The Glass House

by David Rotenberg

  “It’s a dream, Father. When did we last meet in dreams?”

  “The temple at Epidaurus?”

  “Yes, the dream temple. I was covered in a bloody skin—on a raised platform.”

  “I remember.”

  “Another cul-de-sac. No doubt it’s closed now, too. Listen to the music. Remind you of anything, Father? Come on, you’re Bible-read. And of course you love early Dylan. And where exactly is Solitaire?”

  “At the junction of Highways Six and One.”

  “Right. Come on, put two and two together. Find the fucking semblant order here.”

  The words flew from Decker’s mouth: “Come on, Abe, now kill me a son.”

  “Right, Father—and the next important line?”

  “Where do you want this killing done?”

  “And the last?”

  “Down on Highway Sixty-One.”

  An angry cry drew their eyes. Rothko was screaming at the huge triptych on the west wall. Then his screams were drowned out by the roar of fire.

  “What . . .”

  “I’m surprised it took them so long,” Seth said.

  “Took who?”

  “The believers.”

  “But why would—”

  “Because if this is a path, then only one of two things can be true. Either there are more paths than they subscribe to, or their path is wrong.”

  The benches in the centre of the Rothko Chapel burst into flame as all fourteen paintings exploded into rectangles of fire.

  Rothko slumped to the floor and held his head in his hands.

  “Why aren’t—”

  “—we able to feel the heat, Father?”

  “Yes, that.”

  “Because we are not really here.”

  “Is this really happening, Seth?”

  “A foolish question.”

  “Why?”

  “Because this is a dream; besides, “really” is a child’s word. And only a child uses it, because an adult knows that real is a totally relative idea. What’s real to you need not be real to me—in fact, it’s unlikely that it’s real to me. