Memory Hole

by Douglas Jern

  “But I know he’ll be there,” she said, recalling the perverse smile on Homer’s face as he plunged the knife into Jeffrey’s stomach. That was the face of someone who enjoyed doing his own dirty work. He wouldn’t miss the chance to kill Laura himself.

  The feeling was mutual.

  22:18 – Laura

  The interior of the warehouse was dim. Pale moonlight filtered through the grimy windows, accentuating rather than attenuating the darkness. The empty shelves that stretched from floor to ceiling looked like the jagged bones of some long-dead leviathan, sunken to the seabed and picked clean eons ago.

  It was so cold Laura could see the white clouds of her own breath. Her footsteps echoed as she walked, but there were no other sounds. She’d almost concluded that the warehouse was empty when she saw a light ahead.

  A small desk stood in the center of a wide expanse of floor. Underneath it was a large hatch, like a trapdoor, from which an arrhythmic drone could be heard. On the desk sat the source of the light: a shaded desk lamp aimed away from Laura, spreading a sterile white light. The light illuminated a chair on the other side of the desk and the face of the person sitting in it. It was Jeffrey.

  For a full minute, Laura stood and stared at him, doubting her own eyes. Neither of them spoke, nor read the other’s mind. Jeffrey’s eyes were moist with tears. His arms and legs were tied to the chair.

  As Laura watched her brother in silence, she noticed that someone was standing behind him. It was a tall man wearing a gray hoodie and jeans. His face was shrouded in shadow, but his eyes seemed to shine with a light of their own, little beads of light in the darkness. They regarded her coldly.

  The man spoke, and though his voice was one that had never entered her ears before, she knew that it was Homer Moley who spoke to her.

  What is done cannot be undone. That is what you know.

  His voice was a swarm of hornets buzzing around her ears, a rumble from deep beneath the earth, a high-pitched scream of rage—it was all of these things and none of them. It came to her not as a sound, but as a beam, projected straight into her skull from those cold, gleaming eyes.

  She wanted to move, to run away, but she couldn’t. Her feet were bolted to the floor, her arms shackled to her sides. She could only stand there and listen as Homer spoke again, each syllable a rusty nail dragging down a chalk-board inside her ear.

  The past was always written in stone. That is how things are.

  She found that she could speak.

  “Please let him go.” Her voice sounded feeble in the vast darkness, the squeak of a mouse faced with a lion.

  Homer’s left hand floated out of the shadows and landed on Jeffrey’s shoulder.

  Things are not what they seem, said that awful non-voice as the hand tightened its grip. Laura could hear Jeffrey’s shoulder creak.

  “Stop! You’re hurting him!”

  The past is a lie. The present is false. The future is mine.

  Homer’s right hand emerged from the gloom, holding a knife that glittered like gold in the lamplight. The flashing blade travelled in a lazy arc and settled below Jeffrey’s chin.

  “No!” shouted Laura. “Leave him alone!”

  Homer made no reply. Instead, he leaned forward. The light of the desk lamp washed over his face, revealing its features.

  Laura’s heart stopped.

  It was her own face that looked back at her from atop Homer’s shoulders—her own face as it had looked at three minutes past one the day before, strands of her long hair hanging in her face, damp with sweat, her teeth bared in a beastly snarl.

  “Oh God… Oh please, no…” Laura’s pleas disappeared as soon as they left her lips, barely audible even to herself.

  As Homer’s hand brought the knife down towards Jeffrey’s abdomen, his Laura-face regarded her. The fearsome grimace softened into a contented smile. The face spoke, and this time the voice among the angry hornets was Laura’s own:

  “It was me.”

  The knife pierced Jeffrey’s stomach. He let out a scream as the blade tore through his insides, and Laura joined him, sharing his agony. A loud metallic crash shook the floor, and the trapdoor swung open on screeching hinges, plunging the table and the lamp into the void below. The cold light of the lamp was swallowed by a warm, orange glow that spilled forth from the open trapdoor, and the low drone grew to a roar. Deep beneath them, at the bottom of the shaft beneath the trapdoor, a fire was raging.

