Beauty of the Crimson

2

To say Josiah was being overdosed on stimulation was an understatement. When he conjured thoughts on his own, the information was always enough for him to process, and only enough. His environment specifically, was always an uphill battle. Not for Josiah but for humans generally. When introduced to new environments, humans will always be overloaded on processing their vision. Josiah found this to be the case for himself too.

His eyes marveled at the hospital walls which resembled tile in no way. The ceiling was also a different material. He looked and thought about them as he processed the materials they were made of. Drywall piqued his interest. Josiah fell in love with its freshness. He would’ve run up to it and caress it with his palm first thing if he could. An unknown factor trembled into Josiah’s life.

Josiah froze after a few seconds. He looked around and thought. There were many moving things. They all rhythmically moved past each other and flowed against one another. He raised his hands once more and flipped them in his view as he looked at the dance of many. They had hands. The same as him but not quite. Some were different colors. They were lighter and some were darker.

“Humans,” Josiah concluded softly to himself. There were many humans within this hospital who were all moving about in a rushed manner. What seemed to be a perfect dance, fell apart when Josiah witnessed crashing and stumbling. Many of them crowded the small room and hallways.

Josiah spoke to himself instead of thinking. In a surprise to himself, he didn’t quite understand. What scared Josiah more than anything about his situation was what they were doing. Not all of them, but most of them, spoke. They all chattered and it filled the room with noise. He tried his best to drown out their voice but his thoughts could only take him so far. He pleaded to God that he let Josiah know why he would hear them. He was a statue filled with pain.

Stared, a person stared right at Josiah. They stopped whatever they were doing beforehand, and looked at him. At first, Josiah was so overwhelmed by his senses that he couldn’t pay any mind to this person. This person continued to glare at him only to remain lonesome as Josiah rushed past them.

Josiah broke into a sprint and fell over after only a few seconds. The noise of the hospital, while it didn’t cease, it dampened significantly.

Josiah was too scared to pick himself up for a short time. He closed his eyes and thought to himself, “when I wake up, this will be gone.” What he failed to realize was the nature of his existence. His thoughts aren’t everything. They make him all more powerful than most things, but they don’t make him redeemable to everything. Sometimes no matter how many times you close your eyes or think about something else, it won’t change your reality. Josiah opened his eyes and before him was a marble flooring that he would typically be obsessed with. The walls, the ceiling, his surroundings, usually a fascinating experience, left him full of dread. He started to cry.

“What the hell are you doing?!” a voice above him shouted. It sounded endearing even with its harsh tone.

Josiah felt himself being lifted by his arm and being dragged. He felt the sensation of fingers and a hand. He knew what it was like to have and feel those. Even so, he slapped it off in fear. Possibly the most he’s felt. He stood up and gulped through his ragged heavy breathing. Josiah glanced at the person who picked him up. It was a woman dressed in what he concluded was a nurse’s outfit after thinking about it.

“Clothes…?” Josiah weakly muttered.

The nurse rebuttals, “why yes, I think you should put some on, after we wash you down, you lunatic.”

Josiah disregards most of her comments. “Give me clothes.” Josiah looked around and realized that perhaps he feels unsafe due to a lack of clothing. Even he could tell he didn’t quite resemble everyone else.

The anatomy of the human body was studied within his mind after he asked for clothes. He wanted to understand why he looked the way he did.

“No, you-you have blood all over you. I can’t just give you-” The nurse was left powerless as Josiah grabbed her throat with one arm and lifted her off the ground. Her eyes started to pulse and jitter as they looked all they could. Drool was sporadically flying onto Josiah’s face. Not even a flinch came from him.

Josiah noticed a vein was gushing from the top of her forehead like it was begging to be freed from her skin. He laughed. “Give me clothes.” He calmly repeated.

The sad truth of the matter is that no one cared for this nurse. Not enough to stop and look on. A few were surprised to see the sight but almost everyone even reduced themselves to less than bystanders as the ringing chattering continued and they proceeded to rush against each other to places Josiah didn’t know of.

Josiah dropped her quickly but she ran away almost immediately. This was a normal response he thought. He continued to walk down the halls as people shot him glances of disgust. He didn’t understand why. He was walking into the unknown once more.

“Restroom,” the sign read. Josiah didn’t know how to read five seconds prior to seeing the sign. He thought about what he was seeing until he instantly learned how. He still didn’t understand what a restroom was. He thought of it until he understood it but this time something was wrong. Relieving themselves of defecation was a foreign concept. He correlated his newly learned information with the anatomy of the human body and it lined up. Josiah never remembered going into a restroom to relieve himself. Curiosity surged through him more.

One foot followed the other as Josiah entered the restroom. Instantly met with piercing stares. In here, everyone actually stopped to look at Josiah. He counted five people with clothes on. “Are they relieving themselves?” he asked himself in thought.

Water, many of them were running their hands through the water he noticed. Where was it coming from? He noticed a tile floor and wall but it didn’t look quite the same as the pool house. Josiah grasped the concept of a sink fairly quickly and didn’t think much of it. As long as he had a baseline understanding, he was fine with accepting how things were. Yet, he quickly grew bored of the restroom. Part of him expected a satisfying experience in this room. Before leaving he noticed another half of the restroom.

