The day after he met Dana, he made some calls from his 6th floor room. He found a shrink that had an opening in his schedule. A few days later he went, but that was a bust. He didn’t know why, he just couldn’t talk to the guy openly and honestly. He didn’t return, but he didn’t give up either. He made an appointment the following week with another place. A buddy of his suggested he try talking to a female shrink. That it might be easier. It was. Worlds better! The first session, he was in tears for 45 minutes. He spilled everything about everything he could squeeze in. Mostly how he felt everything was his fault. He saw her for a year and half before making the decision to go and live his life. The shrink lady gave her blessing and they parted company. The first few weeks were rocky, but he had Dana there to help him through it. He had gotten her number before leaving the hospital. She had visited him the whole time he was in. They kept in touch when he was out. She did understand his dilemma and said she would wait for him to sort out his troubles. She was a Juggalette, but so calm and peaceful and—later he found—loving. No wonder she was a nurse. She loved helping people. They volunteered down at a local shelter. They went on friend dates with no expectations. They did holidays together and eventually, one late evening over pizza and a carbonated bottle of grape juice, could stand no more. They professed their eternal love for each other then and there and made love for the first time. As he slowly pulled her clothes off and saw her beautiful nude body for the first time, he truly felt inner peace and happiness. They had been ravenous after that. Once the gloves were off—so to speak—it was on like Donkey Kong! It wasn’t much later that Lucy was conceived. They got married shortly after the discovery, but Vic had already popped the question a month and half before. The said Lucy just knew it was time to arrive.
Throughout the years together, it was not always easy. For passionate people it never is. There were heated debates and arguments. There was an accident with a drunk driver that nearly killed Vic and baby Lucy. Fortunately, no one was seriously hurt, but it was a near thing. There was a dark period of time when Lucy was five or six where Vic and Dana had been fighting for some time and Vic ended up sleeping with Dana’s sister. Dana and her sister never got along before. This did not help. Dana, being the passionate type, got even by sleeping with his friend from work. When the fires burned down and the wind swept away the ashes, they sought out marital therapy. It had been the ticket. They were strong before all the bullshit, but now they were invincible. They had been going strong for the last 13 years with no other major fuck ups. They still did date nights and the occasional concert, although it had at this time been nearly a decade since Vic or Dana’s last ICP concert. They still did the romance thing, now more than ever. He still found her irresistible. And even though the equipment didn’t always work like it used to, he kept her pretty happy in the bedroom.
Life was, in a nutshell, wonderful. The life he had always wanted, it turned out. Still, every once in a blue moon, something weird gnawed at him. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but it lay just beneath the skin. An itch he couldn’t scratch. Or like something just at the edge of his peripheral vision and when he turned to look, it was gone. He’d almost make out what it was, but it got away again. This something felt like a bad something. No, he couldn’t quite say that either. It did feel like something, but he wasn’t sure it was bad. It just made him feel uneasy. Not sure if turned off the burner before leaving—that sort of thing. Most days, it never even crossed his mind. He lived a full and wonderful life, the two of them. They had heard about empty nest syndrome. The kid grows up and flies the coup and now you’re stuck with the old battle axe and the two of you can’t stand each other. Or, the other kind, where you like each other, but your marriage suffers anyway because one or both partners feels like they have become useless since the kid got the fuck outta Dodge. At any rate, this was not them. The day Lucy moved out, they told her to call when she got to her new place, closed the door as she left, waved, and then had the loudest, wildest craziest fuck-fest since they first hooked up. Vic would take long hot showers and equally long hot shits with the bathroom door wide open and Dana would very often walk around the house completely naked. He came home from a really rough day at work one afternoon and found her shaving her pretty little pussy in the kitchen! Needless to say, he fucked her right then and there. Life after Lucy was the Heaven they had been waiting for. They both agreed that they missed her as a baby and as the cutest little toddler and every other stage along the way, but this was the payoff. She was an adult and alive and happy and free and living elsewhere! It was party time at the Vanderfelt’s! Still…
Sometimes Vic wondered if the dire feelings he’d been having had anything to do with his brother. Things had gone really bad between him and his brother back in the day. He always thought that being twins, they were strong enough to patch things up again, after all—hadn’t it been both of them spouting off at the mouth? Yes. But he had never seen Vincent again. Something had happened to him, he was sure of that. Something bad. Call it “twin-tuition.” They had never been close enough to have that whole bullshit “twin-speak” thing, but “twin-tuition”? Yes. Definitely. Something had happened to Vincent. Or was going to happen to him. Something really bad and Vic had a notion he would never see him again. About that, he was wrong.