  Still unable to move, unable to even shut her eyes against the horror, Laura watched as Homer dislodged the knife from Jeffrey’s intestines and cut the bindings that held him to the chair. Jeffrey’s body began to slip over the edge of the pit. But this she could not allow. It was too late to save Jeffrey now, but she’d rather die than let him be taken away from her like this. She would never surrender him to oblivion.

  Laura reached for her brother, her feet still stuck to the ground, straining herself to the limit. She heard the joint in her elbow pop and felt the pain but ignored it. Jeffrey, halfway over the edge now, held out his hand, groping for hers, and she redoubled her efforts, stretching her body until she felt like she would tear in half. Jeffrey’s fingers brushed against hers, and then he fell, twisting gently through the air like a falling leaf, trailing a streamer of guts behind him. The mysterious force that held Laura in place released her from its grip.

  She fell in, plummeting through rushing air that grew hotter as she went, the odd droplet of Jeffrey’s blood pattering on her face like inverted rain. He was still so far away from her, and now she could see the bottom approaching—a churning lake of fire almost pure white in hue, a flame to consume all.

  The heat grew fiercer by the second. She felt blisters start to form on her skin. Her vision blurred and faded as her eyes boiled away in their sockets. Her whole body was reduced to a core of pain, her senses shutting down one by one as her matter was consumed, until there was only darkness. And in that darkness, though she no longer had eyes or ears, no senses at all, she still perceived the word rushing in to enclose her and erase the last trace of her existence.

  Switch

  22:23 – Laura

  “Laura! Christ, Laura, wake up!”

  The falling sensation had been so real that she almost felt herself slam down onto the couch. She looked around wild-eyed in the unfamiliar surroundings.

  “Hey, take it easy. It’s me. You’re okay. We’re safe here.”

  She looked up into Zachary’s stubbly face, with its red nose and furrowed brow, and drooping bags under the eyes. Compared to the monstrous countenance she had witnessed in her dream, it was like the face of an angel. He was worried about her, but he was telling the truth. They were safe here.

  “Here” was Leo’s place. She took in the room, grounding herself in her environment. The meticulous order of the apartment was soothing after the chaos of the last few days, which was probably what had brought on the horrible dream. She’d had her share of nightmares in her life, but this one had been a whole different beast. The fire had felt so real that she half expected to find burn marks on her arms. Shuddering at the memory of the burning pit and Jeffrey’s falling body, she looked around the room again, eager to flood her senses with its everyday quality and wash away the dream.

  The sixth-floor apartment was small, but more than enough for one person. There was a bedroom, a combined kitchen and living room, and a small bathroom. Leo had offered her the use of his bedroom, but she’d insisted on sleeping on the couch, hoping to high heaven that her embarrassment didn’t show on her face. She didn’t consider herself a prude, but it felt somehow wrong to sleep in a man’s bed without being in a relationship with him. Leo had thankfully let the matter go without further comment, and after finishing their pizzas, Leo and Zachary had retired to the bedroom, leaving Laura alone on the couch. None of them had expected to get much sleep, but with several hours until midnight, they had tried to catch as many winks as they could.

  As Laura surveyed the apartment, re
lieved to feel the terror and panic of the dream drain away, she saw Leo standing in the kitchen. He was making coffee and humming a simple tune to himself. His mind was perfectly at ease; there was a task to be done, and he’d been given instructions. It was quite impressive how well he could cope with things so long as someone told him what to do. Laura felt a twinge of guilt, but told herself that it was all for the best. She wasn’t doing any real harm.

  Zachary, noticing the direction of her gaze, but completely misinterpreting it, walked over to the kitchen counter.

  “Let me do that, Leo.”

  “You sure?”

  “Hey, there’s two kinds of people who really know coffee: Truck drivers, and old, bitter detectives.” He winked. “Just leave the mean caffeine machine to me.”

  Leo let Zachary handle the esoteric rituals of coffee-making and went to sit down on the couch next to Laura. She noticed a faint excitement in his mind as he approached her. She recognized the pattern and pitied him. He was a good man, she’d meant that when she said it, but he wasn’t her type, and even if he had been, this was not the time for romance. She hoped he wouldn’t let his feelings get in the way of the task at hand.

