Infinite Rooms: a gripping psychological thriller that follows one man's descent into madness

by David John Griffin

  ‘Oh I see. Alright to leave me waiting because the moon hadn’t come out.’

  ‘I didn’t mean that.’

  Stop, stop.

  ‘Anyway, thanks. I only had to carry the shopping two miles while you were snoring.’

  ‘Two miles? Not that far. Still, I don’t understand why you didn’t catch a bus or a taxi home.’

  ‘Didn’t have any money left. And I couldn’t phone, could I, you with your stupid decision to throw the mobile away.’ I know the reason, Bernadette. It’s the infrared, it can damage. ‘Anyhow, what do you mean catch a bus? You were going to pick me up, remember?’

  Lock this room, stop us from arguing, stop the sentences from ever being formed; they ring in my ears before I speak but I’m powerless to keep them from evacuating.

  ‘Won’t happen again, alright? Just belt up. Anyway, are you so damned perfect?’

  These sharp words have pricked her truculent bubble. She’s dissolved into tears. She’s walking back and forth, wringing her hands. Stop her from doing that, doctor, I can’t seem to.

  It’s done, finished, over. Delete the argument.

  This filmic, it should be as easily manipulated as celluloid to edit, ideally to have it erased. This version isn’t valid. Can’t you see? Could be the beginning of the end if I can’t alter it.

  Bernadette has plunged her face into a settee cushion to drown her sobbing. And I’m still ranting in front of her, one sentence demanding another to counteract it, frightened to stop gabbling because this would leave a chasm of silence between us.

  It’s not as though I’m unaware of any impending disaster. I’m only too aware of destroying her image of me. I know I’m rubbing away with a rough sandpaper on our shining relationship. I can sense it’s the first domino to topple onto the line of others. Yet I’m still raging – stop, where are my barriers? How can these bleak memories have the power to hide them?

  9

  ‘Stop, whoa.’ Bernadette attempting to pull the wine glass away. How did you manage to open one of my mindrooms, doctor? I’m impressed.

  ‘Are you trying to get my daughter tipsy?’ That’s Bernadette’s father talking.

  Here’s her mother, Elizabeth, about to add a comment from the living room. ‘Harold, she doesn’t have a birthday every day.’

  Bernadette, leaning back on her metal chair by our patio table, pressing the bridge of her sunglasses. Now smiling gently while sipping her white wine. The high afternoon sun is sparkling within the glass. I will make it incandesce the more, like a fireworks sparkler. I’ll take sugar cubes from their bowl on the table to make the shape of steps. Now it’s a sugar whale. Aromatic smoke dispersing from Harold’s pipe. A lawnmower snores from somewhere.

  Elizabeth has stepped out onto the sun-washed patio carrying a cake. It’s holding twenty-two flame-twitching candles. ‘Happy birthday, dear daughter.’

  Bernadette is delighted. We’ll pull the wine glasses from the table for the cake to sit there.

  Elizabeth tuts. ‘I’ve forgotten a knife.’

  Bernadette’s sister: ‘I’ll get it.’

  A starling is stepping jauntily across the lawn despite the oppressive heat, that purposeful pressure draining the day.

  Elizabeth begins humming the traditional birthday ditty. We join in, the last line supplemented by Marianne as she returns from the kitchen with the cake knife.

  Another waft of pipe smoke. A baby from over the neighbour’s fence is making the pram squeak while paddling its legs. The infant is gurgling and spluttering, vocalizing to the sun.

  Elizabeth has cut wedges of the cake.

  ‘No, really,’ I have to say.

  ‘Don’t be a fuss-pot,’ Bernadette tells me.

  The pipe-call of a cuckoo. A bumble-bee drones over to the geraniums.

  ‘Delicious,’ Marianne has remarked. ‘You’ll have to give me the recipe.’

  ‘Yes, I will, dear. Harold, eat your cake.’

  He grunts a reply while still sucking on his pipe. He has turned to me. ‘What are your plans for the garden, Donald?’ He’s aiming the pipe stem to it.

  ‘Well, the grass has settled in nicely; the circular lawn was Bernadette’s idea. Fruit bushes along there. I want to start a vegetable patch down by those shrubs.’ I’m waving an arm in that direction. ‘You know, lettuce, onions, that sort.’

  Marianne is talking excitedly with her sister. They are both giggling. She’s admiring one of Bernadette’s presents. The pearl earrings sleep in their bed of cotton wool.

