by James Cole
Jeremy needed more information and he needed more time. It would be risky taking a drug that he knew nothing about supplied by a girl he just met. What if this was some kind of ruse? What if the capsule actually contained something that would knock him out? What if she meant to take something from him?
Her tone became impatient. “Look, if you don’t want to do it, then fine, but I’m quite sure I can find someone else who does. I don’t have all night.”
Jeremy’s mind raced on the greasy wheels of rationalization. He was already taking a different kind of chance just being here now, with her. In the company of others, Jeremy had been known to say that every adventure, by definition, carries risk. The present situation was no different: dangerous, definitely, but a temptation he could not refuse.
Jeremy gave in. “Yeah, sure,” he said, with bravado. “Why not?”
“You won’t regret it,” she said. “I promise.”
“This isn’t the only one, is it?” he asked, before adding on a hunch, “or have you already had yours?”
“No, I’ve got some more right here.”
After a moment of digging in her purse, Monika produced another capsule that she popped expediently into her mouth. She chased it with a sip of water and passed the bottle over to Jeremy.
Here goes nothing, he said to himself.
His new companion watched intently as he swallowed the lavender-tinged capsule with the perfumed smell. She leaned over and kissed him, taking the initiative just as she had the night they met.
“Burn, baby, burn,” he said with a grin.
“That reminds me,” she said, “did you happen to see what I wrote-”
“On that five dollar bill?” Jeremy finished Monika’s question for her. “It made absolutely no sense at the time but, yes, I saw it.”
“It was a secret message,” she said with a satisfied air about her.
“You meant it for me?”
“Of course,” she replied. “It bodes well for you that you noticed.”
For a while they sat together on the couch, exchanging the typical get-to-know-you information. She asked him where he was from, what he did at the Biotechnology Facility, what he planned to do when he got out, what kind of music he listened to, and so forth. For the most part, she deflected the conversation away from herself. In fact, about all Jeremy learned about his new friend was that she was 24 years old, painting was her life, and getting your belly button pierced hurts like a mother.
*****
“I just want to check,” Jeremy said.
“I don’t think you’ll find anything about it on the internet,” insisted Monika.
As they waited for his computer to boot up, she said, “Let me,” as she tugged the laptop from his lap to hers.
When the administrative password prompt appeared, she asked, “What’s your password?”
“That would be classified information – here, let me…” Jeremy reached over to type it in himself.
Monika blocked his hand with hers. “No, I believe you’re going to have to just trust me. What’s your password?”
He said nothing, just looked at her with a dim expression.
“C’mon, give it up!” she exclaimed. “It’s not like I’m getting into your bank account.”
“It’s jinnigirl,” he finally said. “That’s one word, lower case.” He spelled it out for her.
“Jinnigirl?” she repeated tauntingly. “Who’s Jinnigirl?”
“Just my password,” Jeremy mumbled.
“Jinni wouldn’t be your girlfriend, would she?”
“Something like that.”
“I knew it,” Monika boasted. “I saw you with her at the Singe show the other night. Where is she now?”
“She’s out of town.”
Monika zeroed in on his reluctance to discuss Jinni with her. It was obvious from her expression that she derived a great joy from the needling. “I suppose that explains why you came looking for me tonight.”
Jeremy didn’t quite know how to react. “I’d rather not discuss Jinni with you. I’m having enough trouble trying to assimilate tonight as it is.”
She did not respond immediately but looked directly at him, sizing him up. He returned her gaze, hoping to get a glimpse into the inner workings of this strange and beautiful creature. What was it about her? What was that quality that so attracted him to her and at the same time intimidated him?
“Chill out Jeremy,” she said finally. “If you don’t want to tell me about your girlfriend, then don’t. And don’t worry. I’m not going to blow your cover.”
“Thank you,” Jeremy said, but his relief was short-lived.
“But we all must lie in the bed we make,” she added with a devilish look in her eye.
He decided his best course of action was no reaction. She was just trying to get a rise out of him, and he simply would not give her the satisfaction.
Just as Monika predicted, the search engines returned no relevant links to any drug or chemical compound by the name of the Unreal.
“Wanna go for a ride?” she asked as she slid out from under the laptop.
It was the second time tonight Monika had posed the question. Jeremy had the distinct feeling much more than an innocent car ride was implied.
“Do I have a choice?” he asked, not meaning for her to answer.
As they were leaving, Jeremy’s landline phone rang.
“The answering machine will get it,” he said.
As Jeremy locked the deadbolt from the outside, the voice on the line pierced the door as if there were no door.
“Hey, it’s me. Are you home?”
Sweet Jinni. The ice pick of guilt stabbed the heart of his conscience.
Jeremy turned away and followed Monika down the stairs and out into the night.
*****
Jeremy drove his car, but he had no idea where they were going. In one fell swoop, all vestiges of control had been ripped from him by the stranger beside him who, at the moment, was digging in her purse. For a second Jeremy thought she was looking for another pill.
“I brought a CD you might be interested in hearing. Mind if I stick it in?” she asked.
“Who is it?”
“It’s Singe, the band from last week.”