  I could just make them go away, she thought, but that wouldn’t be right. She had to draw the line somewhere.

  “You doing okay?” asked Leo.

  “Yeah. Just had a mother of a nightmare.”

  “Was it about your brother?”

  “Yes. I was at the warehouse and he was there. Homer too. He…” She sighed. “God, it was awful. But at least it was just a dream.”

  “I’m sorry about Jeffrey.”

  “It’s okay,” she said. Then she reconsidered. “I mean, it’s not okay, I don’t know if it ever will be. But thank you.”

  Leo didn’t know what to say to that. She smiled at him, hoping he wouldn’t read too much into it, then realized that he did, and she regretted it. She blocked off his thoughts from her mind and cast around for a safe subject.

  “Jeffrey loved those,” she said, nodding at the orchids in the window. “He loved all plants, but orchids were his favorite.”

  “I would’ve liked to meet him.”

  “I think he would’ve liked to meet you too. He wasn’t very sociable, but he could talk about plants until your ears fell off.”

  “Sounds like we would’ve had much to discuss.”

  “Yeah,” she said absentmindedly, staring at the orchids and suddenly hating herself. This whole conversation was wrong. Jeffrey had been alive yesterday, and now he was gone. He had been dead just a little over twenty-four hours, yet here she sat talking about him like an old widow reminiscing about her long-dead husband. It was like her brain had skipped past all the intense sorrow and grief straight into fond remembrance.

  Was that all Jeffrey meant to me? Was he such a small part of my life that I could get over his death in a day?

  The thought made her angry. She could feel the embers flare up. The anger was comforting. It spared her from having to look inside herself. Instead, the anger steered her thoughts towards Homer. Everything was his fault. Her life was in shambles all because of him. She would make him pay.

  Zachary came over with two cups of steaming coffee. He handed them to Laura and Leo, then went back to get his own. He sat down next to Leo and took a sip. Laura followed his example. The coffee—black as tar and almost as thick—was hot and burned her tongue. She drank deep all the same, relishing the heat flowing down her throat and amassing in the pit of her stomach like a lump of burning coal. The pain sharpened her focus. The caffeine kicked in a few seconds later, jolting her wide awake. Zachary’s self-proclaimed coffee expertise was no mere brag. Whatever he’d done to the coffee, it was killer. She drained her cup in three big gulps and breathed out a plume of steam.

  “I’m ready,” she said. “Let’s get moving.”

  They got in the car. Like before, Leo drove, and Zachary rode shotgun. They were quiet. The plan, such as it was, had already been discussed and there was nothing more to add. Each was occupied by his or her own thoughts. Leo’s concerned a vaguely imagined rescue rewarded with reciprocation of his feelings. Zachary’s were a blur of shaking hands covered in blood.

  Laura’s thoughts were on Homer. She was still feeling the rush of the caffeine, and her brain was spinning like a busy hard drive. The dream, terrible though it had been, seemed to have sorted her memories, and she was thinking more clearly than she had in days.

  What is done cannot be undone. That is what you know.

  In her mind’s eye, she saw the diner, where Joey was feasting on falafels, and his words echoed in her head: Homer Moley isn’t human… He controls the future… He wrote down exactly what was going to happen, and it did.

  The words from the note scrolled across her mind like the credits at the end of a movie. She knew where the hint was now. Final goon(s) eliminated by knife. Homer had drawn a blade and dispatched the final “goon,” Marcus something-or-other, himself. “Goon” in singular—and that was the crucial detail. If Homer could control the future, he would have known how many people would be present at the deal. But he hadn’t, as the wording of the note revealed. “Goon(s),” it said, as if the writer had been unsure of their exact number, but still wanted it to appear as if everything happened according to his plan.

  The past was always written in stone. That is how things are.

  The credits rolled on.

  The email address WnstnSmthMoT1984 was easy. She rearranged the letters and filled in the missing vowels: Winston Smith MoT 1984. The numbers were obviously a nod to the title of Orwell’s novel. MoT was The Ministry of Truth, where Winston worked.

