The Shape of Rain

by Michael B. Koep

  Loche feels Julia squeeze his hand. He turns and kisses her cheek.

  Astrid watches the couple for a moment. Across the room she can see Graham speaking with his friend Mal and Marcel Hruska.

  As the last of the VIPs enter into the Atheneum, Astrid says, “Do you two have a moment?”

  “Of course,” Loche says.

  Astrid leads them to the stone Shtan table. They sit.

  “Can you believe it has been a year?”

  Loche shakes his head. “Time plays tricks.”

  Astrid nods. “We’ve done it.”

  “You’ve done it,” Julia says. “The park is amazing, Astrid. It will change the world.”

  “Thanks,” she says modestly. “I hope it makes a difference.”

  “Are you sad to miss the grand opening tomorrow?” Julia asks.

  “Today’s soft opening is enough for me. But Venice calls. Exciting stuff on the horizon. I meet with Helen and Albion on Thursday morning,” Astrid says.

  “What time is your flight?” Julia asks.

  “Early. Way too early.”

  Julia says, “It’s a shame you can’t cross the omvide.”

  Astrid nods. “Yes. I’m grateful that I at least got the chance to experience it when they functioned.”

  “Venice,” Julia sighs. “I wish we were going with you.”

  “We’ll be working for most of our time there, I’m afraid.” She gestures to Graham, “We’re hoping that afterward we might visit Monterosso for a few days and drink wine. George Eversman invited us.”

  Loche feels a tug at his heart. He can almost smell George’s homemade pesto.

  Astrid looks down at the table and pauses. She lifts the wings Shtan piece. “It’s like you said it would be, Loche,” she says.

  “What’s that?” Loche asks.

  “They’ve done it.”

  Loche nods, “Yes. Incredible. How long before the trials start?”

  “They have a group of one hundred people ready to receive the treatment. It is truly amazing. Graham, myself and Leonaie Echelle are meeting with Albion and The Board to discuss their new goal set and the education the recipients are to receive. Immortal Education 101,” she chuckles.

  “They aren’t going to call it that, are they?” Julia asks.

  Astrid smiles, “No. But Leonaie is lobbying to title the courses, Lifeson Studies. The treatment for the recipients has a name now. They are calling it the Lornensha Treatment.”

  “Interesting,” Loche says.

  “The story about how Lornensha saved the life of Iteav—George—and her leaves that brought us the Melgia Gene. Good reasons for the title they thought. Lornensha, the healer.”

  Loche nods.

  “I think it’s perfect,” Julia says.

  “Yes,” Astrid says. “To think that immortality will be ubiquitous. We have conquered death.” She then turns slightly toward the centerpiece of the chamber—the coffin. “We must change to accept it,” she adds quietly. “If only we could make the Earth immortal.”

  Loche’s attention strays to the crystal coffin. He imagines a faint shadow wriggling within. A moving stain in the ice.

  Astrid, too, stares darkly at the sarcophagus. She asks hesitantly, “Do you agree with George about freeing Rearden when the time is right?” Loche does not answer. She shakes her head and sets the wings Shtan piece back onto the board. “Yafarra says that Rearden will face his demons in there, and when he comes out, if he comes out, he’ll be changed.”

  Loche is not so sure. His heartbeat accelerates. The memory of blood—the sound of Rearden’s screams—the horror in his mentor’s face as Loche cut him limb from limb. What is this story? Loche rises abruptly. He walks across the chamber and stares into the icy glass. He says quietly, “Can you hear me, Marcus? The cure, Marcus. How do I heal? How do we heal?”

  Julia is suddenly at his side. Her fingertips graze along his neck. He feels her warmth. She says nothing. Reaching for his hand she interlaces her fingers with his and pulls him toward the stair leading out into the sunlight.

  The End

  AFTERWORD

  LATE WINTER

  Tying Things Up

  Boy, there are a lot of things to tie up.