Monika deftly adjusted the controls on his stereo – the equalizer, treble and base, the volume – like it was her own. It seemed she enjoyed her music loud, as did he.
Jeremy asked, “Do you just want to ride around, or is there somewhere in particular you wanted to go?”
Her response came as a pleasant surprise. “Do you know the way to Sticks River Road?”
Jeremy knew well the way, and as they sped down the seven-mile straightaway, he recalled the one who lived at the end of the straightaway. Grady had warned him not to go past the break in the road. The thought, however, was fleeting, as the contemplation of what he might be feeling consumed his mind.
“How long before we feel the effects?”
“It usually takes about an hour.”
“It may be my imagination but I do feel a little strange, sort of on edge.” After Jeremy reflected on the feeling, he added, “If this is all there is to it, I’ll be disappointed.”
“That’s just the first sign. It won’t be long now.”
It wasn’t long before they reached the break in the road where the straightaway became meandrous and the open fields evolved into dark forest. It was there that Jeremy’s nervousness became something altogether different.
Something wonderful.
Like a pleasure supernova, a thousand million shooting stars of euphoria tingled up and down his spine. Jeremy saw the world with a pristine clarity, like for the first time. It was as if he had been dead and unaware of the dynamic universe that revealed itself, the veil of darkness suddenly ripped from a blind man’s face. Inexpressible, just like Monika had said.
“This song!” he exclaimed through clenched teeth. “What is this song?”
“It’s cal
led Requiem,” she answered. “You like it?”
Burning virgin pathways in its wake, the song was bigger than life itself, a leviathan squatting on the counterweight of his soul, catapulting him to heretofore hidden and fantastic realms.
“You have no idea,” he said.
“Oh, yes, I do,” she countered.
Monika. Jeremy felt as if she were the crucial piece missing from his life, smashing in her beauty and the essence of desire. In her, he saw what he felt; her eyes wild, her pupils black stones dilated with the high-octane excitement of the Unreal.
Monika said something but he could not hear for the music.
Jeremy reached to turn down the volume but Monika intercepted his hand with hers. She leaned over until her lips were almost touching his ear, close enough that he could feel her hot breath.
“It’s just like heaven,” she whispered and kissed him lightly on the neck.
They reached the end of the road after an indeterminable passage of time that could have been seconds or years, or any increment in between. With exuberance, Jeremy slid the car to a crunching stop in the gravel down by the edge of the lake. He unfolded himself from the driver’s seat and stretched a marvelous stretch, arms toward heaven, every muscle clenched, back arched and relaxed with a spontaneous groan of satisfaction.
Overhead, a few billowy clouds hurried by, skimming the treetops. Above that stretched a thicker cloud sheet, solid but broken by a complex mosaic of breaks like cracks in dried mud. The cracks glowed with the light of the hidden moon. They strolled, hand in hand, down to the rickety pier. At the end of the pier they sat and dangled their feet over the edge. They laughed and talked. They flirted. They kissed.
The Unreal, as Jeremy was realizing, caused his mind to hop-scotch excitedly and uncontrollably from one subject to the next. At some point in the course of a rambling conversation – a three-way affair between himself, Monika, and his inner thoughts – he thought of Grady. Had he taken Grady’s warning to heart, he would have missed this awesome experience. Thinking of Grady, in turn, reminded him of the ghost story.
“Have you ever heard of the hippie queen,” he asked.
“Yes,” Monika replied. “Hasn’t everyone?”
Jeremy laughed. “It seems like it. Did you know that there really was a commune – and that it was in these very woods?”
“No, not really,” she replied. “I thought it was just a made-up story.”
“That’s what I thought too, at first. But, as it turns out, the hippie queen was a real person. Her name was Claire Wales. She died, along with six of her hippie friends when their commune burned.”
“How do you know all this?” asked Monika.
“I found most of it online.”
“Funny that you were interested enough to look it up.”
“Funny?” he asked. “Why?”
A flash of lightning, far away and benign, lit in the western sky.
“I don’t know,” she replied. “It just is.”
Regardless of the course of their conversation, their attention invariably returned to the here and now. As they reveled in the beauty of the moment and the beauty of the world wrapped around them, the low-lying cloud curtain withdrew to reveal the upper reaches of the firmament. The moon, three-quarter’s full, came into view, and with it, a massive and brilliantly-lit mackerel sky. A swath of sparkles stretched over the lake, one tiny reflected moon for each of a million water ripples. Jeremy perceived the world in all its infinite detail and shivered with exquisite delight, one tiny pleasure-laden tingle for each of a million chill bumps.
“Now do you know what it is to burn?” Monika asked.
“I do,” he said to her. To the world Jeremy yelled, “Burn, baby, burn!”
On cue the distant sky responded with a double jab of a lightning bolt, low on the horizon, Halloween-orange, its spindly tendrils grasping at the malignant heart of the sky. An utterance of distant thunder of deep booming bass reverberated towards them from across the lake.
