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

by David John Griffin

  With this pale blue upon him his visage has transformed again. Can you see it as clearly as I can? It’s become sarcastic and contemptuous. He yells with each word living in its own colour: ‘How the fuck should I know?’ Those broad shoulders shrugging as he turns orange and walks away, disappearing into the throng about the bar.

  Everybody is flashing teeth in pristine clothing, laughing and dancing, holding each other as well as their drinks, none with a care. But my worries have dragged me down, covered me with apathy and concern.

  Merciless music pauses again. I’ll make my way over to the doors leading to the beer garden. Maybe she’s gone outside.

  I can see the fountain through the doorway.

  Those about the slatted tables and picnic benches are enjoying the summer evening. Couples strolling by, arm in arm, lit by the rows of lanterns strung between the trees. The sounds of water lapping the seawall and the waves breaking on the beach further along might have been, on another evening, soothing and romantic, but tonight I’ve no time for it. I must find my wife. Scan the garden again. To the left, sitting close together on the bench, hidden in shadow – can’t be certain but…

  Strike the chisel, techno drum blows to the wall.

  Barring my way: this girl blocking me from advancing further. In fact, I’m forced to step back into the panelled room with its clamour and mad lights as she leans towards me in an intimate fashion. Can’t she see I’ll make her frock dirty? Anyway, I’ve no desire to stimulate any sort of relationship with this young lady. I’ve love for one woman only. And I’m desperate to find her.

  Lucy slurring. ‘If it isn’t diddly Donald. Fancy meeting you here. Buy my drink now? Vodka and orange. Don’t forget the cherry and the tiny twirly umbrella.’ Why she has to push her breasts forward like that I really don’t know. It’s obviously unnatural. Noticed she’s not wearing a bra. Her lipstick has been smeared. ‘And then how about a romantic smooch?’ Her hand has snaked about my waist. I’ll have to remove it.

  ‘Sorry but no. I want to find Bernadette. You have seen her, haven’t you? She’s out there, isn’t she?’ I must try to push past but she won’t let me. I can’t be too emphatic in my actions otherwise I would be seen by these other party guests.

  Her reply slow with delight. ‘Yup, I know where.’ A girl dancing between us, her arms waving like seaweed fronds. ‘And,’ Lucy continuing in a sing-song voice, ‘I know what she’s up to.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ They are there, out on the bench by the hotel wall in the hulking shadows, next to each other, maybe contemplating the scene, nothing more. ‘Excuse me please, Lucy. I insist you let me pass.’

  Fluttering her eyelashes in such an affected way. ‘You don’t want to leave, silly man. Dance the night away. I bet you’re secretly a good mover. Show me.’

  Yet again she’s hauling me, this time away from the doors. The red and yellow and orange and blue man is closing them.

  On the bench outside, they’re conversing…

  ‘Donald, here, dance with me, forget out there. They’ll be alright. They’re having a long, hard, big, chat.’

  Next to each other but then his arm has found its way about her shoulders…

  ‘Move your hips more, like this; yeah, better—’

  Those beats of music are jarring, still keeping time with blows to the chisel until perhaps he’s placed himself closer…

  ‘You understand I’m pulling you to the bar? Sneaky aren’t I.’ Yelled in my ear. ‘Going to buy me this flippin’ drink?’

  Damn it, I’ve hit my finger again. Begun to bleed. At the same time, instantaneously, this striking has signalled him moving his lips to hers, tongue pushing into her mouth, her hands in his hair while his are massaging her breasts; a sudden ravaging, trying to get as close together as possible, salivating in their passion, not caring who else might see this display in the shadowy murkiness; letting out small utterances, enjoying until wanting to abuse each other; for in the throes of desire one can forget the other which has become the you, and You must feed You, and feed on you, a selfish mastication until sated but you can never be filled, and demand more and get more, and more…

  Won’t take any more of this, I have to push Lucy away. So insidiously leech-like she’s become, there’s the tearing release of suction. I’ll force her down to the ground. I don’t care for her. She’s in league with the others. And they have formed ranks before the double doors like a battalion line of soldiers.

  This is a dungeon delusion or else I’m going politely insane.