  What about Homer himself? The name had from the start struck her as a pseudonym, and a tacky one at that. She saw the letters “Homer Moley” line up before her eyes, sharp and gleaming like daggers in the dark, the initial “H” a blocky steel girder, the final “y” a crooked smile mocking her. An image of Winston Smith at his desk hard at work making up facts for the Party flashed by, and the letters swapped places. Homer Moley—Memory Hole.

  The diner morphed into the dirty motel room where she and Zachary had hidden.

  If Homer’s power works the same way as mine and Jeffrey’s, he would need to get close to the people he uses it on.

  She was certain that was the case. Right before Jeffrey died, she had witnessed his fractured perspective of the fatal attack on Vincent Morricone. One half of him had rushed in to stop Homer, the other had been the one to beat Vincent to death.

  Jeffrey and I must be different… That’s why we realized something was wrong.

  Once again, the painful memory of Jeffrey’s death played back in her mind. She had run towards Homer, consumed with rage, thirsting for his blood. And then he had looked at her, and…

  That was when it happened. That was when it all changed. Homer hadn’t done anything in advance—how could he have? There was no way he could have known that Laura would be there at that time. He couldn’t see into the future.

  Memory Hole…

  And just like that, it all made sense. Her conflicting memories of Jeffrey’s death. The feeling that the world had split into two. Joey’s voice: He controls the future.

  Things are not what they seem.

  No, thought Laura as the final piece slid into place with a click. Not the future, but…

  The past is a lie. The present is false. The future is mine.

  Homer Moley controlled the past.

  PART TWO

  BIRTH

  30 YEARS AGO

  It was the quintessential childhood afternoon. The sun shone down on the world from a cloudless sky, and a cool breeze alleviated the summer heat. Sheets and shirts fluttered on clotheslines crisscrossing the space between the apartment buildings, whose balconies were adorned with flowers of all shapes and colors. A crow soared through the air and settled on a streetlamp, where it defecated onto the sidewalk. It cawed as it took wing again, satisfied that it had reminded th
e world at large that there was no such thing as a perfect view.

  Bobby was playing baseball with Rick in the yard. Bobby was pitching, and Rick was batting using the wiffle bat that Bobby had been given by his mother on his eighth birthday. It was a cheap plastic thing, but it was the best they could get. The ball, on the other hand, was a real, honest-to-goodness baseball, which Bobby had found under a bush in Rivertree Park a few weeks ago. Its stitches were nearly coming apart with age and wear, but Bobby treasured it.

  Rick was a pretty lousy batter, swinging the wiffle bat with much gusto but little finesse, but that was all right—every time Rick missed, Bobby would cheer, imagining that he was Bruce Hurst pitching in the World Series.

  He made sure not to cheer too loudly, though; Alan was lying on the creaking old deck chair in the small yard outside their apartment, reading a sports magazine. On the ground next to the chair stood a half-empty can of beer, which he occasionally picked up to drink from as he leafed through the pages. He hated noise, and he especially hated noisy kids.

  Alan spent a lot of time in the deck chair ever since he had been laid off from his job at Wilson’s Steakhouse. Bobby did not know exactly why Alan had been fired, but there were rumors flying around that Alan had gotten so mad at a complaining customer one day that he picked the guy up and literally threw him out of the restaurant. Whether or not it was true, it was bad news for Bobby. Alan’s late hours at Wilson’s had meant that Bobby and Rick got to spend most evenings alone with their mother, and whenever Alan had a day off, he had usually spent it napping and watching TV, leaving Bobby and Rick alone unless they were too noisy. It had been easy to avoid him by going outside to play, but ever since he lost his job he seemed to be everywhere, always watching Bobby and Rick play with a menacing glare, as if he envied them their fun and was just waiting for them to give him an excuse. And once he had an excuse, Alan got mean; Bobby had plenty of bruises to attest to that. His mother tended to turn a blind eye to Alan’s treatment of her kids, which Bobby thought was because she loved Alan too much to notice.