was about learning to connect not just a way to get laid. I would press my belly against Angela feeling her heat pressed into me, her breast smooshed into my chest as she held me close to her. I could feel her chest rise and fall against me as she inhaled, her breath warming my neck as her arms pulled me into a hugging embrace; her fingers running up my spine causing a pleasant tingling sensation that made me shudder.

Tom would penetrate me, holding himself inside of me as I looked up at his dull hazel eyes. I would touch his belly, his chest, his shoulders with his permission. He would wrap his hands around my bicep, squeezing it and running his hand down my arm, his thumb planted on my inner arm, his fingers on the outer side. My sense of intimacy and my sexual compass had been realigned thanks to these loving human beings.

My regular therapist recommended a Neuropsych evaluation. The results made a lot of things clear to me that made no sense before. She explained the results and what they meant. Options for treatment and coping methods. The first thing was a slight surprise. I had an IQ north of 120, and high-functioning autism. I hated hearing that, but she took the time to explain that it was nothing to be ashamed of, that really it was closer to what people used to call Aspergers before they removed it from the diagnostic manual. That explained the memory, and my inability to communicate the way I wanted to. I struggled internally with how to talk to people for so long, pantomiming through things I learned on TV and in movies. I felt like a robot, activated and thrown in with humanity, but not really belonging. The last two things weren't a surprise, major depression, and anxiety, something I already knew that I had. A pill once a night and suddenly my brain was producing the chemicals I had been deprived of for so long. After a few weeks, I finally knew what real happiness and joy felt like.

The months continued to march on as the subtle season changes of California came and went. Between the behavioral health therapist and the sex therapist, I was back to where I felt years ago. Some of the knots, tied by time, were still in my heart but I was able to think and talk about it freely now.

At home with Emily and Greg, our sex had shifted from the typical freak show that we had put on over the years to an intimate affair. Greg was perfectly fine with this, leaving us to ourselves. She was laid across the bed, and I was between her working in and out slowly, her heat was emanating from below like a furnace. She breathed in tiny gasps each time I pushed into her fully. She would whisper sweet encouragements into my ear as I went about the homework that the therapists had given me.

"You're incredible," she breathed into me, leaving a thin blanket of moisture in my ear. "You are so strong. I've never met anyone capable of doing what you've done. You are a good person," those last words resonated inside of me, the buildup now at its peak as I was pushed over the edge in a moment of intimate ecstasy that touched my soul and made me feel whole for the first time in my life. 

As my therapy progressed and my mental state stabilized Greg, Emily and I began the process of detangling. I would slowly phase out my sexual activities with them as they introduced a new partner; a recently divorced man in his sixties that moved just a few blocks away last year, getting to know the Pearson's through local events. He had been a bodybuilder in his younger years and did not look anywhere close to his age.

I would watch them occasionally, opting to spend more time with them around the house until one day I realized we hadn’t had sex in two months. They started to treat me differently, or perhaps it that I was starting to notice the way the treated me all along? I was like a family member to them and they had nurtured me back from the brink.

Books now lined the walls of my room stacked into piles in an organized mess. I had gathered materials and had formulated a plan. I had researched medical journals, spiritual guides, religion, science, and magic. I was healed, but the old mental scar was still there, and it was time to take it to the pool and be healed. I made my plan, going overboard on everything. I would cover every base to make sure I accomplished what it was I desired.

I gathered my items, placing them into my pack. Emily and Greg had taken the day and were seeing me off on my next leg of my journey. Greg had sold me his old Indian motorcycle. My destination was the Mountains in Montana where a friend would meet me.

We hugged and each held back tears. They knew this was likely that last time I would be seeing them. My old life was put away and I wasn’t the person they had first met. I was going to become someone even more different than that once I reached the mountains.

“If you are ever back in California, please stop in,” said Emily as she brushed away a wet dot forming in the corner of her eyes.

“We’ll always be here for you,” Greg said as he looked at me. I could hear the sincerity in his voice.

“Thank you both for everything you’ve done for me. I love you both, and I will never be able to repay you for what you’ve done for me.”

“We love you too. Good luck and Godspeed,” they said with final hugs being passed around.

I hopped onto the motorcycle, my goods stored away, my mind set on what I was going to do. The motorcycle roared to life as I kicked it into gear and onto the road thinking about what I was about to do.

I arrived in Montana, my friend had gotten there just a few hours earlier. He was a former marine I had served with. He was 6'7'' and struck a fearsome image. A Native American man, he looked stern but was the funniest kindest man in the Corp. A gentle giant, who offered help and asked for nothing in return. He would be watching me on my journey.

