Anthology of Ichor III: Gears of Damnation (33 page)

Teresa pressed against me and returned my kiss with matched passion. Her perfume filled me and became incense that guarded me.

I think it was my last moment of unburdened living, my last moment of blissful, singular existence.

She inhaled deeply after we parted, then viewed me with happily surprised eyes. She was nearly panting.

I took a deep breath of my own. I was starting to lose my hold on the moment. My mind was trying to shift into the previous gear that would travel around the unexplainable event of earlier.

“
Pizza again would be great,” I said, already stepping back. “See you in the morning.”

Teresa smiled dubiously, maybe thinking I believed what had just happened to be a mistake.

No, not good. I was coming off wrong. I didn’t want to end the date on an awkward note, but I wasn’t sure what to do. With each passing second my ankle incident was pushing into my mind with greater insistence, like an air bubble displacing the water around it so it could reach the surface. Then it hit me, and I used what everyone has at some time in his or her life as a cover up for any possible emotion.

“
I’ll be in my spandex for sure next time,” I said; and humor apparently did the trick because she smiled and finger-waved goodbye before entering her apartment.

I’m amazed that I didn’t crash on my way to my mother’s house. I left the keys in the ignition (stupid, I know, sue me; I had bigger worries). Biking home, I did fall twice, but received minimal scrapes. I was a blind klutz learning how to ride a bike.

After arriving, I thought and thought and thought, but still no reasonable explanation presented itself. I couldn’t understand why, upon seeing the girl in the cast, my own ankle had felt as though it had just broken. But that hadn’t been the beginning, anyway. It hadn’t started when I first saw the girl. I watched her and her boyfriend enter and all was well at the time. It hadn’t started until…

I replayed the scene in my mind. Eyes closed, I pictured myself across from Teresa. The pain in my ankle had occurred after I took notice of the Cast Girl a second time, which was after I heard her bump into the table and drop a crutch.

Sitting on my worn couch, which dipped in the middle, I tried to bring back the smell of the place to better recreate the memory. After several minutes, the sound of sizzling onions and peppers manifested with the smell of cheese and warm bread. I even heard the quiet chatter others’ conversations.

Keeping my eyes closed, I imagined the sound of the thud produced by the girl. I turned my shut eyes toward my kitchen, but in my mind saw the couple by their table. The girl’s hair was blocking part of her face while she bent down to retrieve her crutch. The guy beat her to it, though.

The words were key, I somehow knew. What were the words?

The guy apologized, but I didn’t know what was said because he spoke softly, like a berated child addressing an angry parent.

The girl, what did she say? “What’s wrong with you”? No. Maybe: “How could you be so stupid”? No, that was wrong, also. I was reaching and it was getting me nowhere; throwing me off, actually. I needed to let it come to me; let the memory surface in its own time.

My closed eyes were still directed toward my kitchen, and still I saw the couple in my mind. It was like watching a paused movie. The guy had his head down and arms at his sides. The girl gripped the crutch she still held with white knuckles; locks of hair askew. I waited for it to start again.

I watched and waited until I thought it wouldn’t, until I figured the memory would disappear as if the power had gone out during a real movie. I watched, but let my mind float among my thoughts, with no intent to bend or force them to my will…

And the memory continued, but fragmented as if a camera that constantly cut out were taping the scene.

She said, “Well, fu…ason.” Her face was flushed. She continued, but this is what I got: “Woul…mind watchi…’re going?” He handed her the crutch—no, that’s not right. She snatched it from him. Yes, that’s what happened. She snatched if from him and boy did she look pissed.

My heart beat faster as the instant neared that I knew to have been the time my ankle was afflicted. My breathing became labored and my hairline dampened.

She was standing one moment, then the next she was sitting on the booth. It was like looking at a photograph and then seeing one taken right after the first. She must have slid into the booth.

It was coming; was gonna happen any second….

Strange that this part of the memory wasn’t fragmented, but as clear as if I were really there again. The girl set her crutches on the ground and said, “My ankle is killing me….

My own ankle became a frozen mass shattered by a hammer. The memory disconnected as my eyes flashed open. I fell off of my couch and hit the floor hard, and tried to suppress a yell and almost succeeded. What came out were a clipped moan and a string of spit.

The pain was brief and, although it ceased, a line of tears slid from one of my eyes. I laid huddled on my floor for some time, crying. I’m unsure how long, but once I did get up I went straight to the bathroom and took a cold shower, hoping to numb my body and mind. As the chilling water ran over me, I sat in the bathtub, unable to stand.

I wondered what was wrong with me, but didn’t think of the ankle incident any more, afraid the pain would come again if I replayed those words in my mind. My thoughts explored a vague route that led to the teddy bear. The small white bear floated before my vision, taunting me. I couldn’t understand its significance. A goddamned teddy bear.

I was a human prune by the time I turned off the shower and crawled into bed. I slept fitfully that night, and remember dreaming, or nightmaring, to be more accurate. You may not call it a nightmare, but I sure did.

She extends her hand. It is a beautiful hand with thin, delicate fingers.

I don’t like her one bit. She is gorgeous, with supple breasts and a dress that accentuates the curves of her body, but she is bad. I know this. I can see behind her harmless gaze.

“
Who are you?” I say, arms still at my sides.

“
Shhh, Gardner. Take my hand.”

I don’t know where I am. The room is spinning in the air, like this is the Wizard of Oz or something. The wallpaper depicts teddy bears, one after the other, over and over. There is a recliner; the top cushion is a teddy bear head; the arms rests end in teddy bear heads, also. The area rug resembles the wall paper.

