“I feel sorry for Philip. I mean, Amy is everything to him. He adores her. Can we try to tiptoe through his feelings a little bit more and stampede a little bit less?”
Diana had her back to him as she ripped the top from a sachet of sugar and tipped the contents into a mug.
“You haven’t really answered me. What if he’s right? You said yourself – they seem to have got into a real big muddle,” Michael continued, addressing the back of Diana’s head, as she took a teaspoon and stirred the coffee. “My dear, you’re so headstrong. You’re like a big, stupid bull in the proverbial China shop, sometimes.”
Diana lifted the hot coffee to her lips and slurped. Then placed the cup calmly down beside the cheap chrome kettle.
“Of course, I know there’s nothing I can say. So, I just let you charge ahead. No surprises, then, when you knock something ov—.”
Diana suddenly rotated her body with her right arm outstretched, landing a blow to Michael’s cheek with enough power to throw him across the double bed.
3.4
Philip was sitting at Amy’s bedside, talking, hypnotised by the red lights of her device, when he was suddenly hit by an extreme tiredness. The steady hiss of the ventilator felt laboured, the regular beeps of the life signs monitors solemn – as if the machinery keeping his wife alive had finally had enough and was begging him to quit.
He’d stick by Amy until the bitter end. But the thought occurred to him – was this any way to live a life? In limbo for over 3 months now. Day after day, rambling on and on, until he’d run out of things to say, hoping to get a response. And Lewis’ device was clearly useless – stuck on red. Just another machine trying to tell him something – red for stop. He was once racing ahead in the fast lane. Now he was stuck at traffic lights that never go green. All he could do was sit there, watching the rest getting ahead.
A feeling of uncharacteristic despair overwhelmed him
“Please stop this. Please. I can’t. I can’t take this anymore... oh God…” he begged Amy. Maybe Dills was right – he should stop hoping. Was hope just a curse? A less positive man would have given up by now and moved on.
“Amy was a fine lady. She was the complete woman,” he heard Diana’s voice, at that moment, as if in his mind. Then he felt her hand on his shoulder and she sat on Amy’s bed beside him. He must have been so wrapped up in his own desperate thoughts, he hadn’t notice her enter.
“A brilliant mind. An athlete. A winner. But she always had a thought for those who needed help crossing the finish line. A wonderful mother too. Me and her father love her like we can never love another. She was our special child. Our reason for living. But it’s okay, Philip. It’s okay to let this end. She wouldn’t want to see you suffer like this. You need to think of Tom now. Your son needs you. He needs you now more than ever.”
As she spoke, he saw through the hurtful conflict that had divided them. Saw the real Diana beneath the rage – so warm, eyes full of compassion. By the end of her speech, they were both in tears. And somehow he knew she was right. Her words lifted the weight from his shoulders; gave him a new hope – the hope of finally moving on. She was so considerate, she had even brought the form which required his signature with her. The form which would bring closure for them all.
“Oh Amy… I’m so sorry.” said Philip, his voice breaking.
“You’re a brave man. I still consider you to be my son. Always.” Diana reassured him.
He was so grateful to her, at that moment, as she put the pen into is hand. Her presence gave him the strength he needed to perform this tragic act. Just to scribble his name by the X felt like a Herculean effort. But he managed it – relief and remorse whirling together, drilling an emotional cyclone into his heart.
“I just need a moment,” he whimpered.
Diana smiled sympathetically, as she took the form and respectfully left him to grieve alone.
“Amy… this is it now. I have to say goodbye. Know that I will miss you and that you will be forever in my heart. I will never forget you. I will do my best to bring up Tom and help him to become the son you deserved.”
Philip wept. Then, he heard her speak. Softly, like a whisper, again as if hearing it in his mind.
“They’re bits of cheese. They’re cheese in a cube. They’re Benson’s Cheesy Cubits,” she said.
Philip was startled. Looked up to see her device pulsing green. Just briefly, before switching back to red again. Then he looked at Amy – still radiant, still beautiful, still motionless.
3.5
Diana went directly to Dills office. She was away seeing another patient, but Diana made enough fuss to put herself next in the queue. And she insisted on waiting in Dills’ office, despite the nurse’s protests.
She sat gazing out the window, a dozen minicabters crisscrossing above the city. But she was satisfied – finally, she could move on with her plans. After all, this was her destiny. This was her path. Roadblocks were there to be smashed aside. Oh, she was well aware why she was created. She understood why she had been given this extra strength – of mind, and body. Sometimes, she even felt sorry for the purposeless creatures of the world. But not too often.
Dills hurried in and closed the door, flustered. Looked through Mrs Huyt’s notes for something to do while she summoned the strength to say what she needed to say. It would not be what Diana wanted to hear.
“I’ll be straight with you. I’m quite concerned there’s been a serious lapse in procedure. And I’d like to resolve this before we undertake further actions. I’m going to ask for Amy to be kept here – gratis – while we work out what’s gone on. It’s the least we can do.”
Diana grimaced, as if punched.
