Aberrations of Reality

by Aaron J. French

  I wondered if Gemma had found me attractive. I felt like I had handled our exchange okay, but my charms with women usually turned on with a fifth of Jack in me. I’d kept my cool. I’d acted normal. That’s what counted.

  When selecting my room, I opted for one of the Panoramic City-View Tower Rooms located in the Upper Tower. Way more than anything I could afford, but I charged it to my credit card and hoped to pay it off eventually… if it turned out I needed to. For once in my life I was acting like a king, even if it meant financial ruin.

  After a while the elevator dinged at the 49th floor, and the doors slide open. I stepped out into a silent, chic, stylishly carpeted hallway. My heart beat like a kettle drum. I found my room and used the keycard to open it, went inside, closed the door, and leaned against it.

  Breathe, I told myself, breathe. For a split second, I thought I was falling through the floor.

  The room was good-sized, but I was slightly disappointed as I’d expected something bigger. I did a walkthrough, marveling at the brass bed, the leather sofas and armchairs, a kitchen any housewife would adore. The counters were marble, the sink enormous, and the cabinets were forged from fine oak. Even the bathroom was furnished in marble.

  Casting pearls before swine.

  I passed the ornate bathtub and stopped to take a piss in it. Then I turned on the hot water, stripped, stepped in, and had a bath. I lay with my eyes closed for a while, listening to the silence. I could almost feel death closing in.

  I toweled off and threw on my pants. When I’d called to make my reservation yesterday, I had specifically requested a room with a balcony; however the woman on the phone informed me that only a few rooms came thus equipped. Luckily I scored the last one.

  How’s that for divine intervention?

  I made my way out, opening the sliding glass doors and emerging into the wind and sights of Manhattan. This side of the Upper Tower overlooked Central Park, a sweeping expanse of trees, grass, wrought iron gates, and black fitness paths surrounded by tall buildings. Storm clouds piled high, growing darker into the distance.

  I fished the pack of Camels from my pocket and lit up. I thought about what my visitor had told me. I wished I had written it down because I was starting to forget the details. The experience was becoming dreamlike, merging with my thoughts and memories, becoming subjective. Pretty soon I’d only remember a hint of it, a flavor of the things I’d been told.

  That’s why I have to do this now.

  Would anyone believe?

  Do I believe?

  I recapitulated the events, hoping to cement them in the elusive fabric of my mind. I had answered the door and there he was on my doorstep, the man I had worshipped and idolized for much of my life. The good doctor himself, the one and only Dr. Philip P. Vernon.

  My initial response was to burst out laughing. I thought maybe I was going insane. But he introduced himself cordially and came right in. I, stunned, closed the door behind him and asked him to sit.

  He looked much older than anything I was prepared for. Had so much time really passed? He wore a casual dark blazer with slacks, a brimmed hat, and—the kicker—his clerical collar. He seemed so smug in that, so self-satisfied and reborn. I knew from his letter what had become of him. But it was shocking to see it.

  “You received my letter?’ he asked. “And my gift?”

  I nodded. “What are you doing here?”

  When he smiled, I saw he was missing a lot of teeth. “All things have their time, place, and meaning. I’ve thought a lot about the note you sent me. The more I thought about it the more I realized we are the same. So when my agent had me flying out here for The Late Show with David Lettermen, I jotted down your address and brought it along.”

  I shook my head in disbelief. “You’re on Late Night?”

  He waved his gnarled hand. “Forget about that. It’s actually secondary to why I’m here. You see, you and me—and I know I hinted at this in my letter—we are the same; we’re one. I’m merely a rung higher on the ladder.”

  “I’m not sure I follow,” I said. “Am I dreaming?”

  Still grinning, he replied, “Oh you’re dreaming, all right. And years from now you’ll look back on this night and wonder, ‘Did that really happen? Was Philip Vernon really in my house?’ And then you’ll be tortured because your memory will prove elusive, the way memories do, and you’ll be forced to surrender to the fact that you don’t know, that a section of your life remains a mystery. It’ll drive you insane.”

