In his dream Howard was with Jacintha on
the surface of a planet with a low-pressure
atmosphere. He was deliriously happy. Despite the thinness of the alien air they
wore normal clothes and breathed without
the aid of apparatus. They felt sorry for
a man who had earlier been sent to the planet.
They didn't know where the man was but they
believed he was probably still out there,
scraping about, struggling to survive. The
man's companions were dead. Before long Howard
discovered how they had been killed: lying
on the ground were black-and-white photographs
of them. Their necks were riddled with vampire
bites. Then Howard discovered a face - a mask
of skin. Howard and Jacintha inspected the
pale, bloodstained face. He heard Greg. Greg's
disembodied laugh echoed as deafening as thunder.
Howard recognised the face - it was his.
In disgust he threw it into some bushes.
It was ten o'clock in the morning when Howard awoke. He
touched his neck gingerly and groaned. Warily he ventured into the kitchen
and slammed some bread under the grill, lit it and returned to the safety
of his room. He began packing his possessions into the collection of cardboard
boxes scattered around the floor. He found a grey pencil eraser that had an
indentation from having been impaled on a pencil - a relic from his impromptu
liquid nitrogen experiment in the cryogenics lab. As he packed memories of
Jacintha came to him in a turbulent flood.
Howard forgot about his breakfast, as his efforts at packing
became a preoccupation. He felt dizzy and off colour. The room, though tiny,
soon seemed to grow in size as its walls became naked of posters and the rest
of the paraphernalia it contained were boxed and the boxes were removed to
the capacious Maxi. Howard returned to the bedroom to retrieve the single
remaining item, the duvet. The bright blue duvet cover, which was zigzagged
with the coloured stripes and dots, defiantly decorated to the now bare and
drab room. The walls were covered with drawing pins that resembled bullet
holes. He looked at his tattered reflection in the wardrobe door.
Bitterly he whispered, 'I die when I look in the mirror.
I stab myself with my eyes.'
A tiny knock against his open door announced the presence
of Gallie. She was clad in a white nightdress, which followed her body's
contours to tightly it seemed translucent. Her eyes were polluted with sleep
but her skin glowed. The lack of makeup suited her somehow, she seemed so
delicate and delicate objects are tarnished by the pomp of embellishment.
Howard sighed. She looked so vulnerable. She looked distressed. He smelled
burning and could see a faint mist of smoke in the landing air.
'Howard?'
'Hi Gallie.'
'What are those marks on your neck?'
'Oh, nothing, just a few love-bites from last night.'
'Really?' She didn't seem convinced. 'Ooh gosh, that's where
you went last night! Oh, I nearly forgot, your toast burned. I put it out.
Gosh, you're packing! Sooo you are leaving? Last night Karen said
you were leaving but she didn't think you were serious about it. You've another
place to go to?'
'No. I'm leaving university.' Howard looked at the duvet.
He mentally lined up the zigzags between the discontinuities of the patterns
caused by the folds.
'But what about your course?'
'I'm leaving my course.'
'Gosh, why?'
'No reason in particular,' said Howard curtly.
'What's wrong?'
'No, no. I just need to leave. It's nothing.'
'You're leaving because you are sad about Jacintha?'
Howard didn't answer.
'Don't go. I'll help you. Tell me about everything,'
said Gallie.
A small smile played for a fleeting second over Howard's
lips. He loved how sweetly she had said, 'everything'. She had used
a tiny hint, a shadow of a rumble to inflect the word.
'No.'
'Ahhhh, will you...' Gallie's voice trailed
off.
Howard affected a cold expression. He grabbed the duvet
and, without looking at Gallie he stepped past her and descended the stairs.
Out of self-consciousness, he did not want Gallie to see how emotionally affected
he was. Outside it rained. The Maxi was jammed full of torn and overflowing
cardboard boxes. Books and folders spilled chaotically. He crammed the duvet
into a cranny between the back and front seats and scrambled into the driving
seat and started the engine. As the warm noise of the motor bathed his ears,
his resolution not to look back at the house failed. In the doorway, with
one hand on the blue front door, was Gallie. Her anguished posture beckoned
him like a siren's aria. Howard flicked on the windscreen wipers, which jabbed
out the familiar rubber heartbeat. His eyelids also swiped away at moisture.
He banged his fist on the wide steering wheel, drove down Napoleon Drive and
turned onto the Chillington Road.
He arrived at the pedestrian crossing near the Students'
Union. The lights turned red. He was startled to see the same man he had
hit back in the autumn walking across the crossing, but in the opposite direction
to the time of their first encounter. The tall figure huddled his coat against
the windswept rain. He was oblivious to Howard. The man disappeared into
the rain. Howard thrust his foot onto the accelerator pedal and took one
last look at the Students Union building through the splattering weather.
Students strode briskly to and fro through the cold.
With a sigh he drove on. One of his hands clasped the wheel;
the other rubbed his neck. When he had been a child he had been so positive
about life. Everything was going to be fine, everything would work out. Life
was easy and there were no worries: at least not since the threat of nuclear
war receded. There were exams, for sure, and many hassles, but nothing serious.
