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Birds flying on the ground
You never see them too long on the ground
You wanna be one of them? Yeah
You wanna be one of them? Yeah
Whenever Toby thought of his past, he could feel a pit forming in his stomach. He didn’t remember much, apart from like every single bad part of it because fuck him he guessed. He could remember fragments of his childhood- regular visits to the doctor to try and figure out what was wrong with him, his piece of shit dad growing angrier and angrier the more unanswered questions about him piled up. Even back then, he knew his dad was feeling resentful about his birth. Why couldn’t he have two normal children? He wasn’t the one to blame here, I mean look at his sister, (and then Toby’s mind would blank in the memory because he couldn’t even recall his sister’s name) she was a normal child.
In his head, Toby’s mother was to blame (he couldn’t remember her name either I mean come on ) I mean if not her then who? It couldn’t possibly be him, that means it must be his wife’s and his son’s fault, and so from this conclusion stemmed every single one of Toby’s problems growing up. The beatings, the bullying because of his condition, his mother growing to hate him too, blaming him for the abuse (he was a kid for fuck’s sake), his sister dying in a car accident (this one he could remember perfectly, like a scene from a movie you watched too many times and now it’s ingrained in your brain, your mouth moving along with the actor’s, repeating the lines, except this wasn’t a movie but Toby’s own personal hell) and so much more. Realistically, this was God’s fault, according to the religion his parents followed, but their fate was too tainted, too wrong for them to even consider it, considering Him making a mistake. Joke’s on them, he never believed in all of this shit anyways.
You might hear the birds singing flying around
You never see them too long on the ground
You wanna be one of them? Yeah
You wanna be one of them? Yeah
At first Toby theorised the feeling as being guilt, but the more he thought of it, the less likely it seemed. Guilt? About what, killing his parents? No, they deserved it. Guilt for not being able to help his sister? He had been fourteen, what good could he have possibly done. Therefore, not guilt, but what? He never was able to put a finger on it, on the hollow pit that formed in his belly, and so he left it nameless and tried to never think of before he was taken by Him.
At sixteen, he was not the youngest to ever join. That title was reserved for Jeff, who had only been thirteen when taken from his home and whisked away by some weird otherworldly being. Sally didn’t count- she had never really joined them, per se, simply walked in one day and never left. He didn’t make it easy to join Him , either, instead putting them to gruelling tasks and try-outs, allst whilst messing with their brain, their memories, their very beings . Toby imagined it was most likely a game to Him- putting childrens and teens through some life altering situations and seeing what comes out of it.
It was different for everyone, the tasks you were asked to do. Some were very public and known, like Tim and Brian’s, and others less, instead being kept hush-hush. No one really loved to talk about the deepest part of their trauma and near-death situations that put you at your lowest mentally, physically and emotionally to almost-complete strangers.
Toby knew a couple of snippets he had heard from Jack, the longest lasting resident in this decaying house, and they were secrets he would take to his grave.
Whoa now, hey, Mr. Rager, Mr. Rager
Tell me where you're going, tell us where you're headed
I'm off on the adventure
Mr. Rager tell me some of your stories, tell us of your travels
What he could -would- say, though, was that the walk to the mansion had been rough. Nearly starved, a constant ringing in his ears like he had tinnitus or something, the buzzing throughout his whole body, like millions of wasps were stuck right under the surface of his skin, the lack of a normal amount of blood in his body- I mean, you get it, Toby was looking and feeling rather down and under.
(He had tried to get the wasps out from under his skin- he wasn’t used to feeling anything , it had freaked him out so much he clawed his arms right down to his bones which didn’t help in anything but making the buzzing worse. Toby’s vision had gone woozy, forcing him to close his eyes for a bit and when he had reopened them, his arms were back to normal, no bones exposed. To this day he wasn’t sure what had happened- if it was an illusion or if He had something to do with it.)
Back then, he hadn’t even known where he was going, only that one out of four roads led to him being killed, leaving him, I mean, soooo many options. Beaten down and on death’s doorstep, he had stumbled upon the house he now lived in (he couldn’t possibly call this shit hole home) and had promptly passed down on the front doorsteps. He had woken up in a rackety bed in a rackety room with few memories to his name and a metric ton of new trauma he was never going to deal with.
