This story happened close to home, but it still qualifies as a Don’t Even Go There tale.
I regularly go to the gym, both to stay reasonably healthy and to stay reasonably fit. I’m not obsessive about it. In fact, I really don’t like exercising. I do it because it may keep me alive — since I’m the only member of my immediate family who hasn’t experienced a heart-related event.
Anyway, regardless how much or how little I do in the exercise room, I always reward meyself with some time in the sauna. It’s healthy and relaxing. It’s good for my body, my mind, and maybe even my spirit.
This day, I entered the men’s sauna after exercising and noticed the gentleman seated across from me. Now, I’m not judgemental, since I recognize I’m not exactly a perfect physical specimen myself. But this guy caught my eye. He was as pale as a mid-winter moon. He had a sunken chest and a little bit of a belly. But it was his face that struck me the most.
It was as if he had stretched that pale skin of his over his skull so that every bone was visible. Sunken eyes peered out of that skull without expression. Hollow cheeks and a bony chin gave him the look of … Death. That’s what I thought. Here is Death incarnate.
One by one, the other gym members in the sauna cleared out until just the two of us were left. My heart raced. I expected him to rotate that impersonal mask toward me and say something like, “Well, it’s your time. Your heart finally gave out, and I’m here to escort you to the next realm.” I mean, I really expected that to happen.
But in reality, nothing happened. He eventually got up and left the sauna. I breathed the sigh of relief that travelled all the way down my body to my feet. My toes actually tingled.
A few minutes later, the sauna started to fill up again. And then He came back in, sitting in the exact spot he had been before. Again, my blood pressure rose and my pulse raced. But he never looked at me. It was all my imagination, and eventually, I got up the nerve to leave the sauna for the day.
That’s what happens when you’re a writer. That’s the kind of BS you have to expect when your brain takes off on a tangent. I survived this tale, but I never know when something else will happen to me. Sometimes, it’s like living in a fantasy. Sometimes, that fantasy takes a dark turn. Welcome to just one of my nightmares.