****
September 14th was the last really good day as far as Vic could remember. It was just like any other day. Got up to the smell of the coffee pot in the kitchen. He went to the toilet and pissed for what felt like an hour. Very relieving. He was in a loose-fitting pair of white boxers with the front gaping open and nothing else. He walked into the kitchen and found Dana in her short lacy black robe and nothing else. Empty nest, my ass! he thought as he came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her. Her ass still looked good all these years later and the bottom half was showing for how short the ‘robe’ was. He was hugging her and kissing her neck as she sipped coffee and looked out the kitchen window to the river. She sighed contentedly and carefully set her coffee mug down. He kissed her with more passion, more intensity. She felt him stirring down there, becoming firm and pressing against her bottom. His practiced hand found her breasts easily and knowingly gave them just the right pressure of squeeze. She laid her head back on his shoulder and closed her eyes with a moan. His hand found its way down to the smooth treasure down below. As he kissed and stroked her lovingly, she leaned her head back forward and then leaned her entire body forward at the hips. By this time, he had already sprung free from his boxer prison and grinded gently into her. Her feet moved apart in opposite directions and her hand happened back to find his rigidness. She stroked him a time or two and then he slowly slid into her welcoming body. They made love gently and yet full of fire and urgency there in the kitchen. As he came into the woman he had loved for so many years, he thanked God above for all things good that had been given to him. A single tear escaped his left eye. As he came, she came and reached a hand back and grabbed firmly at his leg with her nails. He never forgot that last time they were so very intimate together. That last good feeling. That last amazing thing he had left in this world. They finished the love-making and after that, breakfast. Then he headed off to work.
That night, he got home to a different Dana. She seemed distant and distracted. He asked her if everything was all right. She replied that she was just tired. It felt like the end of the longest day in the history of days to her. She headed off to bed early with what she claimed to be a mother f’er of a migraine. She rubbed her temple and fell in under the covers. He sat awake a long time feeling that weird dread or unease again. That feeling of standing at the edge of a precipice and leaning forward while you did the windmill with your arms to try to balance yourself backwards to safe ground. That second of not knowing whether or not you were going over. He stood up there now, arms flailing for something to grab hold of, knowing in his heart of hearts that it was useless to struggle. He loved her and hated keeping this a secret from her, but a
lso did not want to burden her with it in her current state. After a time, he went in to the bedroom, changed into his bedtime boxers and lay in beside her. She was cold to the touch and she shivered. He drew close to her and held her. He lay awake long and long that night fearing the future rushing toward him like a Mack truck with no brakes. He closed his eyes and slept. The first dream came to him that night. The coin toss.
He woke in the early hours of the morning screaming out Dana’s name, but found her side of the bed deserted. He got up and walked to the bathroom. Nothing. He looked all around the house and finally found her outside on his old bench, staring up at the stars. He had brought a thick blanket just in case. The night air chilled him right though his boxers and by the time he sat down beside her and got them covered up, he was shivering badly. She sat calmly, speechless, unblinking. The stars danced across the universe before them and reflected in her eyes.
“Did you ever have that feeling that you were just a figment of someone else’s imagination?” she whispered in secretive tones. He felt growing concern welling up in his lowest guts.
“What do you mean, honey? What’s wrong?” A tear came to her beautiful hazel eye, held for a moment in silent suspension and fell like the last cool raindrop in the desert of the soul.
“I don’t know. It just came to me yesterday while you were at work. I just got this overwhelming feeling that my time here is almost over. But not like death. Like my portion of the tale is almost over and I’ll just cease to be. Wink out of existence. Do you understand that?”
He looked at the anguish on her lovely face and looked up at the stars. “I feel something, too. I can’t explain it either, but it’s like the first half of my life has been a waste, so I had only a short amount of time to make the second half count. Maybe I still messed it all up somewhere along the way, but I feel like someone or something is coming for me. I feel like it has something to do with Vincent, but I haven’t seen or heard from him since our falling out all those years ago. I don’t know how the two things can be related, but I feel there is a very strong connection.” He spoke these words looking at her again, noticing for the first time how ghostly pale she had become. He looked back out at the night and said, “I feel like we have been given something so good, it defies explanation. We did the best with it that we both could. I think we did a damn fine job. I just feel like someone’s getting ready to pull the rug out from under our feet.” Silence crept in then and sat between them like a stern chaperone. Their hands met on the bench and their fingers interlaced. She leaned over and placed a soft kiss on his cheek.
“I love you, Victor Vanderfelt.”
“I love you forever and ever, Dana Vanderfelt.” She leaned her head on his shoulder and…more nothing.
He awoke later in the day slumped over the bench. There was no sign of Dana anywhere. He picked up the blanket in a mental fog. What had they been talking about? He felt like it had been something really important. He walked into the house. Something was off. Everything was off. The differences in the house were immediately noticeable and unmistakable. The house was his. Only his. He went from room to room in no real hurry, but in a hazy state of fear. Every trace of Dana was gone from the house. It wasn’t like she had packed up her things and left. She was gone completely. He walked over to the south wall in the living room. The family photo wall. His favorite photo of all time was a picture a guy took of them at a lake one year. The three of them, when Lucy was 8 and the world was amazing. The sky was sunny and blue and the pike were biting like mad. He and Dana had stood arm and arm behind Lucy. Lucy, in the photo’s foreground, was holding up a ten-pound pike she had struggled with and boated all on her own. It still had the hook in its mouth and she held it up for the picture by the fishing line. This photo had been blown up extra big and hung as the center piece to all the other photos. He approached the spot on the wall where the photo still hung. His eyes filled with despair as he now looked at this family treasure. It was him alone, arm stuck out to the left holding no one with a magic fish on a fishing line suspended in mid-air. He looked over all the other photos. More of the same. A lot of him and nobody else. Even a photo of him and the car lot was different. It was just him against a blank white background. She had ceased to exist.
