The Time Eater

by Aaron J. French

He looked severely haggard and shrunken, his beard scraggly, his eyes hollow, his hair flattened and stiff with grease. His bony body poked out of the sheet, the angles protruding here and there like some kind of misshapen skeleton. He heard us enter, turned in our direction, and displayed his yellow teeth.

  Dr. Li continued undaunted, approaching James’s bed with the stolid presence of an oak tree. We followed behind uneasily. The room felt different, a change in energy, a flux, an incongruity, as though Dr. Li was a monkey wrench in the Time Eater’s gears.

  At last we all stood before the bed, the doctor in front, gazing down at James like he was a specimen. James looked back with a savage grin. I was convinced the Time Eater had taken control of him completely.

  “Who is this, Roger?” he asked. His voice had a harshness to it.

  “I am Dr. Li,” the doctor said, bowing. “I have waited a long time for this. I’ve dreamed about you.”

  James lifted his head. “About me? Have you now, Doc? Not me. Surely…”

  “It was you. Since my youth I’ve had visions of a black emptiness behind the world. For a long time I didn’t understand the visions and I’d wake from my sleep, terrified and confused. But I began to see things differently, and once I knew you were there, lurking behind the veil of reality, I knew you were coming for me.”

  I realized he was addressing the Time Eater itself, not James. This turn of events, with Dr. Li confessing that he was connected to all this, had left me speechless. Why hadn’t he mentioned this earlier?

  “So there it is…” James said, shrugging in a What are you gonna do type of gesture. He seemed to grow more angular, curving like a hook from feet to skull, the front of his face elongating, protruding with a horse’s set of yellow teeth. His eyes drew out that rat-like quality, and a shadow passed over the bed.

  “Yes, it is the one from my dreams,” Dr. Li said, pointing at James but looking at me.

  “You knew about this?” I said.

  “I suspected but was not certain. I didn’t say anything because if I was wrong than I’d be upsetting you unnecessarily. But this is the being I am karmically attached to. It is fate why we are both here, why all of us are here, why you drew attention to this spirit—what you call a Time Eater—in your youth. Everything is linked.”

  “Listen to that nonsense,” James said sarcastically. “Roger, is this guy for real? He talks how you used to talk back at Ohio State.” Then he looked at Annabelle and his ferocious eyes grew soft. “Anna, sweetie, was it your idea to bring this wacko here?”

  She shook her head. I could tell she was frightened.

  “I’m in so much pain, sweetie, I really am,” James continued. “I’m dying. You know that I am. So where is Norma, why haven’t I gotten my shot today?”

  “Norma won’t be coming anymore,” I said. “Dr. Li is your new primary physician. He’s a master acupuncturist.”

  James’s gaze swung toward me. “So this is your idea. Of course it is, you freaky, hippy, New Age faggot. Why couldn’t you have stayed shoved up your ex-wife’s vagina where you belong?”

  A moment of silence. James snickered. “Well, looks like you’re here now, eh Doc? But I regret to inform you that all your spiritual efforts are in vain. This one is mine. Everything, all of his life and his past lives, every second he has ever spent incarnated on Earth, is mine. I don’t care what kind of portents you’ve received about me. Try what you like; it will do no good. We of the darkness have claimed him.”

  The shadow over the bed expanded, stretching in all directions. The pointy tips wrapped like talons around the bedposts and the frame, lifting it higher into the air. The three of us lurched back to get out of the way, as James rose above our heads, laughing. “How can you possibly stick needles in me, Doc, when I’m way up here?”

  The doctor turned to us. “That is enough.”

  I nodded and led us away from the revolving bed, away from the glittering stars looking like eyes, away from the massive presence of those distant planets, and opened the door for us to escape into the hall. As I closed it, the whooshing sound of the bed and the darkness of the room vanished.

  I looked at Dr. Li. “What was all that about dreaming? You never mentioned that.”

  He bowed. “As I said, I have had dreams concerning the formation of reality, and I have had dreams about your friend.”

  “That was not James,” Annabelle said. “That was that thing, the Time Eater.”

