The scary part of scary movies #11

If you watch scary movies, there is a pattern when the beast, villain, killer, or monster dies. Usually.

They don’t go quietly into the night.

They don’t saunter off begging forgiveness.

They don’t daintily pick up the pieces of what they have ruined or destroyed as they back out of the room.

Oh no.

They explode. Go for one last swipe. They consume. They cling and clutch. They scrape and holler.

They drip their poisonous acid or whatever noxious fumes or slime or rhetoric or hate or goo they can on everyone and everything they can before they croak.

You’ve seen it a million times

You’ve yelled at the screen.

Zombie: Cut off the head!

Vampire: stake in the heart!

Scifi something: cut the red wire!

Serial killer: aim for the head!

Narcissist: cut off the supply completely!

That last one, yes, was an addition of mine.

The death knell of a powerful being usually isn’t a quiet one. Sometimes it is, for sure, a cowardly thing. Selfish. Draining. The impact of something being no more is typically loud and felt for a long time after - a continuous looking over the shoulder, perhaps as well.

Then.

The clean up.

The unraveling.

The quiet.

You rarely see a life rebuilt.

Home. Neighborhood. City. Country. Planet.

After the monster is gone.

That’s where the movie usually ends.

After the heroes high-five each other or walk away broken.

We don’t see the years of therapy.

We don’t see the rubble being hauled away.

The years it takes to rebuild a life, a home, a neighborhood, a family, a city, or a country.

Destruction is easy and swift; things happen so quickly. No time to react, and many times that destruction is permanent. Death is permanent.

There is a difference between broken and destroyed. Broken implies that some pieces can be put back together; however, destroyed usually means gone.

Never more.

There is a power to destruction, which is why so many people are attracted to it. It is why we kill bugs rather than catch and release them back into nature.

The real power, though, is in creation —and, frankly, in cleanup. The building of something new. And we all know who excels at that.

And maybe that’s the secret.

The monster doesn’t die when it burns.

It dies when people start to build again, when the hammers swing louder than the screams, when hands join in the dust and decide to make something better.

Because in the end, the story isn’t about the destruction at all.

It’s about the ones who stayed, who cleaned, who rebuilt.

The quiet, steady army of people who refuse to give up.

Good people are the real sequel.

The rebuilding.

What rises.

Makers not monsters.

If you know how the movie ends why wouldn’t you do something to change it?

Be a builder, healer, warrior who makes sure the story ends differently.

Thank you for reading,

Heather

Empathy makes us human; actions make us warriors.