“What the holy fuck is going on?” he said to no one as the first in a long line of tears began. The vast emptiness was filling him, devouring him from the inside out. It was eating away every part of him that had ever loved her. Every part of him that had held tight to that precious little girl that called him daddy. He took a step backward and lost his balance. He sat down hard on the living room floor. He was sobbing wildly now, uncontrollably. They were vanishing from his memories. “No, please, God, please. Whatever I have done wrong in life…please don’t take my family away from me. Please.” He wept. Long into the hours of the afternoon and then, into the evening as well. By nightfall, he knew nothing of either of them and sat in an easy chair, mourning an emptiness he could not explain. He fell into a deep sleep. The dream came like crows from hell, feeding on the carrion of his life.
****
The doctor sat back in his chair.
“So, you say it’s been four weeks now that you’ve been having this exact same dream?” he asked with a furrowed brow. Vic still lay back on the couch, head against the wall. “And what of these photos in your house?” Vic sat upright slowly.
“They mock me. I can’t explain them. They look like trick photography, but I don’t know from who or why. I have a million questions and no answers. I feel like I’m in quicksand and the more I struggle for answers, the further I sink. I have no idea what happened to Vincent. I feel like there’s been a hole ripped right down the center of me and all the vital bits have been removed for a good laugh. I feel like some sadist god is having a good-old time playing hell with my life, but I’m here living it, feeling it, dying in it. I have to wake up from those faces every night and not know why. I am quickly going insane and I don’t want it anymore. I want what’s missing. I want it found.” He took a long, deep breath. “I want to let go. Fall into the precipice. Find what’s in there for me. Leave behind the nothing I have now.” The psychiatrist closed his notebook and placed it and the pen on his desk. He stood up to stretch and took off his reading glasses. He used his thumb and forefinger to rub at the lower edges of his eyes and the bridge of his nose, then put the glasses back on.
“You aren’t here, Vic.” He spoke these four words deliberately and precisely. He waited for some type of reaction.
“What does that mean?” Vic said, slowly getting to his feet.
“I am an intermediary, not a shrink.” Again, he waited.
“What does that mean?” Vic was visibly shaken now.
“I can help you get what you want, what you seek. I can show you how.” Vic’s eyes were wide saucers now.
“What did you mean by ‘I’m not here’?” Vic returned.
“You’re strong, my boy. My God, you are so damn strong. And you have the heart of a lion for sure. You were never meant for such a cold cruel calloused world such as this. The preparations have been made. I’m going to tell you something now that is going to sting just a little bit.” Vic reached the desk and placed a steadying palm on the cool hard surface. “Are you ready, my boy?” Vic suddenly saw flashes of his entire life in a slide show in his mind, except the projectionist was blipping through the pictures at an increasingly breakneck pace. He nodded numbly and swallowed dryly.
“Tell me. Say it. I need to hear the words. Please. Let this charade end. Please.” He felt his knees trying hard to buckle under him.
“My boy, you didn’t survive the sleeping pills. You died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.” Vic collapsed. The whole world and worlds beyond worlds caved in on him. “I’m so sorry.” Vic sat on the floor, panting hard and trying to catch his breath. He felt his heart jack-hammering in his chest. If he was dead, could he still have a heart attack? Cause he sure felt one coming on now.
“I…I…” he stammered, “can’t…breathe…” he managed. The shrink smiled.
“No, no, of course you can’t, silly boy. You don’t breathe when you’re dead.” He placed a soothing hand on Vic’s shoulder and suddenly, magically…Vic was all better. The breathing, the heart attack, all of it—gone! The doctor helped him to his shaky legs. “OK, this part I’m going to need your assistance with, my boy.” Vic looked at the doctor.
“Why do you keep calling me that? Only my…” He paused, mouth hung askew. The doctor nodded. “Only my dad ever called me that, but he died…back in 1998. Heart attack. I went to the funeral.” The doctor smiled and nodded again.
“This first thing is really rather easy, son. Close your eyes, count to three, then open them fast and really see me.” The old, wrinkled, grey-haired doctor smiled one last Einsteinian smile and Vic closed his eyes.
“One…two…three…” His eyes flew open and Vic’s dad stood before him, smiling ear to ear and arms outstretched in anticipation of a hug from one of his twin sons. “Dad! Oh my God, Dad!” Vic shouted, hugging his old man in a firm embrace. The two men shouted gleefully and hugged long and firmly. They broke apart and his dad said:
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