Together they watched with utter awe as the storm approached, marching steadily forward to the rhythmless cadence and gradual crescendo of growling, rumbling and, finally, crashing thunder. The two lingered until a bolt struck so close that they heard the electric crackle. The concurrent detonation, loud enough to wake the dead, sent them scurrying to the car. Sparse, fat drops pelted the windshield as they sped away, racing the clouds home.
Back at his condominium, Monika cut directly through his bedroom and opened the French doors that led out onto the fourth-floor balcony. Jeremy turned the corner into his bedroom and was met by a hot blustery wind and the sight of Monika. She was leaning against the rail with her back to Jeremy, the elegant lines of her body a sensual silhouette against the backdrop of the cream-colored sky.
“It’s breathtaking out here. You can see the whole town!” she cried. “I love this.”
He joined her at the balcony rail. For a good long while, Jeremy said nothing, speechless with infatuation, joy, desire and several other brand new sensations.
Suddenly Monika turned concernedly to him. “Do you smell something burning?” she asked in all seriousness.
The alarming thought that first came to Jeremy was that one of the condos below might be on fire.
He sniffed the air. “I don’t smell anything. Are you sure?” he asked, before he caught Monika hiding a smile.
“I get it,” Jeremy said. “We’re the ones who are burning, right?”
“Wanna burn a little brighter?” she asked, catching him off guard.
“Huh?” Dosing again had not crossed Jeremy’s mind, though his answer seemed somehow predetermined. “Okay.”
“Wait here,” she instructed.
Monika left him sitting alone at the wrought-iron table on the balcony. As Jeremy waited, the wind picked up and the chimes that hung from the overhead eave came to life, reminding him of the approaching storm.
*****
“More,” Monika implored.
“Didn’t we just take more?” he asked.
“Aren’t you up for it?” she asked deviously.
Jeremy checked his watch – three a.m. Almost three hours had passed since they arrived back at the condo. He could scarcely grasp where the time had gone. The rush of the Unreal had rendered time irrelevant. While he considered Monika’s proposal, he bore witness to her magnificent repertoire of rationalizations.
“Each night is a lifetime unto itself and to give in to sleep is to die,” she said. “Are you ready to die?”
Jeremy had to strain to focus his thoughts. Even here, in the grand fields of euphoria where his mind soared, there was a fine wooden box wherein his common sense lay. The lid cracked open ever so slightly, and Jeremy knew that another hit tonight was probably not wise. This would be his third, if he said yes. Besides, how could he possibly feel any better than he did right now?
Just say no.
Yet neither did he want the feeling to end.
Never say die.
He settled the issue with a compromise. Capsule in hand, Jeremy scuttled into the bathroom. He closed and locked the door behind him and as carefully as he could, he pulled apart the capsule. One half he wrapped in a gum wrapper and stuck in the back of the bathroom drawer. The other half and its measure of lavender powder, he washed down with a slurp of water straight from the lavatory faucet.
“It sure is quiet in there,” accused Monika from the other side of the door. She jiggled the door knob. “What are you doing?”
“What do you think?” Jeremy flushed the toilet and, for good measure, washed his hands before opening the door to her probing gaze.
“Did you take it yet?” she asked.
“I did,” he replied. “What do you want to do now?”
“Whatever you want.”
If their night together had ended at that moment, it would still have been the most memorable night of Jeremy’s life, but there was more to come.
Monika, unlike Jinni, slept over.
<
br /> In the morning, Jeremy awoke alone with an unsettling emptiness. He did not remember falling asleep. He had not heard Monika leave and for a panicky moment considered the notion that last night had been a dream. He crawled from his bed to find that she had left a note on the bedside table, corroboration that she was real. The note read:
Jeremy-
Had a wonderful time last night
Hope to see you again soon
Love, Monika
p.s. Enjoy the cd
Underneath the note was a clear plastic case. Inside was a compact disc. Hand-written on the disc with a black permanent marker were the stacked words,
Singe
Requiem
She had left behind a copy of the mind-bending music from last night.
Jeremy hoped to see Monika soon, too, except hope wasn’t the right word – he had to see her again. Unfortunately, she never got around to giving him her telephone number. Worse, she never even revealed her last name, at least not that he could remember. Recalling the night in its entirety was like recalling a year’s worth of days: the memories were all in his head but not necessarily immediately accessible. Various tidbits of the night occurred to Jeremy over the course of the day – and days that followed. But he was sure that she never mentioned her last name, and he felt certain that had been purposeful on her part. In fact, the girl responsible for what was the most memorable night of his life had managed to deflect or answer obliquely every personal question presented to her. And now, like the euphoria of the Unreal, she was gone.
Chapter 16
Sunday, November 9
Flames, like hot dragon tongues, licked at his body and his naked flesh blistered and peeled in the hellish heat. In the distance Jinni frantically motioned, urging him toward her, toward salvation, but his paralyzed muscles refused to cooperate. A shrill fire alarm rang relentlessly.
With a start, Jeremy awoke. For one confused moment he didn’t know if it were dusk or dawn, or even if he had passed out of this world into the next. As the cold waters of reality rushed in, he realized the ringing was not a fire alarm but the telephone. The late afternoon light was waning and he had been in a sleep fit for the dead.
