Authors: Jeff Noon
She watched and listened. Seeing, hearing...
Flashes of static, snowdrifts.
Random noise bursts.
Fzzxtsststss!
Shapes. Shapes in the grey.
Figures?
Half seen glimpses.
And her own face in reflection.
One more character.
Nola didn't know what to do. She felt bound to the screen for some reason. It was claiming her eyes, craving attention even now, with only a powdery static fuzz in place.
In the flickers, find yourself...
Nola rubbed at her temples.
Time?
Wristwatch. Blur. Eye squint. Tighten...
5:05
She looked at the window.
Dark still. But a glint of sunlight maybe.
Early yet. Maybe there was time to climb into bed, to get some proper sleep before Christina came round. Maybe that was the best option. A lot of work to do today.
The screen made a noise. It changed colour, brightening, filled now with wavering lines: light grey, cream, grey blue, violet, yellow. Nothing could be seen as yet, not properly, but within these shapes, noises were heard: scuffling sounds, hurried nervous footsteps, voices now.
Somebody whispering, fearful.
Nola listened closely, inching forward.
Are you there? Are you still there?
Nobody answered.
The sound of breaking glass.
A human cry.
Ahhh...
Weeping.
Nola leaned forward.
The screen blossomed into light. Images.
The programme.
A family sitting around a dinner table. The man and the woman as before, but delineated now, given types to play: a father and mother, two children with them.
The youngest of them, the daughter...crying.
Some kind of soap opera, or personal drama. It must have been on the whole time, just some trouble with the reception, that was all. Faulty signals.
The mother was screaming, shouting. The father’s head was bowed down; the children in shock, saddened.
Nola gazed at this spectacle in some kind of relief, she could not explain why. Her own fingernails were pressing hard into her palms, modelled on the father’s actions.
His hands in close-up,
nails digging into flesh.
Nola’s own hands.
The pain was good, and she felt the sudden gulping rush of a media high, old-school style, the pre-digital needle to the heart. And behind that, a nagging doubt, a fear.
Unnameable as yet, unknown.
That taste in the mouth.
Skin tingles all over.
Skullbuzz.
Nola stood and walked through into the kitchen area, turning on the overhead strip-light. She poured herself a glass of water and drank it down with two aspirins.
Powder on the tongue. Ice-cold liquid.
Shiver of contact.
Her fingertips burned.
Mouth fuzzy.
Feeling bad.
Supposed to be working today.
How was she supposed to...
Headache.
No matter what she did.
Strange.
She steadied herself, grabbing hold of the kitchen counter.
The room lost focus.
Click.
Back in place.
Maybe it was time, maybe go to the doctor.
Soon.
Yes. Talk to Christina about it.
Maybe.
Click.
Room blur.
Click.
Clear once more, every detail of sink and countertop and cooker sharp, real, overly real.
Nola walked back into the living area.
The wall-screen played on.
Commercial break. Some minor celebrity figure dashing through a house of treasures, speaking of facts, numbers, units sold, usages thereof, the life sparkle, the one hundred different usages of this one, brilliant product. Images of switches being pulled, buttons pressed, a child’s face all smile, all need, all shining pink happiness. The product itself unseen, only talked about, only fantasised over. Now the logo, the final line:
Purchase now, before your friends do.
Be the first! Become the subject of discussion at work and in the home!
Yes.
All is good.
The Bliss Machine lives on.
Here we are gathered...
A presenter spoke in reverent tones of programmes to come, all the mystical pleasure to be viewed and reviewed later on this day, into the night, next week, oh such delight to be accessed at your leisure, when and where you wish!
Nola sat down. She heard secret prayers, the chatter decoded.
Dearest viewers,
Here we meet on each side of the glass
To sizzle and purge
and plug our souls in.
To lick the screen for static
To burn our eyes with dazzle.
Daily, nightly, twenty-four seven
Week upon week
Life-long
We will download, upload
and drown ourselves gleefully
At the electric well
Of glitter,
Of poison and moonshine.
Why not join us?
Nola found the remote.
Click.
Gone. All silent, all blank.
She leant back on the couch. Maybe grab a snack. Need for sugar.
Shhszzsssssss...
What?
Noise.
What was that?
Tingle dizzy.
Moment of.
Blur.
Something wrong. Something is wrong.
The noise again, quieter now.
...shhzzhsshsss...
She stopped. Held herself still, alert.
The skull hum?
No, not that. This was different.
The screen, maybe?
No, still turned off. Definitely turned off.
So listen. Listen now...
Shhhhhshs.
There.
There it was. Slightly louder now.
Shhhhszss...shszts...sshskjszsss...
Words?
Listen!
No. Not words, not as yet, and not even a whisper. Only a murmuring or a faint hissing sound that seemed to come from a slightly different direction each time she moved her head.
Nola closed her eyes, concentrated.
Was it a voice? Was it somebody speaking?
Sth...sh...ha...t...he...mho...istu...shn...
Somebody trying to speak? A child perhaps? A young boy?
Nola could not tell for sure.
She felt
a tingling sensation on her abdomen, which she scratched at without really thinking, her fingers digging in under her shirt. The skin felt warm and sticky.
What?
Fingers searching, pressing.
What in the hell is that?
She leaned back to lift up the shirt, to examine her stomach more closely. There was something there, on her skin.
Difficult to see.
She stood up and walked into the kitchen, where the overhead strip-light still buzzed.
Now. Now she saw it clearly.
...A bruise.
A bruise on her stomach.
It was purple and pink coloured, lurid against her flesh, roughly circular, about two inches in diameter, situated just to the left of her navel. Nola’s fingers explored the area gingerly, almost scared of what she might find. But there seemed to be no puncture, no serious wounding. That slight feel of stickiness, nothing more.
Had she been attacked last night, or even been involved in some kind of fight?
No, not that she could recall.
Could she have forgotten some violent encounter? No. No, it wasn’t possible. Maybe she’d fallen over in the street, in a stupor? But what kind of fall would result in a bruise to the stomach? She must have walked into something, that was it, that was the only explanation, stumbled into a door without realising, or a lamppost or a fence, a parked car, something like that.
It was a mystery.
The tingling on the skin could still be felt.
Nola pulled her shirt back down and walked through into the bedroom. She was suddenly tired, exhausted, struggling to remove her clothes, most of them.
Her head fell back against the pillow.
She was soon asleep.
Dreams disturbed her.
Strange visions, bursts of imagery that never settled for more than a couple of seconds. They could not be truly registered, only experienced, only flinched from or welcomed, each in turn. Around these fleeting pictures lay a wash of low-level static that softened the skull, and within which music could be heard.
Somebody singing.
A voice so beautiful, and that melody, that amazing pattern of notes! She’d never heard such music. Really, she had to get up now and write it down, capture it, jot down the words and the melody before they vanished.
But she could not awaken, not properly.
Instead Nola reached out towards the music, towards the singing voice, these human presences, until the dream folded itself back into darkness.
After that she slept soundly for a couple of hours or so, her fingers resting lightly on her stomach the whole time.
Blood flowed back and forth around the web of veins and arteries.
Feeding the bruise.
............/...
skin >/
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_*: 36 (& falling?>
/ 010110, ’36!’