  “She’s right. The thing’s like a light switch: sometimes it’s on, sometimes it’s off. But when it’s off, Doctor, I’m telling you the real James is scared, terrified, and wants to live.”

  He considered my words, frowning in the darkness. Finally he said, “I hope you are right, because in order for any of this to work, James’s will must be in the right place. Otherwise, he is lost. In my dreams, sometimes everything is swallowed by that horrible encroaching blackness that lurks behind reality… but sometimes it is not.”

  He bowed again, then padded off to his bedroom and shut the door. I experienced a heavy oppressiveness about my shoulders, an immense burden that was dragging me down. I slouched.

  Annabelle picked up on it. Whispering, “You poor baby,” she took my hand and led me to her bedroom. I felt like I could sleep a thousand years.

  * * *

  I dreamed that the doctor and I were running through grass fields. Though he was much older his speed was uncanny, and I struggled to keep up. We hurried across the vast open spaces with strange saggy mountains on either side. Trees, squat and crooked—bonsai trees—sprouted from the soil in places, their trunks and branches smooth. The sky overhead was a deep metallic gray.

  “Where are we going, Doc?” I spat between breaths.

  He glanced over his shoulder. “Into the now, Mr. Borough. And from that now… we go into forever.”

  We climbed the side of a hill and there at the top, situated among several of the knobby trees, was James’s bed with him lying in it. Annabelle kneeled by his head, her skirt spread about her knees in the grass.

  Opposite the bed, Celeste and Jenny stood solemnly, draped in robes like druid priestesses. Their faces, young and comely, peered out of the dark spaces beneath their cowls.

  Dr. Li came to a stop beside Annabelle. She glanced up, crying. Patting her shoulder, he said, “This is not about you, my dear. This is about him.” He pointed to James, who was lying motionless on the mattress. The clouds in the sky began to swirl.

  “He needs your help to get through this. He needs all of our help.” He scanned the lot of us. “In whatever way our spirits are linked—however we have helped each other during past incarnations—we must call upon that bond now. We must make it the strongest. We six beings have been called together for a reason—to fight that thing out there—”

  He aimed a finger at the sky, and the moment he did the swirling clouds parted. Behind, in the vast patch of blue, a jittering round blob of darkness passed across. Its transparent border quivered, resembling the membrane of a giant cell. Housed within was pure and infinite darkness, spotted with tiny lights and glimmering spheres.

  Time Eater, I thought to myself.

  Dr. Li said, “That being is after this particular man’s spirit. It wants to devour him, because that’s what it does. It is mindless. Only a pure spiritual bond, uniting the six of us, can prevent the being from succeeding. Who is with me?”

  Hands were raised, but while the doctor solemnly acknowledged each, James began to age rapidly in the bed. His body shriveled, growing smaller and smaller, and his skin turned the color of petrified wood. The hair on the top of his head grayed dramatically, and he soon looked like a statue.

  I awoke in the brilliant darkness, sweating. For a second I thought I’d been plunged into the Time Eater, that I was being digested in its bottomless well. I sat upright, groping at the space in front of me, and all I kept thinking was, nothing—nothing—there’s nothing!

  A small fire illuminated the darkness: the lamp on Ann
abelle’s side of the bed. Her room was suddenly described to me: her picture frames, clothes, and furniture. A grip fastened on my left shoulder, and I turned sharply.

  “It’s me!” Annabelle said, flinching. She’d thought I was going to hit her. Maybe I was, but for some strange reason this alone dispelled a great deal of my anxiety. I relaxed, took a breath. In the moments that followed, the fear became a deep-rooted sadness. I felt like crying.

  She was there to console me in her matronly way. I was spellbound by her beauty. She was topless. Her skin was soft, pliable, and a sheet of pristine black hair hung over her shoulders. I looked to her face and saw an angel.

  “It was only a dream,” she said, fingers stroking my cheeks. “You’re awake, we’re safe now.”

  “Are we?” My fear was rising again. “Are we safe? What about that?” I nodded in the direction of James’s room.