  A bluebottle has flown lazily onto the back of a chair. I see, doctor, you’ve made it a wasp. You’re getting the hang of this.

  ‘You’ve missed this one,’ Marianne says, pointing to a wrapped box on the patio table.

  Bernadette is removing her sunglasses and like an impatient junior snatches at the present. She picks at the tape, cooing eagerly; her long hair has fallen about her beautifully-proportioned face as she tears away the paper and flips open the box.

  ‘Thank you, Donald.’

  Standing behind my chair, bending to kiss me on the cheek. She has taken the oval locket from the box and handed it to her sister.

  ‘Really nice, Binny. Isn’t it, mum?’

  Marianne is holding up the locket by the gold chain and it revolves and catches the light. Spinning fast, seeming to show both sides at the same time. And there – faster still, beginning to blend.

  Can’t be; how has this conjuring trick come about? The locket has vanished and in its place is an enamelled pendant, round and green, tarnished and encrusted, as though it were a centuries-old coin from the bottom of an ocean. This is making me shake with rage. Get rid of this disgusting materialisation!

  Marianne is attaching the chain about Bernadette’s neck and there’s the gold locket hanging only. I can’t regard it in case the vile transformation takes place again.

  ‘Clumsy.’

  Wasn’t watching where I was putting my big feet. I really must stop putting glasses of wine on the floor. Marianne is running to the kitchen to fetch a sponge.

  ‘Sis, don’t worry. It’s an old carpet anyway.’ Marianne has already returned and is on her knees, sponging at the liquid seeping into the pile.

  Harold says, ‘We’ll think about buying you a new carpet.’

  ‘No,’ Bernadette and I have replied in unison. ‘Really,’ she continues. ‘Donald is getting a raise soon.’

  ‘Going well if you’re getting a pay rise.’

  I’ll sit next to him on the settee. The three women are chatting. ‘To be honest, the work isn’t satisfying enough. Day in, day out, reading copy from somebody else’s pen; I wish I’d become a scriptwriter. Still, these mindroom scripts are becoming easier to influence.’

  Harold is nodding though I don’t think he understands. ‘Listen, a good job is scarce nowadays. You must be grateful at having one at all.’

  Bernadette interrupts. ‘Let’s go somewhere.’

  ‘I’m tired, dear.’ Elizabeth has fluttered her eyelids as if to underline her comment. ‘You go on. I’ll catch forty winks.’

  Bernadette is holding her hands. ‘Come with us, mum – we’ll show you the pier again, you’ll like it.’

  ‘No, really. Go without me.’

  10

  I’ve handed Marianne her candy floss. Pinkness glows from it, creating a sticky tint to smear the clouds and adhere onto beach pebbles and sand, spreading pink over the promenade.

  Can’t keep my sight from straying to the locket hanging from its chain about Bernadette’s neck. It’s taunting me. As I regard it, quickly it changes to green. I must rip the chain from her and throw the locket as hard as I’m able.

  Flashing in the pink sky from gold to green then to gold again until it plops into the pinky sea.

  ‘Going to put a picture in there?’ Marianne asks.

  Distant cries of seagulls as they circle the roofs of The Neptune Hotel. See the row of white and cream-fronted hotels, arcades of souvenir shops and a
musements, the cluster of antiques stalls. Laughter of children making sandcastles on the beach or the occasional shriek from one of the holidaymakers playing ball in the waves. The stretches of sand are broken by rocky clumps, like scabs. Sunbathers expose their chalky flesh to the mighty sun. Up near the west end of the promenade, a golf course lines the top of the cliffs. Tiny flags are waving from the greens. And there, on an outcrop running far into the gleaming sea is a little finger of a lighthouse.

  A maze of backstreets run up and away from the seafront. The whitewashed walls and red tiles are vivid in the afternoon rays. Above the hotels and shops stands Milsley Castle, houses scattered below the crumbling buttresses as though its subjects. Gentle waves are breaking over the beaches.

  ‘Catch up, Donald.’ They’ve walked through an arch – a filigree mass of ironwork – onto the pier. A sound like hissing pistons.

  ‘Do you love me?’

  ‘Donald, stop it, please. I married you, didn’t I?’ I have got hold of her hand while we wait for her sister and father to come out of the souvenir shop.

  But this isn’t right. She’s there at the end of the pier, entering the small white chalet…

  Here again holding my hand while we stand by a lifebelt attached to the iron railings. Her soft hand, perfect and smooth. Made to fit exactly into mine.