  “But this—this is insane!” I laughed haughtily. “It’s undeniable I can see you with my own two eyes, but still…”

  “Oh those things! Haven’t your practices taught you anything? William Blake said, ‘The eye altering, alters all.’ But if you don’t know that the line between mind and sensual perception blurs, perhaps you know nothing.”

  “Of course I know!” I started getting annoyed. There was an edge to my voice which hung awkwardly in the room. The advent of the good doctor on my doorstep had clearly unbalanced me. I took a deep breath and tried to remain calm. “You’ve been my only real teacher,” I said. “For as long as I can remember.”

  He nodded, venting this sort of dim-witted gaze. He was like a small child as he absently surveyed my living room, tilting his head. I imagined him making judgments about my lifestyle.

  “There’s an old tradition in the Mysteries,” he said, “that spreads its roots from the Hindu religion—and it speaks of the relationship between the student and the guru. It asserts that there are truly no gurus at all, that the vessel into which the student peers when he says ‘Guru’ is really just a mirror reflecting his fears and desires.

  “That is why, to the student, it seems like the guru is inside his head, that he knows all his thoughts and feelings and dreams—or that he’s similarly aligned with the student’s philosophical beliefs. This isn’t true because there is nobody inside the guru to begin with; there is only the student, and the student is the guru. The guru is merely the reflection of the student’s Higher Self or Personality. Does that make it any clearer, friend Thomas, when I say to you that we are one?”

  It did, but I felt too afraid to admit it.

  At that point my memories distorted as if my memory banks had gotten effaced. Later the images regained their focus, and the good doctor was asking me about the Bible.

  “I read it,” I told him. “Nearly the whole thing.”

  His brows rose. “Impressive. What did you think?”

  I considered a moment. “Well, it was different than I remembered. What I mean is, I was told a lot of this stuff back in church school, when I was a boy. The story is intense. I felt like I was on an acid trip, to be honest. But I liked it. However I fucking hate all those, mmm, parental admonishments, all the morally self-righteous bullshit, trying to tell people how they should live their lives. Morality, in my opinion, stands in opposition to freedom. The Master, Lucifer, teaches us that.”

  I eyed him gravely. “As you well know.”

  He grunted, sounding amused. “But what about the Christ? The crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and Pentecost—that’s what interests me.”

  “I don’t know.” I shook my head. “Can you honestly say he rose from the dead? Never once in the entire history of mankind have there been any reports of someone actually rising from the dead. But you expect me to believe this one guy—this one and only guy—he did it?”

  “That is what separates you from those that have faith. And yet your inquisitiveness is notable and not unvirtuous. Events ought to be questioned, and the world ought to be scrutinized. Thereby can things be proven: the goal of modern science. After all, what is it that distinguishes a scientist from a Christian?”

  “Common sense?”

  “Experience,” he said. “The man of science can experience the effects and results of his experiments, and gain cold hard solid facts about the natural world. All faith-based prognosticating and theorizing is done with the emotions, with the
heart. Their results and effects transpire in the invisible realm. And yet the faithful ever strive toward the same goal—experience—in order to prove the reality of their claims. Is that what you require, friend Thomas, to accept the validity of God?”

  “Yes,” I told him.

  So now here I was, six hundred and twenty feet in the sky.

  * * *

  Smoking, I stared out into the gray. I concentrated. Hard. Whatever Dr. Vernon had told me—whatever his advice had been—it wasn’t in a place where I could access it. It was lost to the swirl and fugue of my subconscious.

  All I had to aid me was the story from his letter—which I had brought along, the Bible too, the one folded inside the other. The other I had set by my feet. I checked his words, reminding myself.

  “I can do this,” I murmured, replacing the letter. I stared, focused, and held my breath. My eyes tried to blink but I fought them. They tried to tear, but I wiped them.

  God, this is stupid!