I looked around and took everything in, drinking the essence of nature to nourish my soul for the journey to come. The peaks of the mountain were around me expanding outwards, strong figures that made you understand how small you really are compared to this world. Clouds were floating high above decorating the sky, mists of lower cloud washing down the side of the mountain like a waterfall wrapping me in its vapors. The greenery was splendid, leaves and stone and dirt all connected, anchoring me to earth.

I sat on the mountain; my campsite far removed from any curious eyes. John sat down on a log, saying a small prayer before going silent. What I was about to do was probably stupid, but I knew I needed something to take me to the next level. Nothing ventured, nothing gained they say. 

I snapped together the handle for my multitool, attaching the broom head to it. In a circle, I brushed out all of the debris that had gathered. Reaching into my bag I removed the several pounds of salt I had carried with me, their weight during my hike symbolizing the internal weight I wished to shed. Carefully walking in circles starting from the center I held the bags, saying silent prayers and spreading it out like sand in a spiral pattern twisting outward.

I placed candles around in a circle along the edge of the salt half on the salt half on the dirt anchoring the circle. These were hard burning candles that could withstand heavy wind made for survival situations. Looking around at the site I had prepared I hardened my mind again for what was to come, pushing aside all self-doubt and fear.

Attaching the shovel head to the tool, I dug several small holes. One hole was for a fire that I ceremoniously prepared and ignited, allowing it to burn down to hot coals. I placed the kettle into the coals and heated up the water. Taking a handful of sage, I ignited it with the embers of the fire and walked around the site cleansing it.

I removed my clothes, stripping down to nothing. The sun was low in the sky, a few hours from setting though already causing the sky to put on its colorful display of crimson and orange, a sign of a good day to follow. The temperature was cold, but my father had taught me as a child to accept the cold. Growing up in Maine, I took to the cold like others would the heat, letting it wash over my body and into my core brushing aside all shivers and shakes, making my body still.

Taking from my bag a bottle of olive oil, I poured it over my head and allowed it to drip down falling wherever it wanted. I had designed this ritual carefully, taking into consideration all the research I had done. Set and setting were very important for what I was trying to do.

Taking the hot water, I took out the bag of earthy buttons that I had purchased. I had read about the doses and understood what I would need for a heroic journey. I placed the entire bag into the water, allowing it to steep before lifting the cup to my mouth, pausing to say, "Tally-ho," before downing the entire potion. 

A few minutes passed and I purged into another one of the holes I had dug, placing my hands around the top and pushing the dirt in to fill it, covering the filth.

I sat in the circle and said a short prayer and in my mind went over what it was I was trying to accomplish. Ultimately, I wanted inner peace. Beyond that, I wanted everything I could get.

It began hitting me in waves after my nausea had passed. The colors came alive and I could hear the songs that they would sing. Smells caused sensations of emotions, each tied somehow to my past. My neurons were all lit up, each hyperconnected as my brain went through the closest thing a human mind can come to a computer reboot.

It was a rollercoaster ride that I wholeheartedly embraced riding it into the heavens. Thoughts and incites raced and presented themselves to me. I saw my life flash before my eyes, able to see it as an outside observer now years removed. The pain, the anger, everything formed together to create a beautiful painting across space and time each color dashes of influence from others as my color was imprinted on them in turn. I examined each of my past relationships, understanding and learning from my mistakes, the pain disappears. I got a sense of what I wanted and I could imagine those beautiful future emotional colors mixing with the current painting creating a contrast that would make it shine. I was regaining hope and faith.

I could feel the final tightness releasing from my chest. A guttural cry, unlike anything I have done since being firstborn spewed from my stomach. The tears were the final poison draining from my body until I felt light and beautiful again.

The sun rose and I saw it for the first time with new eyes. Its golden rays basking everything in life. Everything intricately interconnected. I understood myself now. The painful memories were there but my response to them had been reset entirely. I could look at them without pain or self-judgment and consider their impact on my life gathering from them lessons that would make me a better, confident, stronger man. A man who knew himself, and was true to himself.

Underneath that a strange feeling. A feeling I had never felt before in my life. I loved myself. This caused a few more tears, though these ones were new, born of happiness and shimmering like diamonds.

My friend stayed to clean the campsite as I ran down the mountain, jumping onto my motorcycle. I cranked the engine, holding down the clutch and revving my engine. I was hundreds of miles from home, but for once, I knew where home was and that was where I was heading. Home.

I kicked the bike into first gear, milking it into second and third in rapid succession. Leaning forward I willed the bike to give me everything it had as I raced down the winding dirt roads towards my destiny.

Destination: Derry