  ‘What did you get? Let me see.’

  ‘Binny, it’s on my head,’ laughs her sister. A sea-breeze plays with the ribbons on Marianne’s sunhat. ‘What do you think, Donald?’ She’s striking a model’s pose.

  ‘Very snazzy.’

  I am leaning on the railings; I’ve looked away and down. There’s a disturbance from under the sea’s surface. Bubbles are coming up and joining with scummy broth, and the seaweed wrapped around the legs of the pier. A whirlpool has started, spinning faster as I look, forming a liquid hollow in its centre. The hollow is growing at a surprising rate. Seagulls are flying in circles as though to imitate this whirl of water. Sunbathers have picked up their towels, running to the promenade while seabathers are blown to the beach, each one riding a wave like a surfer. Brilliant cracks striate the dominating arc of sky; gathering smoke-grey clouds are illuminated for seconds before smothering the sun. A ghostly whistling, coming from the gaps in the gangplanks, join forces with the wind moaning like a lament. Flags and pennants along the length of the pier are flapping furiously and their ropes hum. Then without premonition or expectation the waves about the whirlpool are erupting as if there’s a volcano underneath. Those sheets of water are being flung into this day-turned-to-night. And it’s raining down upon us, drenching me in seconds, nearly washing me off my feet into the turbulent pink waves. There’s a roar and so loud it’s drowned other sounds. It has raced over to the cliffs in the east and the cliffs has sent a duplicate back. Pedestrians have flung themselves into the arcades, cowering in confused fright. From out of the swirling waters is being thrust the three prongs of a trident, each prong the height of a man. The shaft is following, a seemingly never-ending dynamic barrel of metal. And gripping it is a massive hand. The same hue as coral, larger than a bull elephant. I’ll have to hold tightly onto the railings. My fingers are frozen there; sobs are choking my throat; everyone else has been swept overboard. The rest of this titanic phenomenon is bursting forth with such power as to send high waves crashing over the promenade and flooding the roads. Cars are being swept into shop windows. Swells are being sent far off to the horizon. And here before me, like a dream, is Neptune, rising one hundred feet or more. His skin is alive with fish and crabs. His beard and hair are made of seaweed; his crown is coral with jewels from the ocean’s vaults. Those whale-like lips are as purple as amethyst, the gigantic eyes as pale blue and opalescent like topaz. You have to see somehow, Dr Leibkov: Neptune pushing his way through the raging currents as easily as if it were the shallow end of a swimming pool. He’s reached the end of the pier, no more than a bench to him. He has plucked the white chalet from it and holding it on his outstretched, limpet-encrusted palm. I imagine a miniature man kicking open the door of the pathetic structure, Aaron running out, not onto hard planks but the spongy, olive flesh of that giant hand. With an easy motion the fingers of Neptune have tightened about the chalet. It’s disintegrating into matchsticks and pittering the choppy surface of pinkish sea.

  ‘Looking good.’ The girls are running excitedly along the gangplanks to the funfair. ‘See you later.’ That was Bernadette shouting back.

  ‘Fancy a cup of tea?’

  Harold’s puffing on his pipe and nodding.

  I doubt you need a drink, doctor. Anyhow, I’m not sure you deserve one. I’m repairing my past future but you’re not helping enough yet.

  An announcement telling passengers to change trains broke Clement’s dream-like state. Clement stepped off the train and joined the crowded platform. He looked up to the sawtooth slats along the platform canopy then to the ornate brackets holding it but still not really seeing.

  Or feeling: he had become a sensationless rind with his insides stone, cold and heavy. And mind adequately clouded. Cloaked in mystery, he estimated. He liked the idea of that. Then wrapped in enigma and covered with barriers. Yet why should they be failing, he asked himself. Had Dr Leibkov’s insidious claptrap begun to have an effect and if so, how long before he was damaged?

  A shrill whistling: a guard with a whistle still to his lips and a flag held to the wintry air. Clement was bewildered; he turned one hundred and eighty degrees. The other passengers had boarded the train that stood on the opposite side of the platform, save one. She ran past the guard. ‘Quickly,’ he urged.

  The girl was wearing brown leather shoes and black diamond-patterned tights (or stockings, Clement considered in an instant) with an elaborately embroidered cape about her and a salmon pink dress. Her hair was held up with a tortoiseshell hair clip. Fine wisps and a white neck below her bunned hair as she stepped up. Her profile was to him. Unplucked eyebrow, the high cheekbone and pouting mouth: he saw these in a handful of seconds. Clement ran to the same train carriage she had entered, brushing past the guard as he went, his sight never leaving the young woman.

