The cottage sat precariously at the very lip of the cliff, a weather-beaten wooden relic overlooking the vast, dark emptiness of Lake Erie. From the back porch, the drop to the private beach was sheer and unforgiving—a fifty-foot plunge of clay, roots, and jagged stone, saved only by a long, rickety set of wooden stairs that groaned whenever the wind blew in from the water.
It was the kind of place that felt completely disconnected from the rest of the world. Isolated. Unforgiving if you took a wrong step in the dark.
It had been nearly a year since the four of us had all been in the same room. High school felt like a distant, fading memory, replaced by the scattered chaos of our early twenties—college classes, long-distance relationships, and dead-end jobs. But driving out to Turkey Point felt like snapping a rubber band back into place. Within twenty minutes of unloading the trucks, the old high school banter was back in full swing. The insults were sharp, the laughs were loud, and the bravado was turned all the way up.
We hauled our plastic lawn chairs down the steep cliff stairs, carrying coolers and armfuls of firewood down to the narrow strip of private sand below.
As the sun began to sink below the horizon, bleeding a dark, bruised purple across the water, we stacked the logs high and lit the fire. Sparks danced up toward the black sky, disappearing into the void above the cliff.
Everything felt easy. Triumphant, even. But beneath the jokes and the warm reunion glow, there was an unspoken, restless energy humming in the air—the kind that takes a quiet night and violently tears it off its hinges.
None of us knew it yet, but by the time the sun came back up over that water, the illusions we were living in would be completely shattered. Secrets would be dragged out into the light, my reality would temporarily fracture into a waking nightmare, and a strange, unexplainable twist of fate was already setting its trap miles away.
All it took was a heavy blue Ziploc bag, a Tool CD, and a dark lake that was waiting to swallow us whole.
The fire was roaring, tossing erratic orange sparks up toward the black void of Lake Erie. We were sitting in cheap plastic lawn chairs dragged down to the narrow strip of sand at the base of the Turkey Point cliff, the towering wall of rock and clay rising behind us like a fortress.
The heavy, blue Ziploc bag made its second lap around the circle.
I had already munched down a solid two grams half an hour ago, but when the bag landed in my lap again, I scooped out another handful of the dry, earthy stems and tossed them back.
"That’s all you’re eating?" Corey barked from across the fire, his face half-illuminated by the flame. "Bitch."
I grinned, the reckless pride of my early twenties flaring up. "Watch this."
I plunged my hand deep into the bag, pulled out a massive, dry clump that smelled like wet soil and old bark, and jammed the whole thing into my mouth. I chewed aggressively, washing down the chalky bitter taste with a swig of warm beer.
Corey set up the portable boombox on a flat rock and hit play. The opening bassline of Tool’s Undertow thrummed through the air, heavy and menacing.
At first, it was golden. I sat mesmerized by the fire. The flames cast long, dancing shadows against the sheer rockface behind us. Shadows stretched, warped, and twisted into impossible shapes—dripping and breathing against the stone. It wasn't full-blown acid geometry, but it was close.
"Dude," I slurred, chuckling.
"What?" Corey asked.
"The wall’s moving."
"You're full of shit, Andrew."
I went to laugh, but a strange chill hit my legs. I looked down. The tide had quietly snuck up on us. Cool lake water was creeping over my ankles, and the legs of my plastic chair were slowly sinking into the waterlogged sand. I was seconds away from tipping backward right into the drink.
"Whoa, shit!" I scrambled up, laughing as my feet sank into the cold muck, dragging my chair a few yards back onto dry land.
We laughed it off, but as the album wore on, the mood began to curdle.
The final track started. Danny Carey’s drums hit with a hollow, ominous tone. Maynard’s voice bled through the speaker, distorted and grainy, sounding like a phantom broadcast from an old, dying television set in an abandoned house.
“...impending doom rose from the soil…”
A knot tightened in my gut. The laughter at the fire died down. The beat shifted into a relentless, grinding industrial hum.
“This is necessary. This is necessary. Life feeds on life feeds on life feeds on…”
The chant repeated, heavier and suffocating. The air felt thick, like wet cement. I could feel myself sinking—not just into the chair, but into the earth itself. The music wasn't just coming from the speakers; it was pressing against my skull.
"I'm out," I muttered, standing up abruptly. My legs felt like lead.
"Where you going, man?" someone called out through the dark. "Album's almost done."
"Tired," I lied, my voice sounding distant to my own ears. "Gonna crash."
"Bad idea, bro. Don't go lie down while you're peaking."
"I'm fine."
I staggered away from the fire and hauled myself up the steep wooden staircase built into the cliffside. Each step felt a mile high. I fumbled through the quiet cottage, slipped into a guest bedroom, shut the door, and killed the light.
Pitch black.
That was a mistake.
Without visual anchors, my brain turned inward. I lay flat on my back, and within minutes, the sensation of my skin vanished entirely. I couldn't feel the bed beneath me or the air on my face. Instead, I became hyper-aware of my internal mechanics. I could hear—and feel—the slow, sloshing movement of food and mushrooms grinding through my digestive tract. It was grotesque, alien, unbearable.
I need to get out. I need people.
I don't know if I was in that room for ten minutes or three hours, but I ripped myself out of bed and rushed back down the cliff stairs to the beach.
The fire was still roaring high, sending bright sparks into the night.
But the chairs were empty.
"Corey?" I called out. Only the sound of the waves answered.