  In a corner of this empty living room I have peeled back the carpet to reveal another layer of carpet. Getting my fingernails beneath it, I pull and discover yet another layer—a spectacular circa 1973 olive green and orange over white crotchet pattern. I can feel my eyes widen. I like the look of it. I don’t know why Farah Fawcett, The Fonz and my mom’s date bars come to mind (likely Sunday evenings when I was a kid, lying on the basement floor watching TV with my brother). The memories are dashed, for as I pull now on this bottom layer I quickly learn it has been glued down. Taking a firm grip of the triangle of carpet layers, I pull and my legs push. Staples snap, the backing rips and the wall trim splinters. A thick tar-like residue remains adhered to the floor like a black foamy sticker. And cat. Oh yes, cat—you know the stench. The house hears my first string of heated profanity—something about wanting to meet the bastard that thought gluing was a good idea—I suggested plagues upon him—upon his own house—et cetera. A few minutes later I am scraping the tar. I find the floor. Douglas fir, aged wood floors. Scarred, stained—perfect. But this is going to take some time.

  The carpet’s stains, the cat piss, the furniture crop circles read like a diary of the house. How many memories, footsteps, wine spills, nervous, hundred-turn paces happened on this floor? How many pitter-patter sprints to the Christmas tree? How many wrestling matches?

  I lay back, stare at the ceiling and whimper, “Boy, there are a lot of things to tie up.”

  It is another story altogether to explain why I am lying here on three layers of carpet in a house that was built in 1910. A house my son and I have just purchased. Another story entirely to explore the shocking and unexpected turns of matrimony and how it breaks. Another tale for another time to discuss the better part of the dark three years that have knocked me down on this overly cushioned, mattress-like floor. And, I think, if I stay down here, where its dark, I’ll stay here—so I sit up, I climb to my feet, I put my hands on my hips and I say to the house, “Alright, my darling, be that way. I’ll have your coverings. There are new memories to make. Out with the old—in with the new. Let’s get on with it. Boy, there are a lot of things to tie up.”

  Why do I keep saying that? Boy, there are a lot of things to tie up. Probably because during all the monumental shifts in my world over the last few years, I’ve been in the process of writing the third and final book of a rather involved trilogy. The story was seeded sometime around 1996 and has since crowded my daily thoughts, my journals, countless conversations and, I’m thrilled to include now, it has inserted itself into a relatively notable number of readers. And it has been remarked by many that the Newirth Mythology is, thankfully, not spoon-fed fiction, but rather, “Thoughtfully complex and meticulous with plenty of unexpected pathos.” (I didn’t write that, someone else did.) Aside from the story’s penchant for a cliffhanger or two—or three, there’s the occasional unresolved philosophical meandering (for instance the heavyweight “why am I here” puzzlers), and never mind the time jumps from a witches pyre in the 14th Century, to an evening with Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, to a psychologist’s journey across an ocean of death to what some may name the place where artistic inspiration is birthed and others, the Afterlife. Bearing all of this in mind, my publisher, Andreas, Dad, my friend Scott, my editor, Allison, the very nice gal at Safeway, nearly every fan I’ve met at signings, almost every person that knows I’m working on the last book of a trilogy has, in one way or another, expressed, in no uncertain terms, a kind of proclamation or unchallengeable edict from deep within the collective knowledge of spun yarns, for don’t we all know a story or two ourselves—and by God, we all know that stories should end a certain way. They have all said regarding my not yet released, third and final installment: “No pressure. But, boy, there
are a lot of things to tie up.”

  Other reader comments include—this one is my personal favorite, “How does it end?” That’s a toughie to answer. Second place is, “Do you know how it will end?” I typically shake my head gesturing no while I say, “Yes, of course.” And coming in third, but not necessarily last, “What’s it like putting a book together? Because, hell, there must be a lot of things to tie up.” Sometimes I think I just might have the right energy and vocabulary to effectively answer. Certainly I’ve been doing this long enough to at least offer my particular method and process when it comes to creating a long piece of fiction. For example, I might talk about how most of the story develops out of simply doing the work, staying at the desk and writing it. I might discuss themes and plot and character development, et cetera. But in the end, endings and knowing how to put together a book has mostly to do with, well, you’ve likely guessed: tying a lot of things up. Into a neat little package—with a bow, no less.

