by Shaun Allan
I was in a 'dark place.' Reason for suicide. Reason for self-harm.
Reason for murder.
Or excuse. You say 'tomayto', I say 'tomarto.'
You say 'potato', I say 'spud.'
It was a black and stormy night. It had to be, right? It couldn't be half past 'dentist time' (2:30) in the afternoon, with the sun streaming in through the window, dogs barking in the distance, the smell of fresh cut grass vying for your attention against the scrummy odour of freshly baked bread.
Well, it could be, I suppose. Maybe that would make it even worse. That would make it an offence against the bright, happy summer day. Horror and hate have no time for Time. They are dedicated 24/7 workers, always ready to jump in and rip your insides out.
But, in this instance, it was night and it was black. Did I mention there was a storm? Oh, good. Because there was.
The weather had been bad all week, apart from when it had been good. The sun and the clouds and the rain were all playing hopscotch with each other, chopping and changing more than a new born baby changes its nappy. Or its mother does, at least. But you'd wake up to the rain beating its way into your bedroom and, by the time your morning cuppa had cooled enough to not scorch the inside of your mouth, the sun would be making Incy-Wincy-Spider all ready and raring to climb that water-spout. Then the wind would take a deep breath and bloooow that sunshine away, replacing it, once more, with a deluge Noah would have been wary of.
The storm was one of those thunder and lightning, very, very frightening jobbies. The ones that make adults jump, children cry and dogs bark like crazy. Rain was falling so hard it was bouncing a foot high off the pavement, drops the size of marbles. It sounded as if a herd of antelope had taken a wrong turn whilst stampeding the ravine that would result in Simba's father Mufasa's death, and had, in fact, come down my cul-de-sac instead and was hammering across my conservatory roof. I suppose that would make the rest of the Lion King rather boring, and would eliminate any need for the sequels. And give James Earl Jones a bigger speaking part.
I'd long since turned the TV off. Skipping through the myriad channels of reality shows and old comedy repeats had bored me and the only program I'd fancied - a crime drama I keep meaning to follow but never get round to actually seeing - was so close to the end, the credits would be rolling before I'd even figured out what was going on. The black screen stared at me, the hazy reflections of my room looking like dusk in Alice's world. I waited for a white rabbit to run through the scene, late for such an important date, but none did. If one had, then perhaps it wouldn't have just been myself who was haunted. Maybe my own, dead spirit would have had the company of another, one that wandered my house wishing an open door would lead somewhere other than a black abyss.
Hey, I wished the same. I felt like Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis trying to leave their home but finding they were surrounded by huge, sharp toothed worms and dysfunctional family members - whichever is worse. If I stepped outside, I'd be devoured and if I stayed I'd be driven insane. There was no invading family here, just my own darkness enclosing me like a pillow over my face, but the threat was the same.
Maybe the white rabbit was really Donnie Darko's Frank, telling me the world was going to end in 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes and 12 seconds. At least I'd have a date, then. Something to look forward to. But Frank was off chasing disappearing cats and I was left to wonder if it was possible to step through my television screen into the matt blur of the world beyond.
And in the meantime, the rain beat at the window like the local drunk trying to get into the post office to cash his benefits so he could get his morning pint of whiskey before the previous night's bucket-full had worn off.
The remote control was still in my hand. I looked at it, momentarily confused. What was it, this oddly shaped piece of plastic? What purpose did it serve? Before my confusion had passed the baton of sense over to realisation, the telephone rang. I lifted the remote control up towards my ear; then the fact that I might be able to turn the TV on but not answer a call on it caused me to pause. I put it down and reached for my phone, somewhat embarrassed even in solitude.
Smartphones are the boon and bane of modern life. They can keep whole libraries of books, photos and music on them, keep you in Social Networking touch with a world of complete strangers and - apparently - they can even send texts and make calls. Genius. But that is their desire and their detriment. They’ve become more than mere aids to the modern life, a smartphone has become an extension of the person. Glued, almost symbiotically, to one’s hand like an extra finger, but one too big to pick the nose or scoop the last dribble of ice cream from the bottom of the tub. Lose your phone and your life could well be at an end, and much faster than furry Frank might predict.
