EDIEWIGB

A man's attempts to improve himself don't go as planned.

EDIEWIGB

Robert was doing a lot better. He left the house every day now. He met up with friends or sometimes he just sat by himself somewhere. The old voice, that one that used to tell him over and over that he was crazy and stupid, didn't bother him anymore. He had peace of mind, something he had never really believed could happen. He was still a bit surprised when his friends said yes. The police had stopped knocking on his door. The real ones and the ones he made up. He was proud of the fact he never forgot to brush his teeth. The most amazing change was in the Morning, he would smile and jump out of bed, ready for life. In the old days it was one crisis after another. There was the time he failed to salute someone on the street and spent the rest of the day and night trying to find them again. The words that went liturgically through his brain were "Why didn't you?...Why didn't you?.....Why didn't you?" There were those days when he starved himself. He only shopped at Safeway, it was the only place to get safe food, and the closest one was miles away. He couldn't keep food at home, because of the man hiding in the cupboard. His friend had laughed when he told that story, he had tried to make it sound funny. He hadn't mentioned how scared he'd been or how lonely it was, believing those things.

The thing that saved him was the daily regime. The 3 cornerstones were, exercise, meditation and socialising. They balanced each other, when he was too tired to exercise, he meditated, when he wanted to be mentally stimulated, he socialised, when he wanted to be alone he went for a run by himself. If he thought people were after him he ran until the feeling went away. Forcing himself to socialise took away his fear of people. His friends knew the truth about him, so he didn't have to worry about his crazyness being exposed. And when the voice started up, battering him with criticism, he just sat and meditated until it roared itself hoarse. The regime was like a scalpel that he used to cut out the bad parts of himself.

One night Robert had a dream. In the dream he was in bed, he was tied down and he could hear chanting all around him. Somehow he knew it was an excorcism was taking place. The room was full of smoke. His stomach was stretched out, he could feel some kind of mass within. He felt like he was about to get sick. Something was crawling up his throat, choking him. He held on to the mattress, willing the thing to be out of him, like he was giving birth. It was long and dark and seemed to be without end. It slowly poured from his mouth onto a pile on the floor. Finally it was over, the smoke lifted, and he sucked all the air in the room into grateful lungs. He felt an overpowering sense of relief. The snake that had been in Robert flowed away across the floor and he fell back to sleep.

The next morning Robert leaped from his bed. He felt a stone lighter, a result of the psychic liposuction that had happened the night before. Sunlight filled the room and Robert felt it combine with a light inside himself. It used to be that when the universe zigged he would zag. But now he was finally on the right wavelength. He stopped being late all the time. His plans came to pass. He would think of calling a friend only for the phone to go off in his pocket. A day when he was having financial worries would be same day he'd find money on the ground or a shop clerk would left him off a few cents. He became more generous, he didn't feel he had to hold on tight to what little he had. Life was good to him.

Most of the people Robert had considered friends were people too soft-hearted to remove him from their life. They felt guilty knowing he had no one else and afraid of what would happen if he was left alone. Any new friends he acquired he didn't hang on to for long, they got resentful when they saw their well meaning advice was being wasted. They met him in cafes and struggled to pay attention as he delivered self-centred monologues in a continuous drone. But it was his friends that noticed the change before he did. Where did that light in his eyes come from? They assumed that it was their investment of energy that was the cause. He told them about the regime, the meditation. He didn’t mention the dream, which seemed less real to him every day.

What had been stagnant in Robert now lurched into action. He volunteered at a local mental health centre. He experienced compassion for the first time and thining of others reduced the pressure in his own skull. The inner critic was in hiding, he gave it no more quarter. He took up painting. There was no weasle voice to tell him he couldn't. Coughing demons onto the canvas in vivid reds and blacks. With every layer of paint he scraped away a layer of crud from himself. He decided to reduce his meditation to 10 minutes a day. With all the projects he was taking on he needed the extra time. While delivering a talk on the effects of depression to an audience of college students, he paused mid-sentence and had an out of body experience. Could this be him? The madman? He saw himself through the eyes of the kids, they were looking up to him.

He started having this dream. It was the middle of the night and he was in bed. Confused and groggy it took a moment to realise what had woken him. There was a sound coming from the hot press at the end of the room. The narrow white door was shut, something he never did, and it was creaking. It sounded like a wooden floor straining on a sunny day. Little beads of white sweat were forming on the surface of the door, like the inside was boiling. The little door became magnified in his vision. It must not open. Only his intense concentration could keep it shut. He could sense such rage on the other side, imprisoned in the darkness. Exhausted by the effort, he would pass out in the dream world, and wake up in reality. The hot press would be open and ordinary. The panic and dread gone by the time he brushed his teeth.