  Despite my frustration, I resisted any impulse to stop. I was determined, even if I had to stand in the cold all night. I could see much of New York City spread beneath me, gray buildings mirroring the grayer sky. Central Park and its carpet of green, a natural haven amid urban fields.

  This place didn’t feel like home to me. It felt like an escape. I got as far away as possible from my old man and the backwoods shady lanes of Michigan. But as I looked out from the 49th floor balcony I realized all my running had taken me nowhere. I came to Manhattan looking for a fresh start, but I feel more out of place here than I ever did back in Michigan.

  Suddenly the edges of the sky began to glimmer. Pulled from the gloom I absently flicked my cigarette off the side and narrowed my eyes. I gripped the railing, my hands squeezing metal.

  Come on…

  I had to keep my gaze steady or else I would lose it. The lights shimmered in and out of focus—as if my attention fixed them. I glared, gazed, and fought blinking. I let tears stream un-wiped down my cheeks. I was refusing to let this experience pass me by.

  The patch of sky, of air, directly before the balcony had become a blur of colors and light. Tiny, darting pinpricks and light-filled motes. They blew all around each other, creating a cloud, sometimes there, sometimes gone.

  Come on… hold steady… concentrate…

  “You will not escape me,” I hissed, teeth clenched.

  I focused and yes, yes!, the lights remained visible. They existed, were colorful—they were there—whirling about like a storm of molecules. The more I watched the more they gathered form, coalescing into a tangible shape—something like a winged feminine angel.

  My heart jumped. My head spewed adrenalin. My pulse raced. This is it! Just like Dr. Vernon said. Everything he told me is true. Holy shit, it’s true!

  Yet just as this glorious form was about to manifest, the lights and cloud faltered. Boring, ordinary sky threatened to return. For a moment, all I saw was my own insignificant existence.

  “No!” I cried out, not caring who heard. This was it, the final show down. Life or death. I was on the brink of madness and discovery, but either way nothing could ever be the same.

  The cloud of lights shimmered back to life. Suddenly, large flapping wings appeared. I was breathless.

  “Yes!”

  The wings vanished.

  “Ahhh!”

  I pressed against the railing, leaning dangerously close. The light cloud streamed toward me, as if responding to the movement. I reached out with my hand.

  If only I can touch it, I thought, straining with all my might. I felt the muscles ripping in my underarm. If only I can touch it… then I’ll know…

  Then…

  I can believe…

  DWELLERS IN THE CRACKS

  “Through all this horror my cat stalked unperturbed. Once I saw him monstrously perched atop a mountain of bones, and wondered at the secrets that might lie behind his yellow eyes.”

  —H.P. Lovecraft

  (The Rats in the Walls)

  I got the cat on Tuesday.

  By Wednesday Rebecca was dead. She’d been dead a couple hours when her boyfriend discovered her in her apartment. I saw him talking with police in the hall. He looked shaken up.

  I didn’t get the story until later, but apparently Rebecca was found strung upside down in the bedroom, ankles tied to the rafters with a bed sheet. A tall woman, so her arms rested against the floor below her head, palms up. Each hand clutched a solid brass pentagram, her neck bent so that she appeared to watch the boyfriend as he entered.

  I’d have been shaken up too.

  My girlfriend Suxie arrived later that night, following her restaurant shift. The cops were still filing in and out of Rebecca’s apartment, while some loitered downstairs in the lobby.

  Suxie hailed from New Jersey originally. She was tough—the sight of cops didn’t scare her. Plus she was Italian. Her uncle had died of a mafia hit (or so she claimed), and her father was a Catholic priest. She’d grown up in the housing projects of South Newark, where her two brothers taught her to shoot a pistol before she was nine.

  All she said coming up the stairs was, “Who died?”

  For as long as I’d known her, which admittedly was relatively limited, she’d never shown me much more than a tough, Jersey Girl exterior. I was kept in the dark as to what went on inside her, what she was thinking. Fortunately, her killer body and seductive, cat-like eyes assuaged any dismay this might’ve caused.