  There must be a weapon here somewhere. I have to get to my wife before it’s too late. The stuffed fox has limped from the protection of its coat stand and is weaving in and out between my legs in a figure of eight, no doubt trying to bewilder me. On the wall at the back, surrounded by oil lamps and photographs, is one of the long glass-fronted cases. That’ll do. I feel low, unwashed and somewhat slightly dazed; I’m bringing the hammer high to reach it. I’ll strike the case – the glass has shattered. Someone shrieked at the breaking glass and it’s too obvious in the room: the music has stopped again. I’ll reach up to snatch the narwhal horn from the case and grip it to my side, the twisted rod ready to threaten those who would try to stop me. Must have cut my palms on the glass shards because they’re bloody and slipping on it. Everyone is shocked or frightened by my actions. And so they should be; they must understand how determined I am. I wish them no harm but I will charge those by the doors if necessary. But look, there’s no need. I was certain if I menaced them they would see reason. All but one has stepped aside. This last person has opened the doors, ushering me through with a sweep of an arm and a generous bow. And if it wasn’t for that sneer I’d think he was a type of servant.

  At last I’m in the garden.

  37

  Bernadette has unlocked from her embrace – tears springing readily from her – now running into the bar. Aaron has his hands high with his palms towards me as though the point of the narwhal bone near his heart was a gun.

  ‘Don’t do anything you might regret.’

  How ill at ease he sounds!

  ‘Move over there.’ I’ve indicated with the long bone which is aggravating my blistered and bleeding hands. But I can’t let go, for the power which I’ve gained would leave me as surely as water spinning from a bathtub. This vigorous force is instilled in the horn or hammer, whichever I have here. Unable to tell. It doesn’t matter, either one is vibrating with a robust potency. Finally, I’m able to destroy this person who has brought me so much misery. He’s sniggering but I know it’s a nervous reaction to cover his fright. I’m making him walk backwards through the massive bleached arched bones of a whale. As he comes upon chairs or tables, other guests are moving them out of the way. I can control them all, you see. Everyone is feeling my omnipotence, tasting my power. Go on, further, you miserable dog, smarmy snake, though careful not to trip. Like that but luckily you’ve not fallen but continue, staggering backwards to the railings. Gulls in this night sky like white ash floating from a bonfire. They’re silent for a change, aware of what is about to happen, knowing of this reconstructed past future.

  ‘You can’t do this. No harm meant, of course. Forgive me, Donadette, and I’ll repair the situation. I’m deeply ashamed of my actions; never in my wildest dreams wished to harm your feelings. Believe me, I want to repay you if you’ll allow it, help heal the damage caused. Will you let me do that much? Can I? Can we be friends? Do you see my sorrow?’

  No, frankly I don’t.

  Again duality of action, balance of twoness: as I clout the metal, biting into the forgiving plaster, so the long weapon, javelin-like, is thrown into the night.

  I wish to savour this.

  I’m able to slow it down as if it were on film and watch my missile toned by the Chinese lanterns in shimmering shades. See it describe a precise semi-circle as graceful to observe as a diver plunging between Castor and Pollux until my elegant projectile punctures his body. It’s made a sound like
plaster falling from a wall.

  I could create a theatrical howl of agony from him, and have a slopping rope of blood come where he’s been struck, as well as where it’s left the body in the small of his back. But no, I’ll merely have this skewered man close his evil eyes to the beer garden and on the life he’s to leave. And if there’s to be a stream emitting, I would want it to be his life-force seeking sanctuary in the very place from where it came from. There he goes, losing balance as vitality betrays him and leaves a sinking ship. He’s falling over the railings into the murky sea below. Not much of a splash. He’s slipped silently under.

  I observe that the jetty beer garden has returned to normal. Youngsters with their cans of fizz chasing each other with excited squeals, adults busy drinking, trying to forget work and their pressing concerns.

  Smoke and hubbub in the bar hits me, and your voice. You’ve shouted so loudly it’s hurt my eardrum. Really wish I could be free from you.

  ‘I think you’re deaf, you know. I asked for my drinky.’

  ‘I will, Lucy, but first I’ve got to find her. She has to be here somewhere. It’s as though she’s hiding, trying to avoid me.’ But there, next to me. Why I didn’t see you before, I really don’t know. ‘Where have you been? I was fretting.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid, Donald. Lucy, this is Frank, another of Aaron’s friends. Have you bumped into Aaron?’