Mine, as was the wont with so many others, was sitting by my side, ready to leap into action at my merest whim should the occasion demand. Facebook and Twitter would declare my most mundane moments to the world in a silent tap of virtual keys and every so often an icon would pop up to say ‘Hey there, you’ve got an email! Come on read it! Answer it! Come on! COME ON!’
They could be so demanding, you know. Always insisting you pick them up and play, whether you liked it or not, sucking the hours from your life like the battery from theirs.
I could practically feel the excitement from mine. It was like a dog that’d waited patiently all day for its owner to come home and had just heard the garden gate go.
Swipe. Press.
“Hello?”
Silence.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Whenever I normally received calls of this nature, it was from call centres wanting me to change my power to a much cheaper tariff or to tell me how much money I could claim back in PPI charges that I’d been so falsely sold, bless me. Some people hung up straight away. I preferred to (they’re paying for the call, after all) wait until they came on the line so I can tell them a flat ‘No’ and then hang up.
You could tell, though – in those circumstances – that the other end was making a connection, that someone would be bugging you very soon. This time, I couldn’t. There was no breathing, but the line didn’t sound (or feel) dead.
“Hello…?”
I thought I caught a whisper. Or a whisper of a whisper. Just the edge of breath as it curved around words too faint for my ears, pressed tightly to my pocket computer, to hear. If I had, in fact, caught the whisper, I fumbled it, dropping it to shatter on the floor, the pieces skittering away like a thousand tiny spiders.
I lowered the phone and looked at it. Unknown Number, it said helpfully. Yeah, thanks.
Once more unto the ear dear phone.
Still the same undead silence.
I ended the call. A shiver ran up my back and down my arms – possibly the remnants of the whisper I probably hadn’t heard.
My phone lay in my hand, replacing the remote control and inspiring as much interest. For once I didn't feel the need to check my emails or be networking of any kind, particularly 'Social.' The screen was black and, like the television, reflected both me and the room. This was clearer, though. Sharper. More in focus, as if the television needed to put its glasses on to sharpen its mirror. I was less inclined, however, to step beyond its boundaries. An unfocussed world seemed to match my own rather than this smaller, more real version.
But I ventured towards neither. Playing literal Snap (if my head was departed from my body) with the Queen of Hearts or having tea with Hatters who were decidedly Mad didn't appeal.
And they would offer no escape, anyway.
The call.
I guess I should have been freaked out by it. I wasn't. If someone had asked me what my favourite scary movie was, I may well have laughed. If there'd been heavy breathing, I'd have offered some Salbutamol. And if there'd been a throaty voice, sounding like it had smoked a hundred cigarettes a day for the last thirty years, then I'd have told my mother I'd call her tomorrow. A silent few minutes was worse, I think. Worse because it c
ould have meant nothing or so much.
And that whisper. Or ghost of one.
Ghost. Good one. Just what I needed.
No, I wasn't freaked out. The shiver had travelled down my arms, bounced on the tips of my fingers and was now jangling in the base of my neck. It was giving me a headache. Fingers of pain were wrapping around my neck and pressing into my temples.
I wonder why it's called your temple. Do little neurons gather each Sunday and worship there, praying to the god ‘Id’ for a good harvest of alpha waves? Maybe the pain is a sacrifice? A ritual killing to appease an angry deity? Or, it's actually the deity itself, incensed that no sacrifice has taken place.
Whichever way the credo crumbled, I didn't appreciate this little display of religious fervour. I pressed my own fingers against my temples, willing the neurons to get back to work. After all, it wasn't even Sunday morning. It was Thursday night, so they had no excuse to be shirking their working. They clearly didn't recognise my sovereignty and continued their huddled harassment of my mind.