  It was Bernadette.

  11

  Five other people occupied the carriage compartment though Clement’s attention was for Bernadette only.

  So she did exist again outside him. He wanted to hug her close, smell her scent.

  By impulse, he looked to her feet. The shoes there were not brown leather. The legs and the tights were as he had seen them though the calves seemed plumper than remembered. The salmon pink dress was neither pink nor a dress, but a mustard-coloured pleated skirt. She was undoing her cape which, Clement noticed, was secured by buttons.

  This person was not Bernadette after all. A similarity in facial structure maybe but inspecting her annoyed face with its different nose, smaller eyes and thinner top lip, this woman was a mere caricature. Clement resolved to smother his sight, suddenly swamped with fatigue.

  He inexplicably found an erotic scene flashed into his inner view: a woman seductively draped in silken ribbons, laying on her back upon a Persian carpet. This sculptured carpet was made with the finest of dyed silks, the pile cut to different heights, intriguing symbols in pastel shades within it. The woman’s head lay as smooth and featureless as an egg, propped up with large pillows. These pillows glinted and caught light; they refracted luminosity, splitting it into prism colours which altered the shades of the carpet in streaks and spots as though a reacting chemical had been spilt there. She was surrounded by lakes of poppies and bright daisies. Some of the mustard and red flowers, being flattened by the carpet, lay poking out from around its perimeter, their petals limp and stems snapped, or bent and oozing a resinous sap. About her, a summer brightness. Beyond this incandescent bubble was a night sky peppered with stars. Her breathing was deep. She felt her shoulders before moving both hands down, caressingly, to the cleft between her ample breasts which rose and fell with each breathe. Rhythmic sighs left her as
gentle as the susurration of autumn leaves, the scintillating pillows beneath her letting out clouds of white points like sparks flying from a bonfire. The exotic carpet undulated and rippled, the brightness waxed and waned. Her sighs became the wind and it blew in bursts, making the luminous fields of flowers bow and quiver. And there, leaving a furrow behind him, a black-moustached figure walking closer. He wore a striped jacket. The faceless woman breathed faster as though she sensed the nearness of him.

  Arrest the man’s advance: manipulate sparks from the pillows to form walls, instruct these to surround the woman, to hide and protect her from the advancing man. Let pale green stars grow until they overlap, becoming a ceiling above.

  This mindroom I know; it has been developed and tailored to perfection. Bernadette is laying on the bed next to me. With her elbow buried in the pillow and her upturned palm forming a plinth for the side of her head, she’s flicking through a magazine. The evening sun seems loathe to rest, still feeling as hot as the afternoon.

  ‘My skin’s glowing, look. Do you think I’ve tanned?’

  The walls shimmer; the eiderdown has become perfumed satin sheets as large as the largest of rooms, as smooth as cream. This space can be an art gallery with dimmed spotlights, white wine trickling down granite walls and over gilded picture frames. Entrances at either end are sealed with large cubes of red wax. A string quartet’s lilting melodies emanate from the chandeliers with the aroma of lavender.

  I will lay down beside Bernadette and hold my cheek against hers. This simple contact fills my being with elation. Our lips meet and I stroke her hair, touch her skin turned a glowing pink. My own skin is tingling through excitement as I undress her – this mindroom is private, doctor. You’ll have to stay outside for a while.

  I’ll sprinkle you with kisses, my palms tenderly moving over you before the union.

  A delicious fragrance while me make love. I can believe in the divided soul of self for I’m split into two entities. It seems as if the effort required to leave my body and stand on the other side of the room as an observer wouldn’t be much. Then the potential has passed, having been seduced to remain with the physical aspects of being. As I encircle, breathe you in and in, we blend; I see you made of glass. Melt into this sensual domain, a plunging communion as strong as prayer, speaking with fragrant spears and knowing you sweetly burn with my glorious burning; entangled within a secret paralysis while the moment revolves, evolves until the suspended empty space yields too soon, becoming the final surrender. Sensual peeling of skin, jolts of electric ecstasy, one after the other, time after time after time. And as you cry out a name, it’s easily ignored as an unknown dialect, while I’m ripped apart like a tissue, an escape from mind to body that has been captured, concentrated and released.