“Doctor, we have been messed about by you and your colleagues long enough. The whole family are in agreement. And I have Philip’s signature to prove it,” she said, swishing the form in Dill’s face. “The reputation of this hospital is already ruined, in my eyes. If you continue to cause us unnecessary pain, then we’ll have no choice but to speak out.”
Dills was staggered. How could this woman be so unreasonable? All she wanted was a little extra time to find out the truth.
“While we’re trying to fix this. That would be a shame, wouldn’t i—.”
“Or…,” Diana cut in, “we can resolve this right now and draw a line under what went on before.”
“I understand that you want to move this along quickly, but it’s not just about getting a signature. This has to go through the proper channels. The form has to be processed.”
Diana slid the form emphatically across Dill’s desk. “Process it.”
3.6
Philip was standing in the corridor outside Amy’s room, in full panic mode, wondering if this was all a bad dream. How could this have happened? What had he just done? Signed his wife’s execution date. Seconds later, the device detects activity. If he’d just waited a moment longer… How could he have been so stupid, so weak?
What now? He pulled his phone from his pocket, but before he could call, a video message popped up on the screen, spoken by a fresh, happy-faced guy, sitting in an ordinary white-walled living room:
“Hi Philip! It’s so great to talk to you today! It’s a wonderful feeling to be in a relationship with Amy, I know, but how is your sex life? Are you feeling underwhelmed by the attention you a—…”
Philip cut the spam and dialled.
“I signed the consent form,” he confessed to Lewis.
“You signed? What?”
“Louis – she spoke. Just after… the light… I heard her. She spoke to me.” Philip realised he probably wasn’t making too much sense. “Louis – the light.”
“You got the green light? I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Philip jumped in a minicabter and headed back to the hotel, hoping to catch Amy’s parents before they did anything he might regret. If he could explain what had happened, he hoped to persuade Diana to hold back on submitting the form.
When
he got no answer at their door, he hammered a few times and called out. He heard a groaning from inside, then the latch clicked. He pushed the door but it was stuck. With extra force it opened wider. Then into his hands fell Michael, his face carrying fresh bruises and a split lip.
“Michael?”
“I… I remembered…” the old man managed to whisper before passing out.
Philip looked up to see a woman pass across the end of the corridor.
“Hey! Can you help, here?!” he called out. She was familiar to him. But from where?
Leaving Michael lying in the doorway, he pushed through a set of heavy double doors just as she stepped into the elevator. He saw the elevator up-indicator glow red and took the stairs. On the top floor, Philip rounded a corner and found himself at the end of a long, narrow corridor. Walking to the end, he found doors to rooms numbered 01 to 06.
Now he remembered – it was the young woman with the long afro in the spam video he received a couple of days ago. What had she said? “Pick a number from 1 to 6 and call me.” Right at the end of the message.
Pick a number from 1 to 6.
3.7
Diana led the pack down the long dark-blue corridor towards Amy’s private room. Dills, a nurse and an assistant trailed behind. Family consent had been cleared with hospital bureaucracy – finally, this ridiculous episode would come to an end. The machines would be silenced and her daughter would pass away, peacefully. Order was about to be restored.
But Lewis stood in the doorway, blocking her path.
“Can we talk a minute.”
“Get out of my way.”
When he refused, Diana opted for brute force.
“Hey, hey! This is a hospital.” Dills reminded them.
His reprieve didn’t last long as Dills radioed security and had him removed from the building. But, curiously, Dills’ key no longer worked on the door to Amy’s room. Before she could call the facility manager, Diana put her shoulder to the door and, in one shove, crashed it open.
Both her and Dills stood aghast as they peered inside – Amy’s bed was empty. She had gone.
3.8
Philip paced up and down the corridor. 1 to 6… 1 to 6… Did it even matter which door he picked? What had she said? They have a whole load of new tricks. Anyone can afford it. What did she mean? 1 to 6… Like his room number – 126. And he’d misheard the receptionist, anyway. He’d thought she said “1 to 6”. Anyone can afford it… Then it’s free... 3? Too obvious.
4.
Somehow that number stood out. He had no idea why. Anyway, he’d try it, then if he didn’t find anything, he’d try the rest.
The door to room 4 opened as if pulling him into the darkness. Before he could find a light switch, it clicked shut behind him. He was then hit by a sudden cold dampness in the air. Soon, there was no sense of a room. Just a limitless dark space and, before him, something glowing. Lying on a circular platform, in a harsh white light, was Amy. Surrounding her, facing her – greyish discs, about the same size as the platform. On the back of each disc was mounted a small monitor displaying a grid of numbers and moving graphs.
A shaded figure led him to a seat beside Amy. The psi-complex bud, already embedded on the side of her head, blinked red. He understood they were here to help him and felt no need to resist as they placed a button-sized device to his temple.
He gazed at her, as peaceful as she was beautiful. Took her hand and whispered, “I love you.”
Her device instantly pulsed green. He felt an electric tickle under his skin, moving into his skull, like when Lewis had demonstrated the device’s mind-connection function, before.
The shady figures, standing behind the discs observing the screens of the monitors, faded. The light shining onto Amy dimmed. He lost all sense of everything around him.
A thousand new thoughts rushed into his mind and he gasped.