My heart was thumping in time to the beat of the neurons' drums, the subwoofering bass to their timpani. I knew that painkillers would be as much use as my mental mutterings but pushed myself up anyway. A couple of co-codamol may just have a placebo effect and dull the pain caused by the spiders' tap-dancing on my skull. Plus, the water might wake me up and refresh my senses.
After all, I'd turned my phone off a good half an hour before, with the intention of going to sleep. I always turned my phone off at night. The last thing I wanted was to be woken up at Stupid O'Clock by some friend who'd forgotten their address in their current drunken state, or a wrong number wondering if Tracey was in.
It had happened.
So. How could I have been called? My smart phone wasn't actually THAT smart. It didn't know how to turn itself on when someone rang. It stayed there, asleep, until I woke it, until I called it forth into action. And, this time, I hadn't.
So (again). Water and codeine.
I used to take tablets with no water, at least until I heard about ruptured stomach ulcers and internal bleeding, anyway.
I ran the tap to irrigate the stagnant liquid and took a glass out of the cupboard. By the time I'd returned to the tap, the water was running nice and cold. I took a mouthful before downing the pills and washing them on their way. Glass down, a deep breath, and back to the sofa.
My bed may well have been the better idea, but it offered no comfort to me. I felt as if, undressed and covered, I'd be distanced from my woes. The quilt my shield and my pillow my trusty steed across the land of dreams.
I didn't want to sleep, not really. Yes, I'd switched my phone off and the TV had followed suit. I'd intended to drift off, but in reality I'd known that wouldn't happen. The shadows were watching me, waiting for me to close my eyes. I wasn't going to give them the satisfaction.
But peace. That was what I really wanted. A little silence. A lull in the riotous world that spun around outside my house. I wanted, for a moment at least, the eye of the hurricane to be trained on me.
So (and thrice so), how could my phone, smart and clever and all-encompassing as it was, have burst into life and rung?
And there you have it. It couldn't have. I must have been departing this world on the first fairy wing to the Land of Nod. It must have been my imagination. That was why there was no voice, because there was no call. My mind must have manufactured it as it would a dreamstate drop, where you plummet to the earth, waking with a start just before you're pizza on the pathway.
Simple.
Of course, such is the way of the wishful thought; once you enter a dark place, you leave 'Simple' at the door.
I don't have such waking dreams. Once I'm gone, I'm gone. Granted, I can wake up at the slightest sound - maybe not a pin dropping, but a floorboard creaking, geese on the river opposite my home, something going 'bump' in the bowels of the night. But when I'm asleep, I am exactly that. Knocking out the Zeds; though I'm not sure what the Zeds have done to warrant me knocking them out.
And I don't normally dream. That's not to say I never do. Occasionally I'll remember fragments of journeys my subconscious has taken whilst I'm snoring away, but not often. Not even once a month, I'd say. And even then, fragments are all they are. Snippets of scenes which don't quite go together. A jigsaw puzzle with everything but the sky long lost.
So, so, quick, quick so. It wasn't a dream. It wasn't an imagined voice out of the ether - not that there was a voice.
It was real, in a surreal kind of way. My phone, dead to the world by virtue of being switched off, had rung. A voice had remained silent apart from the hint of a whisper. Like the call, that shade of speech might have been there and might have been an echo of my mind playing its tricks. But, if I was convinced of the existence of the call, surely...
But why? Why call? Why ring somebody up and then say nothing apart from... well... nothing! Not something they can understand, at any rate. What does it gain, other than putting the jizzles up their jazzle?
Or mine, in this case.
But then... My phone was switched off. There could have been no call, but there was. There should have been no whisper, but I was sure there was.
Thus, I wasn't freaked out as such - the temperature inside my body had taken a dive down to something only Kelvin had experienced. I was surprised that I could still feel my heart beating, that it hadn't become a heartsicle with the flow of blood solidified to become the stick. That wasn't 'freaked out'. That was, if I admit it (which I suppose I must), 'afraid.'