  Bernadette has put her back to me. Is it because I’m dirty with muck, and need a shave and a bath, need to repair the homage makeup and torn skirt? I can understand that. She has her arm linked with Frank’s. I want to pull her away.

  I’ll take her hand in mine.

  For a second I’m within an empty space with the bottom halves of its walls deprived of plaster, and Bernadette squeezing my knuckles tightly, blisters hurting. But no more quickly – the loud bar jammed with its crowd has returned. She’s snatched her hand from mine as if I’ve burned her. I’ll take hold of it once more but she pulls it away again, complaining between clenched teeth. ‘Don’t be so damned pathetic.’ Lucy and Frank are smirking. ‘Nobody else holds hands. If you want to do that then hold your own.’

  ‘There, there,’ interrupts Lucy. She’s slithered up to my side. ‘I’ll hold your hand, Donald.’

  My wife finding it amusing. I must try to speak again but the dust in my throat is preventing me.

  ‘Anyway,’ Lucy informs us, ‘Aaron was over by the bar, five minutes ago.’ Grinning, to me. ‘After he’d finished his sexy dance with I wonder who. Know what I mean?’

  Couldn’t fail to notice the sharp jab Lucy received in the ribs. And to underline the message, Bernadette saying, ‘Shut up, Lucy.’ She’s turned to me. ‘Donald, get some drinks.’

  ‘Oh, you’ve decided it’s my round, I see. Another order, is it? As it happens I don’t want a drink. I want a dance. I feel energies returning.’

  ‘I’ve got to find Aaron, for Frank.’

  The guy hasn’t been paying much attention. He’s wandered away; now chatting to someone by the engravings.

  She’s trying to antagonize me. I’ve hardly the strength but dancing is a way to be close to her. ‘Why can’t you do something I want for a change? I’m convinced real Bernadette is hiding in you. I might get drinks later.’ I could happily buy a drink but I’ll not let her doppelgänger win this time.

  Her hands are on her hips. One of her favourite stances lately. The possibilities of an argument, especially in public, is beginning to arouse her. But before she can speak, Lucy speaks. ‘I’ll dance with Mr Donald Duck – we’ll bop the night away,’ and before I can reply she’s leading me over to where several couples move gently to slow music. She’s plastered herself to me. And in the time it takes to revolve a full, annoyingly slow, three hundred and sixty degrees about this noisy, bustling room with its coloured lights, my wife has disappeared again.

  Doctor, this is becoming another bad dream. My every move is frustrated. Mercifully the beat is gentle and I can match the pace when lifting the hammer. It’s grown to weigh ten times more than when I started.

  Lucy rocking me and whispering. I’m finding it most irritating. Burying her face into my filthy blouse. Surprised she hasn’t sneezed.

  ‘Where’s she gone this time? Lucy, you must help.’

  Ignoring me and I’m snarling. This snarl, doctor, like this?

  We’re revolving faster. The ridiculous music is speeding up, I’m convinced. The bass drum is the pump pulse of my enraged heart. With a particularly nimble expertise, Lucy is manoeuvring me about the floor and between the others as if I were a dodgem. Now and then she anticipates incorrectly and I’m steered into a couple, or collide with a table. Each time this happens, watch the white fog come from me.

  I’m unable to control this situation. Becoming dominant and overtaking.

  Difficult to see faces with shadow and these infuriating lights, but also the speed we’re turning. The exercise is debilitating. The pace is becoming too much. How can I repel a girl who has a supernatural grip?

  Faster and faster we rotate, the thumping pulses matching us. Is the music keeping with our speed or is it the other way around? Let me rest.

  Dizzily spinning we are, a crazy roundabout. This erratic, mad twirling sending me flying uncontrollably about as empty and lifeless as a deflated balloon. The whole of my body hollow, all there sapped. Bile in my throat making me wretch. Two-inch nail driven between my eyebrows.

  And now the oddness, both of being and of knowing…

  I’m able to be in several places at the same time. See me revolving on an axis, sent about and around like a wild tornado. Then the see is the I see, for I view myself; watching me – in a tangerine dream – perhaps from a corner by the stuffed carp with starfish placed about it like asterisks; or the I adhered to the wall above the door lintel as though a fly or spider — then at the attempt to define the startled insect form, I understand I’m a moth. And there’s a third me, on the floor of a small office littered with broken plaster. And this variant could easily lay down to sleep, or die. Not sure of the difference at the moment nor really care.