4.0
Philip opened his eyes to find himself lying in Amy’s hospital bed. The lights were down and the life support machinery switched off. In fact, apart from the distant baby cries, there was no sound at all. When he sat up and slid out of the bed, he saw his legs were shaped like a woman’s – was this another weird dream?
He stood up and opened the room’s only door (with a woman’s hand) to reveal the dark corridor outside and shafts of bright light cutting across from the high windows on the right. The floor of the corridor was strewn with all kinds of junk: broken furniture, empty bottles, books with yellowed pages, shiny ceiling panels, propped up against the wall, dazzled his eyes with reflected light.
He followed the wailing sound down the corridor, past open doors leading to rubbish-filled rooms. It was as if, decades later, the hospital had been abandoned and long-since left to fall into ruin.
Up a wide stairwell, he followed the crying to an elevator lobby, called the elevator and climbed in. As the brushed chrome doors slid closed behind him, in the faint reflection he made out the figure of Amy staring back at him. Then he spun, as a wall monitor sparked into life and displayed a video of a round-faced, shaven-headed man – an earnest frown creasing his brow.
“Amy, thank God! I thought I’d never be able to reach you. Look, this is very urgent. In fact, I’ve been desperate to get this message to you for weeks, now. So, listen very carefully, okay? The company I work for are now giving up to 50% off selected garments. All you must do is subscribe, following the link below. But hurry. The offer ends on March 15th!”
The screen went black as a huge, thumping boom echoed down the elevator shaft from above. Philip ducked, instinctively, looking up at the ceiling. Gears clunked. The elevator motor began to turn. The red level-indicator moved from 0 to 1.
Philip heard something moving around on the top of the elevator carriage and backed against the wall. The level-indicator moved quickly to 2, then 3, 4 as the elevator began to accelerate. The motor whined with the strain as the rattling carriage hurtled faster and faster upwards. The level-indicator flashed past 30… 40… as Philip was thrown from side to side. He squatted down and gripped the sides. Whatever it was moving around on top was getting more and more frantic, clawing at the ceiling.
The motor sounded like it was about to explode when suddenly the upper escape hatch slammed open to reveal the black shaft above.
Everything went quiet and still.
When Philip opened his eyes, he was back in the darkened hospital room, lying once more in Amy’s bed. Only now the life support was back on, ventilator hissing. He couldn’t move, except to glance left or right with his eyes. From the shadows emerged Amy, dressed in a white doctor’s gown.
When she moved to the life signs monitor to check his condition, he tried to speak to her, but couldn’t – he was totally paralysed.
Then another doctor appeared from the far side of the room – a young man whose boyish looks seemed familiar. He knew this guy. Yes – it was Damien. Damien Ehrlichmann.
“What’s wrong?” Amy asked.
“Nothing,” Damien replied.
“You’ve been so distant, lately.”
“You know, I have a lot on my mind.” He took Philip’s arm and slid in a hypodermic needle. “What does this guy have in his veins? There’s nothing.”
Amy moved up to Damien and whispered, “I love you so much.”
Philip remained frustratingly paralysed as Damien turned away from Philip and lingered, eyes locked with Amy’s.
“I love you too,” he said, then took her in his arms and kissed her tenderly.
Philip’s heart thumped in his head, as he strained every muscle in his mind to reach up and tear up them apart. He was stuck to the bed, frozen.
Suddenly, blood shot up from the hypodermic needle still poking out of his arm, spraying the couple in their loving embrace. Damien jumped to staunch the flow.
“Got it.” He busied himself quietly taking Philip’s blood sample, his back to Amy.
“Hey, what’s up? You’re not telling me something.”
“
I’m just down because... you know… That this will end soon.”
“What? Why?”
“Amy, we both know we can’t go on much longer. We always knew that.”
“Are you splitting up with me?”
Damien’s look said everything. Tears formed in Amy’s eyes as she watched him fill one vacuum tube after another.
Philip began feeling lightheaded from the loss of blood and the room began to spin a little. He tried to retain his focus on Amy and began to see more clearly the physical likeness between her and her mother.
Then, slowly, Amy became her mother.
And now they were standing in Dills consulting room, hot light burning through the window blinds – Diana in a doctor’s white gown.
“My dear, he wasn’t the one for you,” she said, calmly, and rested her mouth into natural smile. “We all knew that. You just couldn’t see it. Your perfect match hasn’t been found yet. But when we do, eternity is yours.”
“Did you say something to him?” said Philip, but with Amy’s voice.
“We had a very long and rewarding conversation. An old mother to a young man. And he is a fine man. Just not the man for you.”
“Why are you always interfering?”
“I’m just doing what’s right for you. I love my little girl.”
“I love him. More than I can tell you,” said Philip, determined. Still with Amy’s voice.
“You will get over this. You’re strong,” insisted Diana. “I know how you feel. When you’re young, you think every little romance is life and death.”
“Why do you always talk like our paths are drawn out and you’re the only one with a map?!”
Furious, Philip spun away – only to be confronted by Amy’s father, Michael, standing before him like a living-corpse, face a mess of blood and bruises.
A Room Of Dreams (Kosmos Book 0) Page 3