  Meanwhile, I make lists for the house: paint (hobbit colors: burnt umber, yellow ochre, autumn leaf crimson), brushes and scrapers, electrical tape, masking tape, work gloves. Call on new furnace. Call a flooring company. Make a dump run. Fix the ceiling fan, the back door hinge, the leak in the kitchen, the broken railing, the rotted porch steps. Create a room to sleep in. A room for Michael my son to sleep in. Make a home. I crimp my eyes shut after a few hours of demoing a water damaged bathroom floor and keep reminding myself: the house is scarred, stained and perfect. I take a break from hacking out the bathroom floor and survey the rest of the house to determine the right position for a temporary writing desk. It isn’t long before I fully understand that I can only do one thing at a time. One foot and then the next.

  Daylight slips into evening. I pour a scotch. Dusty and tired I sit on the porch and watch a violet sky fade into purple.

  In the morning I wrestle a desk into a corner, open my laptop to the where-I-left-off-place and turn to the kitchen to brew coffee. The wreckage of my life crowds around me—boxes and boxes of books, LPs, a turntable, two drum kits in cases and art supplies. A bag of tools sits beside a massive pile of old, stinking carpet.

  I think of the trilogy’s main character, psychologist and writer, Loche Newirth, and his horrible plight. How the stories he has written—his works of fiction have become real, and they are destroying not just the lives of those surrounding him, but worse, eliminating the promise or chance of life after death. I recall thinking early on about worst case scenarios for my story, and how I wanted to do something I’d never seen done before. Typically, the worst case scenario for one’s characters is, well, death. Imagine it: the gun is held to the captive’s head, the bad guy says, “Don’t take another step or else” So, now we’ve got some tension, right? Death and its permanence—and we all agree to define that as bad. Well, for the Newirth Mythology, I wanted death to be a scenario, but certainly not the worst case. Instead, I put into harm’s way the hope of an Afterlife. The destruction of what some might call Heaven. It took some doing. First, you need to provide some plausibility that an Afterlife truly exists outside of mythology, outside of the hearsay, “I saw the light” stories, and the old, “There’s an afterlife because, well, it would be stupid if there weren’t.” Then you need to surround the Afterlife with potential killers, put a gun to Heaven’s head and say, “Take one more step and the Afterlife gets it,” and so on. Needless to say, Loche is in a bad way. And so is everyone else. You too, I expect, if you happen to be hoping there is a place waiting for you beyond this life

  SPRING

  Supernatural Trickery

  “Let me make this perfectly, abundantly (add more adverbs here), clear—I do not believe in the supernatural.

  I do not believe in ghosts, hauntings, or what the Immortals in my story would call Bridging Spirits or Bridgers, or Godrethion.

  I do not believe in gods, prophets or messiahs.

  I do not believe in planet position personality predictions, augury lifted from out of palm wrinkles, nor foretelling from flipping a few cards.

  Neither do I hold faith in McKenna mystic psychonauts, meditation, shamanism, yoga, crystals, essential oils, new age manifestation, Hicks existential high vibrational gonna-get-it-done-now-to-find-fucking-meaning spiritualism.”

  I share these personal laws aloud one late, rainy afternoon in May as I witness my new bedroom door close entirely by itself, accompanied by a Stokerian hinge creak—a groaning, longing, spine scraping, torture chamber creak—the kind the vampires of Transylvania pay high dollar (or lay) to have installed. I stare at the door in mid stride with a bucket of paint hanging from one hand, and in the other, a raised hammer. I wait for the gooseflesh to smooth out—my breathing to slow—my eyes to find the reasonable answer. I tick through logic. Wind? No, there’s no wind inside. The heat is off. I bumped it when I passed? No, I am on the other side of the house—and have not been to the bedroom in hours. My heavy footfalls perhaps? I say aloud, “It must be…” and I drop off. I try again—my inflection rising questioningly, “The explanation is easy Scoob—the door opened because—the weight—of the—tri layered—carpet—being gone—has allowed the foundation—to settle—a little ——bit.”

  I open the door, press it to the wall and place a doorstop at its base.

  After this, I begin talking to the house in earnest.