  She shook her head, still smiling. “It’s relative, of course. And besides, Dr. Li is here now and he’s bound to make something happen.”

  I nodded distractedly, remembering my dream. Finally I was able to let go, and I turned to Annabelle, giving her my attention.

  I kissed her, afraid she’d withdraw, but instead she reciprocated. In a moment my hands were cupping her breasts, our tongues playing tug-o-war, her fingers dragging down the back of my neck.

  She pulled away. “I haven’t slept with a man for a long time. And you know that if we sleep together, everything will change. I have to be prepared for that.”

  “I’m positive that it’s been longer for me,” I said. “Things’ll change, but they might change for the better.” I almost laughed, hearing myself. Who was talking? Certainly not Roger Borough, divorcee, fourteen-years-long single man who hated women and had given up on them, who’d grown bitter and sullen—no, certainly not him.

  We slid underneath the covers, my heart beating so fast I thought I might choke on it. The feeling of her naked flesh pressed against mine was almost too much. I grew aroused, the throbbing down there aching to be inside her.

  I can’t believe it. After all these years… The smile on my face was so wide I felt embarrassed and switched off the lamp. But Annabelle hadn’t noticed. She was caught in the passion of the moment. Opening her legs, her knees poked out of the covers, black hair staining the white pillows. She grabbed my hips and guided me into position, pausing to whisper in my ear, “I want you, Roger. It’s been so long…”

  We made love quickly, rashly, fitfully, but with a growing urgency. We stopped and breathed, while I lay collapsed on her chest. We didn’t speak. As the night wore on, soon, just as I thought we were both falling asleep, we made love again. Softly, slowly, gracefully. This went on for some time.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Sun poured through the window, gilding the wood furniture, illuminating motes of dust. In the back of my head, a voice reminded me, You had sex with a woman last night, and I grinned instantly.

  I selected new clothes, hit the shower, glancing at the wall clock on my way into the hall. It was eight o’clock.

  I smelled breakfast as I came down the stairs, found Annabelle and Dr. Li sitting at the kitchen table. She’d whipped up eggs and toast and hash browns, bacon, and waffles. Even fresh-squeezed orange juice.

  What’s gotten into her?

  When she looked up and met my eyes, I knew she was feeling as happy and excited as I was. We shared a brief moment from which the rest of the world was excluded. Annabelle and I had a secret knowledge about why we were in such high spirits. I could get used to this, I thought.

  “Good morning, Roger,” she said. “I made you a plate.”

  I sat down and thanked her. She gave me a kiss on the cheek, then started washing some dishes.

  “Morning, Doctor,” I said.

  “Good morning, Mr. Borough.”

  “How’d you sleep?”

  He hesitated. “Not well.”

  Annabelle came over to refill his mug with coffee. In that red apron, she looked almost like a waitress in a diner. “He had nightmares,” she informed me.

  Dr. Li thanked her, then said, “Not exactly nightmares, but visions. Meetings on the spiritual plane. There is here, the material plane—” he thumped the table with two knuckles “—and there are the higher spiritual worlds.” He pointed toward the ceiling.

  “The spirit realm,” I said.

  “While my physical body lay here, asleep in the bed in the guest room, my astral body was out there, with the spirits, sort of floating around. That’s what the soul does during sleep: it becomes disconnected from the physical foundation and crosses to the sea of infinity. That’s why we dream—it’s what our bodiless minds glimpse while we’re over there. Sort of like LSD.”

  “Turn on, tune in, drop out,” Annabelle said, joining us at the table. She had her own coffee and was sipping it.

  “That’s Timothy Leary,” I said between mouthfuls. “By the way, the breakfast is amazing.”

  She smiled at me. “I am glad you’re enjoying it.” Then she turned to the doctor. “Didn’t mean to interrupt. You were saying?”

  “I was talking about the two worlds, the material and the spiritual. Last night I met with you all in the spirit realm. James was there. Also the missing woman, Celeste, and your ex-wife, Jenny. The Time Eater was present.”

  I dropped my fork, which clanged against the plate. “Holy shit, I had the same dream.”