  My sore eyes. They’ve been prised from their sockets and empty bone bowls filled with grit before being pushed back in.

  I’ll lick my hands like a dog. The stinging is constant.

  But know this: send me more pain and sorrow or lurid torment – any mixture of these – or curdling distress in its murkiest form. Whatever’s decided, I will cope. I’ll not go under. I must endure for the survival of my consciousness to be guaranteed, to find the real her. Or at least for as long as it takes to finish this important job. This is the hard school I must learn. Bring me any type of trauma on its dull slab and I’ll transform it – the shapeless shoddiness of it – into something manageable and uplifted.

  Oddly enough it’s none of these holding fear for me. The one which can induce utter panic is the stealthy one, the soft, plumping-pillow one which is marshmallowing me away. And it mustn’t be given the chance to take hold. Take up thy tools and work. Put the chisel to the wall and then angle it for the best purchase for when metal strikes metal.

  Not the metallic ring as expected but the music rudely interrupting again. Surprisingly its insistent beat can bring me a renewed strength to slow the uncontrollable spin to a standstill. Lucy still in my grip. You know where the real Bernadette is. How many more times do I ask? Where? Where? Where?

  She seeming perplexed. ‘Steady on, Donny. You’ve had one too many. There she is.’

  38

  Passing in front of me, pressed to Aaron, she is there – and if only I had another five seconds before they were swamped by other couples, I might have been certain she was kissing his neck.

  No Lucy, do release me. You’re as many-limbed as an octopus. I have to speak to her. There’s an urgency. Not too long before this last wall’s ready. I still might be able to alter the outcome.

  See the trail of seaweed where they’ve been. And when I come upon them I understand w
hy. Aaron has a decaying stench about him with barnacles covering his hands and face. The texture of any skin not covered has desiccated and become striated like bark. The eyes have gone, leaving bleak holes as impenetrably black as moonless night. He speaks and from between those puce, swollen lips gushes spurts of tiny fishes. ‘Agreed then. I’ll put you up for the night.’ My wife is giggling rudely.

  I’m not sure what he means or really what’s happening. Surely this foul man should be dead. I can see the stump of the narwhal bone covered in slime, protruding from his chest.

  ‘Bernadette, let’s go. I’ve had enough. I’m desperate for sleep but not yet. The last wall isn’t quite finished. Anyhow it’s time we went home, time we started from square one.’

  Lucy remarking: ‘Time you were tucked up with your hot water bottle.’

  ‘Aaron is offering to put us up. He’s got a spare bed. No need to be unreasonable, Donald. You’ve had a few drinks. And it’s unfair to ask Aaron to drive us home. He only lives a few roads away.’

  This is a conspiracy made behind my back. ‘I want to sleep in my own bed.’

  Bernadette’s soul thief smirk. ‘Fair enough. See you tomorrow.’

  ‘What’s that meant to mean?’

  ‘A joke, Donald. Just look at yourself. As usual you’re being perfectly unreasonable. There’s no alternative. It’s not friendly to refuse an invitation.’

  ‘You’ve both worked this out. No alternative you say. Haven’t you heard of taxis? And surely, Aaron, you can’t be upset just because we want to get home.’

  His laugh is really ugly. A gurgling from the back of his throat. His breath is fetid. Making me want to retch. I’ve become as weak as a kitten. How clever they’ve become. The tables have turned again as swiftly as in a chess tournament. It’s quite knocked me off balance. I’m unable to control destiny. My power must have left me with the release of the bone from the narwhal. Confusion muddling my reasoning; a measured panic has me again. My heartbeats are tripping over. I don’t know where I am. Is this the bar of The Neptune Hotel? It should be, I was here a few minutes ago. But it’s changed. There’s only the four of us. The bar staff have vanished. Something very peculiar is happening; it’s unreal. Without my noticing, the maritime items have been taken from the ceiling and it’s empty, except for that large circular lamp stuck there. More peculiar are the walls. Panelling and the pictures have gone and the plaster removed. My three companions don’t seem worried by this. Perhaps I should calm down. There’s a vague memory for I’ve a dusted-white hammer and a chisel in my hands. But why would I want to take plaster from the walls of The Neptune Hotel? Illogical. It should not be.