  I place a book or two upon a shelf. I say, “Hello, House. I’m placing a book up here.” The last piles of cruddy carpet I heft into a dump pile outside. I say, “House, I’m cleaning up your floor. Making room for new memories.” All the baseboard trim has been removed for the painters coming tomorrow. “House,” I smile, “new clothes tomorrow.” I startle at another sound. Hail clatters on the porch and the metal roof. I listen carefully to make sure it is not a chain being dragged from room to room upstairs. After some time with my head tilted ceiling-ward, I’m still unsure.

  Later, at my desk, I try cleaning up a few paragraphs from the day before. I stack words into new sentences. Tools and dust and bent nails and sandpaper, clutter the corners of the room around me. Ignoring the chaos, I secretly wish the bedroom door, there on the other side of the dark living room would yawn and creak closed again. Loche Newirth would love for that to happen. But then, I think, with all he’s been through now, Loche might likely use a scary groaning door as a sleep aid.

  Part Three, The Shape of Rain has its share of supernatural bumps in the night, or to be more accurate, bumps in the mind. If Part One, The Invasion of Heaven dealt with the power of stories and the transforming influence of myth upon beliefs and behaviors, Part Two tells of the repercussions of said beliefs—murder, assassinations, the descent into the maelstrom of madness. These stories tell of supernatural lovers. Betrayals. Of trespassing gods upon the Earth and an Order of guardian Immortals sworn to send them back across the threshold of death —and all of this, created and penned by the main character, a conservative psychologist and non-theist, Loche Newirth, whose writing has altered the course of history, and his catalogue of created characters are all now living and plotting to interfere with our mythical beliefs of afterlife, our notions of gods, and the hope that our lives in some way, matter—Part Three, The Shape of Rain, wrestles with it all. Each day I have errands within the narrative. Lines to follow. Plans to see through. Each day there is seemingly something new. I move my characters through the paranormal while they struggle to see through their new lenses of reality.

  SUMMER

  The Burrow

  My son and I have given the house a name. We call it The Burrow after JK Rowling’s description of Ron Weasley’s house in the Harry Potter series. A house, she wrote, “that looked like it was held up by magic.” In the center of our Burrow is a staircase that coils its way up to four small, almost hobbit-sized bedrooms, each meeting at the stair landing. It feels like a fort, as Michael describes it, “Like Ron Weasley’s fort…” Thus, we call it the Burrow.

  But long before the name The Burrow caught on, I wan
ted the interior of the house to match what I imagined Bilbo Baggins’s home, Bag End, would look like. Now the walls are painted a parchment yellow. The old-world wood trim around the doors I have stained to a rich mahogany. And the floors? Did I mention the floors? After cleaning, sanding, a few repairs, and swathing an oil color stain somewhere between burnt sienna and chocolate, the hardwood patina turned out better than I could have imagined. These are Bilbo’s floors. This is the floor of an Irish pub (only slightly cleaner). And now when I rise in the mornings, the entire house glows amber and gold. There’s hand made crockery in the kitchen, and swords in the hall, and medieval maps on the walls, and candles. Quill and ink on the desk, and old books on the shelves. And tucked away in a room near the back is a desk lit with a single lamp. Four coffee cups, two empty, two half full, stand guard around an open lap top.

  It seems the more I find the proper places for things, I find more places that need filling. A lonely corner of the living room is without a lamp. The empty walls up the staircase need framed pictures of Sheree, Auntie Jo, Auntie Mel, Uncle Stan, Shakespeare, Buttercup and the Man in Black, Jeff Spicoli, a picture of my band mates Cris and Cary, Scott and Mark.

  Then, at the same time, I feel as if I have too many things, (or better stated, too much shit). The pack-rat genetic trait has been firmly lodged in my DNA. My father’s voice, “You never know when you’ll need—” insert peculiar metal rod that’s been leaning in the corner for twenty years, or bag of old coat hangers or the weird tool that does that thing that you found with the stuff that you got from that guy that time when you needed that thing… you know, that thing. Why do I continue to haul around this Barry Manilow record? Why do I keep T-shirts that are over thirty years old when I don’t wear them? And while these questions deserve consideration, all I can think of is, where in the hell do I place the T-shirts, the Barry Manilow record, the coat hangers and that thing I got from the guy with the stuff that time. For some reason, all of it needs to stay.