  Dr. Li nodded. “Yes, I thought so. Your presence was strongest of the group. What I realized from this vision is that James’s spirit, not his physical body, is sick. To heal him, we must battle for his soul.”

  We were quiet a while, absorbing this information. After breakfast, we went out to the backyard to have tea. The house had a large wood deck extending into the grass. We sat around a large square glass table, beneath some shade from a tree.

  “Where do we start?” I said.

  Dr. Li reached into the pocket of his shirt, withdrawing something small that I mistook for a cigarette. He lit it with a lighter, setting it in the ashtray on the table, and I realized it was incense. A thin line of smoke twisted upward, smelling strong and unpleasant.

  He looked at me. “We begin with you, actually.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Before we can hope to get at the Time Eater, we must incapacitate the other suffering spirit.”

  I suddenly understood what he was talking about and my heartbeat fluttered. “You mean Jenny, don’t you?’

  He nodded. “James took care of the other spirit, his ex-wife Celeste. Now it is up to you to handle this one. You must face her, Roger.”

  Annabelle touched my hand. I nearly jumped out of my skin. The very idea of seeing Jenny again terrified me. Annabelle touched my hand again; this time I let her. “I’m here,” she said.

  “I’m not sure I can do it,” I said. My voice had gone shaky. “I don’t know what power that woman has over me, but it rules me with an iron fist. It controlled my life while we were married, and even afterward it controlled me. I was resigned not to get involved with another woman because of it.”

  I glanced at Annabelle to determine her expression, but her eyes were unreadable. She thinks I’m still in love with Jenny, I thought.

  Dr. Li took hold of the incense, waved it before my face. I wrinkled my nose at the odious smell. “Christ, what is that stuff?”

  He smiled. “Very special moxa stick. Can’t be found anywhere but in China. And only certain people know how to make it.”

  “Let me guess. You’re one of those people.”

  His smile widened. “Moxa’s most common use is for the smoothing of blood and qi flow. But with this, I see into the heart of one’s blood and qi. Past it even. Into one’s soul.”

  Using his hand, he waved the smoke in my direction. It began to curl around my arms like a snake’s tail, around my neck and head. I felt my eyes water.

  Annabelle gasped, took her hand off mine, and put it over her mouth.

  “
What is it?” I said, panicking.

  She shook her head. Then pointed. “I can see her face. It’s right there with your face—I can see you both, like hers is superimposed on top of yours.”

  “What?”

  I whipped my head toward Dr. Li. Very calmly and casually, he flicked his wrist until the moxa extinguished and placed it back in the ashtray.

  “This woman Jenny has attached herself to your soul,” he said. “The moxa reveals it as such. This is why her will has been able to control you even after her physical presence has gone. Her essence grafted onto you and a projection of her is inside your mind. This is not healthy.”

  Jenny’s voice boomed in my head like a loudspeaker. Don’t listen to him! No baby, don’t listen. Listen to Mommy. You need me, you always have. You never grew up and you never really became a man because you’re over-attached to—really in love with—your deceased mother. It’s simple psychology, love, Oedipus 101. I’ve done my best to make you aware of it.

  I hated that. I hated everything she used to tell me, that she used to whisper in my ear as we lay in bed at night after sex. All of her insidious, psychological probing, which enabled her to have total knowledge of my inner world. Gnosis, she’d called it in a sick, condescending tone. A great scheme to take control of me.

  I jumped to my feet, picking up my chair and heaving off the deck into the grass. It tumbled twice before coming to a halt, scattering the birds from the tree.

  “No!” I screamed, slapping my face with my hands. I could feel Jenny all through me—her smell, her taste, her touch—like we were the same person. I wanted her out.

  Annabelle dashed across the wood planks. “Stop it, Roger, Jesus!”

  “No!” I kept clawing at my cheeks, even after Annabelle had her arms around me. “I can’t take it anymore!”

  But Annabelle refused to give up. She was surprisingly strong, too, managing to pull my arms down and pin them to her chest. I had my eyes closed, shaking my head, but she got right into my face. “Remember last night, Roger. You’re with me now. Goddamn it, remember!”