The shiver that was clinging Alien face-hugger-like to the back of my neck (which would make it, no doubt, a neck hugger and much less scary) shivered again. Well, it's what shivers do best.
I followed suit.
My phone was on the cushion next to me, its usual position. This time, though, it seemed to be taunting me. I glanced over to the remote control, wishing it actually did make calls, only to find it was joining the phone in mutual mockery. I was surrounded by deriding electronics and I needed to get out.
Forget sleep. Forget Alice's world beyond the television set. I needed to get outside. Fresh air. The rain to wash away my fears and phobias. The lightning to zap me back from Beyond and the thunder to grumble because the lightning was the flashy one and got all the glory.
I pulled on my jacket, and slipped my phone in my pocket. I didn't switch it back on - it didn't seem to be a requirement - but, if I left it behind, I'd feel like I was missing a leg. There'd be this long bungee cord threatening to yank me back. How dare I even contemplate leaving it behind?
Zippedy-doo-dah, zippedy up. I'd never owned an umbrella and the only hat I had was a cloth beanie (so not much cop against the elements), but I was looking forward to the feel of the water on my face. Bring it on. The laces on my trainers were loose and tucked in making them almost slip-ons, so I slipped them on. My hand was on the door handle when I had an urge to turn around.
You know, the old 'someone is watching me' syndrome. There was no-one lurking at the top of the stairs. I could see the murky reflection in the television screen and no little white rabbits, big black rabbits or somewhere-in-the-middle ghosts could be seen. And the shadows stayed exactly where they were.
I shuddered, but smiled to myself.
"Idiot."
That was the brave me talking to the not-so-brave me. The realist to the surrealist. I turned the handle and stepped outside.
The storm was in full effect. I doubted that neither Spielberg nor Cameron could re-create the likes of this deluge. Nature didn't have a budget when it came to blasting us with her power or basking us in her glory. And she didn't have anything to prove either. She'd scooped at the planetary Oscars, where the best film producers and directors could barely get an honorary mention.
I was drenched by the time I'd reached my garden gate. I could feel my clothes clinging to me and my feet felt heavy. The product I put on my hair each morning ran into my eyes causing me to blink and wipe it
away. No need for the 'wet look' now. I'm sure I laughed. Not because anything humorous had occurred, but simply at the madness of venturing out on such a night. Madness, pure and simple. Part of me wanted to run, to find shelter from the downpour, but a larger part of me refused. Just deal with it. What point is shelter when you can't get any wetter anyway?
It didn't occur to me to turn and go back into my house. The call had happened there. The mirror world was in there, secretive and dusky. I was still in that dark place, but a flicker of light seemed to be illuminating the blackness out here. Perhaps Outside was too big to be that sort of dark. Maybe my inner demons could only suck the light and hope out of confined spaces. If that was the case, then maybe I'd never go back. I knew I would, at some point, though. I'd have to. I'd need food. My bed, once sleep became something I desired again. A change of clothes. My phone charger.
For now, however, the Darkness inside of me was beaten back by Nature's own blockbuster. I didn't feel free, but I felt... lighter. As if I'd been carrying someone on my shoulders and had finally put them down. Walk yourself; it's doing my back in.
Woah, now I feel floaty-light.
Indeed. Not like that at all. Just less under stress. Less cornered. Less like I could be lunch for a prowling lion at any second. Or worse. Much, much worse.
I mentioned self harm. I wish it were as simple as that.
I wish I could go back through the door of my dark place and slip right back into 'Simple' like it was a favourite slobbing jumper. The one I wore when I was having a chill day. The one with the paint drips on and the coffee stains that won't come out. The one faded with wear and wash that I'll never throw away.
But I can't. Simple peeks through the letterbox and sniggers at me.
Self harm. It started off like that. Not in a cutting way. Not in a 'cause the pain to release the pain' way. No. Self harm in a 'now you're on a slippery slope and there's nothing you can do' kind of way. Not that I can really say what it was, but I stopped it and that started it.