The spring had gone out of his step a little but he supposed that was normal. You couldn't expect the euphoria of the early days to last forever. He decided to stop seeing his counselor. He had read that most counseling relationships lasted around 2-3 years and it had been about that long with Peter. He had lied to him for the first 2 years, came in every week and gave a glowing report from someone else's life. Peter would nod wisely. One day he asked Robert what he was thinking and this time he told the truth. He said "I'm thinking about taking this glass of water and smashing it into your skull". Peter looked happy about this, he nodded wisely, then said "thank you for your honesty". He liked Peter. But their sessions were starting to feel redundant. Examinging the same issues over and over from every possible angle. He wanted to live his life not analyze it. In their last session they said almost nothing, like two old friends who have nothing left in common. He didn't see much of his other friends. A lot of them weren't very healthy themselves. Robert could see it. The kindest thing he could do for them was to leave them alone. He was his own best friend, each night he stood in front of the mirror and said the words "Every day in every way I'm getting better."

He woke up in the same dream. The door to the hot press rattling, paint peeling off it in ribbons. The whole room was hot, he could feel his bedclothes, sticky and stinking with sweat. He wanted to move but fear sat on his chest, pressing into his ribs. A black fluid was seeping out from under the door. Don't let it touch you. He thought. You can't let it touch you. There was a smell, like the smell in a place where horses are melted for glue, he wasn't sure how he knew this. The rattling got louder, the hiss became a scream. The heat was too much, he had to get up, he had to turn it off. Fear held him down. He went back to sleep. He opened his eyes and saw a normal room. He got up, had a boring day, and forgot.

He didn't go out today, or the day before. That's okay, the answers aren't out there, they're within. Some people down on the footpath kept talking about him, they kept giving him little looks. He decided to play a trick on them, he painted the inside of the window black with little holes for his eyes so the next time they looked up they'd get a fright. But then he felt guilty, it's not nice playing tricks. He got some white paint and put splashes of it on the window, as a sign of peace. There was something he badly needed to do but he didn't know what it was. He took everything heavy in the apartment and piled it against the hot press door. That helped a little and he rewarded himself with a cup of tea. Maybe he should have offered those people tea. That's stupid, he thought, you can't do that with people you don't know. They'd think you were strange.

This would be the last time he had the dream. The hot press door was open. The heat was gone. Inside were towels, blankets, and something else curled up with them. Something black. I'll do the things, he said, I'll run, I'll meditate. His voice was tiny and desperate. Come back Tomorrow he said, begging for mercy. The thing in the hot press listened patiently. It listened to him talk until he ran out of lies, until he couldn't make words anymore and pleaded with his eyes. It had no mercy to give. He tried to remember one of his prayers, "Dear God, be with me please..." something about hope. The thing twitched, it started moving. It unwound to its full size and Robert could see it had arms and legs. It was made out of the same stuff the snake had been. So there's enough evil in me to make a whole man, he thought. The head was a half melted waxwork of his own face, long strands of dark liquid hung from the nose and mouth. You can't be here, Robert thought, I tidied you up, I put you away. It lowered itself like a spider to the floor, laughing at its new freedom. It was his own laughter, the laughter of a brain gone mushy from solitary confinement, of grinning soliders torturing prisoners of war. Hope was an illusion, the fear that bathed his nervous system, the panic that reverberated like a fire alarm in his brain, that was real. His madness had returned. It crawled toward him on shaking legs.

Reviews

[Deason]

In order to provide horror, one must provide an atmosphere, and this story delivers in a terrifying manner. Your style of writing kept me hooked on each and every word! The clever metaphors and detailed imagery were enjoyable to reflect on, and this is a story I will be mulling over for some time. Our demons cannot be suppressed, and hiding from them cannot protect us from their sinister plans. Robert's simple thought process as a character reminded me of Winston Smith from George Orwell's novel 1984. You showed through this piece that horror does not rely on gore or what lurks in the dark, but what we hide from every day without even consciously knowing we are. I'm looking forward to seeing your future works, bravo on this story.

[p]

That was really freaking good. It was eerie as all hell and hopeful in all the other places. The only change I might've made was separating the paragraphs where the dreams start, but other than that you've got a really good story on your hands.