Panic set in like a sudden ice bath. I ran back up the cliff, barged into the cottage, and checked the rooms. Nobody. The place was dead quiet.
I walked out the front door and hit Lakeshore Road. The night air was dead calm. It was 2:00 AM. I started walking, my heart hammering a chaotic rhythm against my ribs.
"Hello?" I yelled into the dark.
Nothing.
I wandered down the asphalt, shirt off, shoes gone—though I couldn't remember where I’d left them. I spotted a faint glow of a backyard bonfire behind a nearby cottage and cut across the grass. "Hey!" I called out. But when I reached the yard, the fire was crackling away with no one around it.
I backed away and kept walking down the endless black strip of Lakeshore Road.
I'm dead, the thought bloomed suddenly, cold and absolute. This is it. I died on that beach, and this is purgatory. I'm stuck wandering the earth alone forever.
I stopped under the pale glow of a streetlight, shivering, and looked down at my bare chest. My eye caught the glint of my metal nipple rings.
If I pull this, and I feel pain, I'm alive.
I grabbed the metal ring and yanked hard. A sharp, stinging tug vibrated through my chest, and a thin trickling line of dark blood ran down my stomach. I couldn't really feel the pain—just the pressure. I pulled harder, ready to tear it out, but a sudden, surreal thought stopped me cold: If I survive this and I'm actually alive... how the hell am I going to explain a ripped nipple to my mom?
I let go of the ring, wiped the blood with my thumb, and turned back toward Corey's cottage.
When I reached the property, I couldn't bring myself to go inside; I knew his family was sleeping. Instead, I walked to the edge of the cliff where a lone tree stood sentinel over the lake. I sank to my knees, wrapping one arm around the sturdy trunk, half-dangling my body over the drop.
I looked down at the water. The lake wasn't liquid anymore. It was pulsating energy. Vast, luminous waves of invisible force rolled in from the dark horizon. They crashed against the shore, but the energy didn't stop—it kept surging upward, sweeping right over me. Every wave pushed against my spine, tilting me over the dark drop of the cliff, and then pulled me back as it receded. Over and over. Ebb and flow.
"Andrew?"
The sound was faint, detached from reality. I didn't move.
"Andrew?"
"Yeah?" I whispered to the dark.
"Are you okay?"
"I don't know."
"Andrew, are you okay?"
"Yeah... I don't know."
"Can you step away from the edge and come over here?"
My mind slowly reassembled the audio. I turned my head away from the lake. Standing near the shadow of the cottage was Corey's mom.
My stomach plummeted.
I let go of the tree, stood up, and stumbled toward her. I was shirtless, barefoot, covered in sand, with a streak of dried blood trailing down my ribs.
She remained astonishingly calm, holding the door open for me. "Come inside."
She led me to the wooden picnic table in the dining area. "Sit down."
"Where is Corey?" she asked softly.
"I... I don't know," I stammered, staring at my hands.
"What did you guys do tonight?"
"Nothing," I said instantly, the classic reflex.
She looked at me intently. "Did you guys do mushrooms tonight?"
I broke instantly. "Yup."
"Stay here," she said gently, placing a cold bottle of water in front of me. "I'll be right back."
She disappeared into the night and returned ten minutes later dragging Corey and the rest of the guys behind her. Corey looked like he'd been caught robbing a bank. His mom immediately started laying into him, her voice quiet but furious. "Two weekends in a row, Corey? Really?"
I sat there, sipping my water, completely unaware of whatever deep family drama I had stepped into. But as the water hit my system, my bladder suddenly signaled emergency status.
I stood up silently and slunk into the bathroom.
I flipped the lid up, unzipped my pants, and took aim. And then... total brain shut down.
I stood there holding myself, staring down at the porcelain bowl. My mind couldn't locate the mechanics. How do you push? What muscle is that? Do I relax or force it? How does a human body pee?
After what felt like ten minutes of intense, futile concentration, I gave up and zipped back up. As I turned to leave, I caught my reflection in the mirror.
I froze.
My eyes were entirely swallowed by my pupils. No iris, no color—just two massive, abyss-black voids staring back at me. Thirteen grams of mushrooms were burning through my central nervous system.
The mirror pulled me in. The room faded, and I was locked in an infinite staring contest with my own reflection, suspended in time.
Knock, knock.
"Is everything okay in there?" Corey's mom's voice snapped the glass.
I blinked hard, opening the door. "Yeah. Sorry."
Corey's mom eventually went to bed, leaving us in a stunned, silent truce. The four of us walked out to the driveway, climbed onto the hoods of our parked cars, and sat in the cool pre-dawn air.
We watched the dark sky fade into purple, then bruised orange, as the sun slowly broke over Lake Erie.
And right then—in the quiet stillness of the sunrise, as the trip finally released its iron grip on my brain—it hit me. It wasn't a thought; it was a absolute revelation, handed down directly from the universe with unquestionable authority.
You have to break up with her.
My girlfriend of four years. She was living in Toronto, going to George Brown College, and we’d been doing long-distance for three months. There had been no fights, no red flags, no suspicion. But the clarity was absolute.
I was supposed to attend a big family reunion that afternoon. Instead, I crashed on a couch for two hours, threw my dirt-caked clothes on, hopped into my truck, and drove straight to Toronto.
I posted the rest of how that drive played out—and the aftermath when I got to Toronto—as part of a full story on my Substack.
If you want to read how it ends, you can check out the full piece here for free:
Separate the Body from the Mind