Sixteen he had been back then, just dipping his toes into teenagehood, twenty three he would be this year, just dipping his toes into adulthood.
The past seven years weren’t all that bad- there had been some good times spent with others, laughing deep into the night, trying not to make too much noise in case someone woke up.
A fond memory he had was a couple years ago, when he and Natalie had some weird thing going on, they had spent three days hiking around the forest, telling each other campfire stories and eating junk food by a fire. Along the way, some had joined them for a night or a couple hours, sharing their own stories, snacks or just admiring the forest with them. Back then, things had been simpler- less people in the house, and those who did live in got along or wouldn’t argue for the sake of other residents around.
He remembers Tim and Brian driving six hours with him just to take him to get a blackwood cake for his eighteenth birthday in a shitty supermarket by the side of the forest. They had to cover up their faces and almost got into a fair share of trouble but, at the end of the day they had a slightly mushed cake just to themselves. Toby had eaten way too much, to the sorrow of Tim who had spent the whole night cleaning up puke and comforting a sick adult while also making sure Brian didn’t have a heart attack from laughing at Toby so much.
Just a couple days ago, he and Jack had gone for a stroll through a less explored part of the forest they lived in and had found some pretty great spots, like this giant waterfall, surrounded by thousands of flowers. They had slept there that night, under the stars, and just talked about anything and everything.
It's just.
Just.
It’s just, that-
Well.
Toby wanted to be free .
Whenever he'd get the sinking feeling in his stomach at unwanted memories surfacing or caught a bird in his sight, flying high above them, Toby longed for him to be free. He wanted to live the rest of his life peacefully, away from killing (if his sixteen year old self could hear him now- there’s no way he ever thought he’d be tired from murdering people in his free time) and doing more…mundane things. Toby wanted to grow a garden and live in a stupidly cute cottage away from this poor excuse of a roof over his head, and have a couple dogs and do nothing with his time.
Hey, Mr. Rager, Mr. Rager
Tell me where you're going, tell us where you're headed
I'm on my way to heaven
Mr. Rager, can we tag along? Can we take the journey?
Of course he didn’t mind if others joined him- he could upgrade his fantasy cottage to a cabin instead, with a couple bedroom and a comfortable pullout bed (not like the gross one that they currently had in the living room) and a nice, cosy fireplace. During winter, the fire would keep the whole house warm (for others- he didn’t care about keeping himself warm because, what is he gonna do, feel it?) In summer, the house would have big windows opened to let an airstream in, and there would be a pool in the backyard, one of those fancy ones that are dug in the dirt and whenever it was too warm, whoever lived with him, including himself, would just jump in the water and cool down. No more worrying about heat strokes he couldn’t feel coming on or getting frost bites because he couldn’t tell if this was gloves-inside kind of weather or bare-handed-is-okay kind of weather.
This fantasy (because that’s all that it would ever be- a fantasy ) that Toby had started a couple years ago, when the mansion started getting overloaded, causing everyone to become cranky and annoyed with each other, creating rifts in their relationships. Since then, it nagged him front the back of him mind- the future he could have had, had he not gone fucking insane early on. But really, is he to blame? It’s not his fault, not God’s fault, but his dad’s and it will forever be. No matter what Toby became, no matter what the future held for him, there’s one thing that would never change.
If Toby focused on the pit in his stomach long enough, he could feel something that he was able to name, something that he considered an old friend- anger . Because if there’s one thing anger does, it’s linger and faster until it’s too much for the bearer to manage- until it erupts into an ugly fight, lashing out, screaming, breaking bones, anything to calm down the burning feeling under your skin. And if there’s one thing that will never change, it’s that Toby will never, ever , forgive his father, because if there’s one constant in Toby’s few memories, it’s how his dad was and always would have been a piece of shit.
Toby would take his anger to his grave until he could meet his father in hell and kill him over and over again because, through thick and thin, through every single bad thing that ever happened to him, there is a singular thing that never has and will never change and that’s how Toby wished, every day and night, that he could have given his father a more painful death.
Knocked down, round for round
You're feeling like you're shot down on the ground
When will the fantasy end?
When will the heaven begin? Yeah
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