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[TVR] Letters from Mission Row, part 1.


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Letters from Mission Row, part 1.

By Raoul DeSavio


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The car struggled up the mountain path doing about fifteen miles per hour. The whole damn thing rattles and shakes giving off the impression that at any moment we’d go tumbling back down in minutes. The only true damning thing about this is my inability to roll down the window. Not only would it be an exercise trying to force the device into motion, but we’d all be choking on mountain dirt. I remain committed to damaging my lungs however and crack open the glove box to rummage around for the source of the nicotine stains littering the vehicle and come up with a few Redwoods. I was more shocked that they were Golds more than I was by the lump of old condoms they were perched on. Behind the wheel is Lin who sails her dinky, creaking ship up the dirt path and reacts to noises by either talking over them or simply blasting the radio louder. In the backseat behind me is another member of the lost generation who is currently introducing her knees to my spine. No fault of hers! Just this soviet-era vehicle mass produced to be just as stubborn and narrow as the mechanics who made it. I imagine most cars made anywhere in that time were produced with the idea to survive nuclear explosions so that people could still make it to their nine-to-fives during the apocalypse. The fact the IRS has a chapter in their employee manuals advising its people how to appropriately continue during such leads me to believe they’ve got a fleet of these vehicles in an underground bunker for just that reason!

 

We were on a mission of macabre intentions. It didn’t start as such for me as I was advised to conduct an interview on the Goth community that had blossomed in Mission row under the leather boots of Evanglyn Blackwood. It was supposed to be a brief dive into whatever Wiccan mysteries these girls were hiding behind closed doors or some cute interview on what makes people obsessed with Goth girls. But after a couple of nights in the area I was aware of a more fascinating, and certainly more respectful angle. I had found myself in a rare refuge of the city, where, for the most part, these women felt safe. Their stories about the rest of the city are told with the same campfire ghost story resonance involving a serial killer in the woods and you have to wonder how dangerous these women could be if they ever wanted anything more than just quiet peace. So now here we were getting as far away from the city as possible in search of a less dangerous, more supernatural idea to scare us. Fortunately for the sanctity of where we drove I cannot remember how to fuck to return to it. Hell, late at night now and off my rocker on acid I have to chalk the whole thing up as just a hallucinogenic dream to avoid going crazy. There’s your witchcraft, damnit! They made me imagine all of it and I’m still trapped in this rabbit hole. A paranoid frenzy thanks to their talk of ransoming for safe passage with some tribe of hill people! This state is so radically fucked that they even chided me for being trusting enough to allow them to haul me up a mountainside after only a few hours of conversation, but I was already strapped to this strange rocket and I could hardly back out now.

 

We found our peace and quiet in the void of an abandoned mine. True darkness. A blackness so damning the flashlight we carried only served a purpose of giving a heads up to whatever horror resided within that we were trespassing on its turf. We had talked about the appeal of being in haunted places. To be standing where something truly fascinating or outlandish happened in defiance to life itself is a humbling thing. You walk quietly and if you absolutely must break the air with obnoxious words then you also do so quietly. With enough suspension of belief and faith you can hit that peculiar atmospheric watermark where you can’ttell if your hair is standing straight because you heard something whispering from out of the darkness or if you forgot to update your proof of residency. Shit. Author’s note: Do that.

 

Still, despite all of this my friends were operating at their very best! Our only stumble was getting tangled in some dangling rope that was severely mistaken for a manly defiler. She showed that rotted twine what-fer with a few chaotically placed karate chops and we kept trucking. This was a true way of unwinding. Chasing a more supernatural ghost or spectre is far more entertaining then having to deal with the curses and experiences that culminate into a collective haunting weight on the mind. Maybe it meant something more to them? Perhaps some doors of perception are meant to remain locked and bolted. It isn’t my place. This was their world and I was just a passenger. At the furthest reaches of the mine a note was left. Warning future thrill-seekers and malcontents of the most abject horrors of this lifetime. Reminding us that no matter how far we trek and revere these melancholic places where ghosts linger, we can’t truly get away from our own much more horrifying melancholy and that our car’s warranty has expired...

 

Signing off, Raoul DeSalvo

 

 

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Username: Countess

Comment: This article got overshadowed by the interview way more than it should've been. Looking between the metrics of the two is disappointing because this one deserves some more reads. Like a short-story. I know that little deathtrap he's describing in great detail- it's as terrifying as he's illustrating it to be. My first comment was an understatement, well done, again, and I can't wait to see what's whipped up for part two.

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