  I propped up the doorway of my apartment and said, “Rebecca.”

  That stopped her. She glanced at the policemen. “Jesus, you’re kidding?”

  “’Fraid it’s true, check it out. They got that Fernando guy over there, asking him all kinds of questions.” I pointed out Rebecca’s boyfriend.

  “Did he do it?”

  “Sorta doubt it.”

  She gave me a weird look. Her eyes, darkened with eyeliner, gorgeous beneath a mane of brown hair, sometimes reminded me of Isabella Rosaline’s. I had no idea why she was looking at me like that, almost with a playful smile on her lips. What she said threw me for a loop.

  “Did you do it?”

  I guffawed. “Are you crazy? Of course I didn’t do it. Get out of here.”

  She shrugged. “Hey, you know my family. Anyone can be a killer.”

  I told her she was being overdramatic. I knew some big, bad criminal shit had gone down in her life, but still I suspected she overplayed it.

  One of the officers was going door to door, questioning all Rebecca’s neighbors. Like me most of them stood halfway in the hall; and, like me, they were scared. Death in the building was serious.

  The officer made it around to Suxie and me. Young Latino fellow with slick black hair. Had a pen in one hand, a clipboard in the other. “This your place?” he said.

  I nodded.

  “Both live here?”

  “Just me. But my girlfriend stays over a lot.”

  He took a minute to write down our names and some personal information.

  “What happened?” Suxie asked.

  “That’s what we’re trying to find out. Were you here today? Last night?”

  She shook her head. “Not today. A little while last night.”

  “Sleep here last night?”

  Shook her head again.

  He turned to me. “You?”

  “Slept here. I was here all day, actually, but I was mostly working.”

  “On?”

  “I’m a financial consultant for small businesses. Most of my work is online.”

  He grunted. I could tell he didn’t consider that real work.

  “Hear anything out of the ordinary? See anything odd, any strange people? People who don’t belong in the building?”

  “Nah. Like I said, I was working.”

  He scratched the back of his neck with the pen. He seemed to search for something to say. Abruptly, he said, “What about rats? Got rats here?”

  “None that I know of. Why?”
r />   He heisted, then offered: “The victim had some bite marks on her face; probably occurred postmortem.”

  “Gross,” Suxie said.

  Just then, the cat I had gotten the previous day darted between my legs and ran across the officer’s shoes.

  “Shit,” I said.

  “I got him!” Suxie hurried out into the hall, calling him. “Here, Anubis! Here!”

  “New cat,” I told the officer. “Still getting used to having it in the house. Gotta remember to keep an eye out when the door’s open.”

  “You named your cat Anubis?” he said.

  “Not me. Former owner. But he looks Egyptian, like the cats you see on those Queen of Sheeba and Nephrititi History Channel shows.”

  He chuckled, then handed me a business card. “Tell you what, if you remember anything give us a call.”

  I accepted the card. “Sure.”

  He moved on to the next apartment—Anton’s place. I watched him speak with Anton for a moment. Then Suxie came back, cradling Anubis in her arms.

  “Let’s go inside,” I said.

  I let her and the cat go before me, then followed after, shutting the door. As I walked into the living room I thought of what the officer had said about rats in the building and bite marks on Rebecca’s face. For the first time, I felt happy about taking Anubis.

  * * *

  Friends of mine were moving to San Francisco. Two lovers: Crystal and Adeena. They had lived on Long Island for going on five years. I used to watch old French sin-uh-muh with them, drink wine, and eat cheese. After I met Suxie, she started coming along with me.

  Anubis had been Adeena’s. He liked to sit with us while we watched, cruising from lap to lap, purring, searching out strokes. Adeena was fond of him, and I was surprised to learn she was giving him up.

  “Anubis is old,” she told me over the phone. “Too old to move across country. He’s spent his whole life on Long Island. Seems right that he should finish it here. That sound sentimental?”