Quiet Room - Lori Schiller [70]
No one before the Voices that is. The Voices taught me about a hell that was beyond all religious beliefs. It was worse than the worst horror movie I had ever seen, worse than my worst nightmare. It was beyond all imagining, beyond all human hope.
And it was completely and totally real. The Voices told me so. And the Voices told me they would take me there.
As I sat in the Quiet Room, the Voice that spoke to me was as clear and real as any other voice around me. In fact, he was more real, because he was both inside me and outside me. He spoke directly to me, in low, gravely tones, hoarse and husky, a true demon from hell.
“Come to me,” he crooned. “Come to hell with me.”
I didn't want to listen. I didn't want to hear. But I had no choice. Where could I go? How could I escape? He seemed to know that. He began to sneer.
“Come to hell, cunt. You whore. You bitch. You asshole. To hell! To hell! ”
Beyond him I could feel the hell of his imagining yawning up to swallow me. There were red and orange devils and smoke and fire everywhere. There were only two kinds of people in his hell, the tortured and the torturers. Everywhere, almost as if on an assembly line, men were having their balls cut off and hung onto wooden poles. Women were being raped by piles of disgusting men at a time. The sounds of that inferno filled my ears, filled my head, began to consume my whole body. There were shrieking, shrilling, squealing sounds of victims in pain, and the hysterical laughter from their tormentors. This was to be my fate. This was my destiny. The infinite pit of hell was reaching out to claim me. And then it got worse.
This Voice was joined by another, and the two began to argue. They shouted angrily at each other, struggling over my fate. I was at the mercy of these Voices. Whatever they commanded would happen. I was totally helpless before their wrath. Their quarreling surrounded me:
VOICE No. 1: She must go to hell.
VOICE No. 2: She will be punished.
VOICE No. 1: She must be punished.
VOICE No. 2: She will be punished, that fucking whore.
VOICE No. 1: She must be punished in hell.
VOICE No. 2: Ha! Ha! Ha! To hell! To hell! To hell, that bitch. No!
VOICE No. 1: Don't cry, little bitch. Hell will come.
VOICE No. 2: Hell will not come.
VOICE No. 1: Hell will come.
VOICE No. 2: There's worse than hell. There's hell's hell, and she will take us there.
VOICE No. 1: She must DIE and we will take that pussy to hell with us. That trash!
VOICE No. 2: Why so soon? Needs to suffer more. Needs to swallow our presence.
VOICE No. 1: Needs to die! Ha! Ha! Ha! VOICE No.2: To hell!
VOICE No. 1: To hell now! Come to me. Come, you fucking bitch.
VOICE No. 2: Ha! Ha! Ha! You whore. You will be punished and you will go to hell …
I tried to escape. Tried to flee. Tried to punch them, wrestle with them, strangle them. Too late I tried to leave their world, tried to return to the other world, the world of patients, the world of the hospital, and nurses and dinner. I shouted for the Voices to leave me.
“Stop it! Stop it!” I screamed at them. “Shut up! Shut up!” “Ha! Ha! Ha!” they taunted me. “Take the pussy to hell!” one said.
“Not now. No, later. No, later. No, later,” said the other.
“To hell! To hell! To hell! ”
I screamed and writhed and fought with them. I covered my hands with my ears to block out their taunting. It didn't help.
“Come to me … come to me ...” shouted No. 1.
“To hell! To hell!” screamed the other.
“No! No! No!” I screamed. I tried to run. Nowhere to run. Tried to hide. Nowhere to go. Nowhere safe. They're everywhere. A chair. A window. Must break away. Must break. Must punch. And I punched, and I