“
Take my hand,” she says. “You invited me, remember? We’ll have such fun!” She steps toward me.

I try to step back, but my feet move forward.

“
Oh, Gardner.” She has a smile that widens and widens.

I try to say no—I don’t want to touch you, I don’t want to go anywhere with you—but my hand raises to meet hers, and then she has a hold of me. Her fingers are cold, and the shiver that snakes through my arm and upward plants the image of a teddy bear before my eyes.

~*~

The next morning I skipped work, but hadn’t planned to upon waking. I rose from bed, lumbered to my door in a somnolent state, and opened it right as Ms. Brown’s banging began to get louder.

“
Oh, why hey there, Gardner,” she said, waving yesterday’s paper in front of me.

Every morning she gives me yesterday’s paper so I can read the funnies. This arrangement first started several months ago when I asked for the funny section when she was done with it. (She gives me the entire paper although I only request the funnies, I think so she doesn’t have to recycle it.)

“
Hey, Ms. Brown.”

“
Still in your jammies, I see.” She had a gleam in her eye that made me want to gag.

I wore only boxers and socks.

“
Yep.”

Ms. Brown was looking me up and down with indiscretion. “Never seen you in your jammies before.”

And you won’t ever again.
“Had a long night.”

Her eyes widened so much behind her thick bifocals that I thought they would pop from their sockets. Then she winked as though we shared a naughty secret. “Sly one, eh? I didn’t even hear her leave.”

My god, Ms. Brown.

“
Yeah,” I said, starting to close the door. “Thanks for the paper.”

I swear she took another peek at my junk before I shut her out of sight. I dropped the paper on my table and went in the bathroom to shit, shower, and shave. Most days, I had this all done before being greeted by Ms. Brown. But that day, well, it was as I told her: I had a long night.

I wasn’t really hungry; so, once dressed, I leafed through the paper, turning over the sections, looking for the funnies. A picture beneath a bold headline caught my eye. The headline read:
gas line explodes: two dead, four injured.

The picture showed three kids huddled together, faces covered in dirt and soot. They looked familiar, but I couldn’t place them. I stared at the photo for several seconds more before my eyes slid to the article framing it…

At three thirty this afternoon, several boys were attracted to a smoky column rising from the ground…

I felt a rupturing in the earth, some great moan of tearing mass, and I glanced around, sure that the floorboards would bulge and shatter as something rose up from below, but I knew instinctively that it was only in my head. My ears filled with a gigantic roar. The next instant, I felt one of my arms torn from my shoulder and heard my tendons and muscles rip as my humerus bone was ripped from its socket; a slushy wet sound as when one lifts their foot from a clingy patch of mud. Before I could look to prove my loss, I was blown to oblivion, to fall in chunks upon the scorched ground.

My heart seemed to swell to the point where it should have broken my ribs and burst through my chest. The shock of the survivors thrummed through my veins as smoke, fire, and stench billowed from a huge hole in the ground I knew was there because they saw it, although I myself, in my apartment, could not. I smelled the smoke and was touched by the heat of the flames. Dust clogged my nostrils and I began coughing hard.

In my kitchen, I stumbled into a counter, while in the vision I heard names yelled and I, one of the surviving boys, looked around and realized my friends were dead. I was consumed by a grief so raw, a white shock. My legs were unsteady and I didn’t know which direction to walk through the smoke and fire.

My connection with that surviving boy broke and I was left leaning against my counter, staring at the newspaper with a perfect horror, a fear so great. I swept the paper to the floor with a sound of disgust and passed out.

When I came to, my head throbbed. I wondered vaguely why I wasn’t still standing.

I saw the newspaper on the floor, then remembered the picture, the article—

I squeezed my eyes shut and began yelling “La la la la la
la la la la la la
…” until I was away from that train of thought. I opened my eyes and accepted that I had passed out, then knew why my head was throbbing, and that it wasn’t the only thing to have connected with the floor when I fell; my elbow likewise throbbed and began to feel numb.

Pushing up against the counter, I averted my eyes from the newspaper. Once on my feet, I shuffled sideways with one hand thrust out, reaching like a blind man. The linoleum squeaked under me and I smelled the stale smell of sweat. I closed my eyes and knelt, feeling along the floor. My fingers brushed the newspaper. After I had my shirt off and rolled around it, I threw the bundle in the garbage. I found a chair and sat, then held my head between my hands.

For the next several minutes (five, ten, fifty—I don’t know) I made inarticulate sounds while I pulled at my hair and rubbed my body with shaking fingers, amazed that it was still there in spite of just being blown to bits. I ran my hand over my face, expecting it to come away covered in dirt and ash, but it came away clean, just wet with sweat.

I went to the bathroom and faced the mirror. My face was sweaty, but it was the same face I’d seen in the mirror every morning.

I swung the mirror open, revealing the medicine cabinet. There was a bottle of sleeping pills I’d bought for those times between studies when I had to force sleep upon myself. I dry-swallowed two of the pills and went to bed.

When I woke ten hours later, my head was heavy. I walked slowly to the kitchen, my hand against the wall as I went. I reached my answering machine and saw the light blinking. The message was from Teresa, who asked why I hadn’t shown up for work and wanted me to call her back. I saw my bulging white shirt in the trash, and the sight of it filled me with nausea. I rushed to the bathroom and dry-heaved over the toilet for five minutes, then after some time resting with my head on the toilet rim, I crawled to my bed and swallowed two more pills.

Eight hours later, I didn’t even rise from my bed, but swallowed two (or maybe three or four) more and was still through the night, without dreams or nightmares.

~*~