There were incomplete walls with the lower part of them cut off. He could see many things resembling feet through it.

“Dude, what’s wrong with you? Did your gown fall off?” Before Josiah could finish many of his thoughts, one of the many men staring at him, approached him calmly to assess the situation.

Josiah responded calmly. “Give me clothes.” His face was neutral.

The man sighed in front of Josiah, “And you-you’re fucking bleeding everywhere and your dick is hanging out. I’ll get a nurse or something. Just stand in the corner and don’t bother anyone.”

Josiah rose his arm and blocked his path to the restroom exit. “No nurse! Give me clothes.”

“O-okay, no nurses… Just let me out, I’ll get you some clothes…” The man quivered. He couldn’t stand to look Josiah in his eyes. His body trembled.

Josiah was quick to let the man past him and stood in the corner as he requested. Unfortunately, the man never returned.

Everyone in the restroom continued to leave Josiah be alone. After Josiah processed all the new knowledge he had come to experience, a chill licked his spine as it caressed his body and forced itself into his head. Fear has returned. Josiah sat down in the corner and buried his head in his legs as he closed his eyes. He started to cry. At least he thought he did.

Silent weeping was briefly heard. Josiah rose his head and though many men were washing their hands and some looked his way, he was interested in the cries. He looked back towards what he called half walls. He looked back to the shapes resembling feet, he forgot to look back on these. He thought about them until he learned the concept of shoes. It didn’t explain why he could hear crying. He studied more until he realized they were also clothes that people wore. There were people in those half walls. “What are they doing in there?” Josiah pondered briefly.

He decided to think about shoes more and learned the relevance they have. The higher the price, the better they were. Josiah didn’t understand that concept itself. All he knew was that expensive was better. Why it was better was a question he didn’t care to know the answer for.

He looked at all the shoes until he found the pair which was the most expensive. Simply by thinking about the specific pair, he was able to conjure their price and brand.

By the time Josiah stood up and walked over to the stall door, all the men learned to ignore his presence. Josiah tried to push the entrance open as he did with the hospital’s main door. No avail. He decided to think about it and understand the concept of a stall. He figured it was locked. Josiah raised his leg and stretched it around. He started to gather an audience of gazes again. Finally, Josiah kicked open the door in one swift motion. Inside the stall was a man sitting on a toilet, with the seat and cover done. He was fully clothed and had his face buried into his hands. An expensive tuxedo suit was the main interest for Josiah.

The man looked up and stopped his crying momentarily, “W-who are you? Leave, get out of here!” He sobbed more.

Even Josiah felt uneasy in this situation. His fear was mixed with anxiety. The man proceeded to yell at him.

“...I want your clothes…” Josiah managed to whisper out.

The broken man didn’t even hear Josiah and kept yelling. Josiah hated speech enough already. “What is wrong with him? Just shut up.” Josiah thought.

“I don’t care if you’re as big as me, I will kill you! Get out! Get out!!!!” The man shouted for the final time.

“You are very upsetting to me,” Josiah loudly stated.

The weeping man laughed in his face in a maniacal manner. Josiah was overloaded. An ugly emotion intoxicated him. It made him grit his teeth and clench his fist. He felt a pump from within his body. A fiery rage. Before the man could finish laughing, Josiah extended his right arm and grabbed the man’s lower jaw by putting his fingers inside his mouth. He screamed aggressively as he clenched and crushed his chin. A splatter of blood hit the walls and floor as teeth ricocheted against the small walls. A tooth bounced its way over to the next stall and screams ensued as the men looked into the stall and saw the horrors. The once weeping man was still alive and tried letting out cries as his face rushed blood like a waterfall. His tongue fell out and flopped on the smooth tile floor for a few seconds. Josiah picked up the man once more by his head and inserted his thumbs into each eye socket. “What the heck, it’s all mushy…” Josiah thought. Eventually, the man went limp. Josiah’s fury came to a progressive halt. There was blood on the clothes but that made it look nicer in Josiah’s opinion. He looked back and all the men fled from the restroom. “Peaceful,” he thought before he took the clothes off of the man and put it on himself.

He turned around to walk out of the stall and was instantly greeted with a mirror. It scared him for a brief second. The elegant dark skin he had, painted in red. He turned around and dove into the pile of blood. Josiah covered his hair and face with it all. He laughed. The limp corpse was grabbed as Josiah began to rip it apart. He fell in love with the red.

After mutilating the body and covering himself in blood, Josiah decided to face the mirror once more. He thought to understand the mirror. A mere reflection. He thought to understand reflections also. Whatever is in front of the mirror is shown to his vision. A tall dark skin man, covered in blood. An instinctive smile formed.

Josiah started to tear up. He brought his hand to his face, “Aren’t I beautiful, Mr. Finger?” Josiah chuckled. “You’re something.” Mr. Finger added. “Something indeed…”

Josiah, now fully clothed, leaves the restroom in search of something new.