His childhood had been a bland, pointless exercise in learning little except
that life owed him a living. What a disgusting myth that was!
Two days previously he had dared open the latest red letter
from his bank manager. His account was devastation. He winced at the horror
of those crimson figures that passed foul judgement on him. He was in serious
trouble. How trouble free his childhood had been. Little had he suspected
reality was evil and that the world would turn against him.
People resent you. People die on you. People abandon you.
Your friends are your traitors. No one looks out for you. There are no guardian
angels, only damning authorities. They do not teach you that at school. At
school they do not give you lessons in how to survive the bastards that would
tear you apart. They don't even warn you of the danger. He supposed they had
not warned Jacintha either. At least Jacintha had been able to kill herself.
He hadn't managed that: even the hangman's noose was beyond his feeble reach.
He cursed. He was pathetic. He couldn't even do himself in! He winced
with embarrassment as the remembrance of what had happened in the cellar the
night before.
In the darkness he had let himself fall forward. A light
had blinded him. The cable had hurt his neck. He had crashed onto something
metallic.
'Get off my fucking Vaxes!' came a high-pitched scream.
Howard blinked. His eyesight was returning. He sprawled
about on the metal. He breathed hyperactively: he struggled for air.
'Get away from my computers!' demanded the hysterical voice.
Howard took the noose from around his neck and, moving his leg and dislodged
something. There was a sudden, heavy smashing sound. Glass tinkled.
'Get away!' screamed the exasperated voice.
Howard coughed. He turned his gaze to the aggressor. His
eyes depicted a shadowy figure. A skinny, scruffy looking man with stubble
and silver-rimmed oval framed glasses was gesticulating at him wildly.
'Marlon?' Howard gasped in surprise. 'You
must be... Marlon?'
The man backed away nervously. Howard winced at the pungent
whiff of rotting sweat.
'It's none of your business!' screamed the man.
Recoiling with terror, Howard fell off the large metallic
box and landed heavily on the concrete floor. Winded, he opened his eyes.
Next to him he saw the insides of the computer, which was missing side panels.
Behind patchy plating were green circuit boards and straggly wires. Above
him a naked light bulb dangled from the same beam he had attached the cable.
Embedded in his car, Howard drove out of Redater and climbed
into the moors. Upon reflection he realised that when he had tried to hang
himself he had been facing the wrong way. Disorientated by the booze and the
darkness he had unwittingly changed his bearings. Instead of falling off the
computer as intended he had merely fallen forward onto the one behind it and
as he had fallen in the wrong direction the power cable had slid off the wooden
peg. At that moment Marlon had switched on the cellar light.
Howard slammed his foot on the break. He struggled to control
the car on a sharp bend. Leaning desperately, he veered onto the wrong side
of the road. He was lucky. Cursing, he resumed his painful analysis of the
previous night.
In a state of shock he had hauled himself up himself off
the cold, dirty cellar floor. Marlon looked mortified.
'What are you doing?' cried Marlon. 'You vandal! This is
gross sabotage! I am reporting you to the police!'
Howard panicked. Detectives would surely question him about
his role in Granny Grail's death.
'No! Wait! I was just trying to murder myself, that's all!'
'Absurd crap!'
'It's true! Honest! I came here to kill myself!'
'Absurd crap!'
Howard realised the power cable was still wrapped around
his neck. The plug dragged by his feet. He felt as if he were dragging a pathetic
ball and chain. He pulled the noose over his head and proffered the cable
as evidence.
'See!'
'I'm not falling for your absurd lies!' ranted Marlon, his
eyes glaring. He snatched the cable and waved it manically. 'Pull the wool
over my eyes would you? An alibi! That's the oldest trick in the book, you
must think I am stupid! I know you came to steal my power leads!
And that's not all! I know you came to help yourself to my eleven seventy-three
boards too! Huh!' Marlon began to mumble to himself. 'I knew there
was a burglar! I knew it the moment the juice went down on the - Oh my God!'
Marlon addressed Howard again. 'My V-three! You've smashed it! Fuck!
Fuck, fuck! You've smashed my baby! FUCK!' Marlon was close to tears. 'That's
it! I'm calling the cops right now!'
'Don't! I'll tell them you've stolen University property!'
blurted Howard.
'Shit! OK, OK! I won't call the cops. Oh fuck,
you've fucked the Ultrix box! I'll kill you!'
Howard bolted past Marlon up the cellar stairs. Marlon pursued.
Howard raced to his room, slammed the door and leaned his back against it.
He tried to recover his breath as Marlon hammered upon the door for a few
minutes and screamed threats.
'You boiling effluent thieving scum! Know this: I am booby-trapping
my silicon! Stay away from my machines or you will die horribly! Oh and I'm
sending you the bill for the dead V-three. And the Vax repairs!'
Howard wondered how anybody could get so worked up over
some inanimate tin boxes. There was more to life than boxes, even expensive
boxes. It all seemed so pointless. Marlon's attack was upsetting. He hoped
he would never meet his newly acquainted housemate and enemy again. Life got
worse.
 | | | | |
| From: |
Knoeier | Subject: | 2003-01-07 06:36:38 |
| | | | |
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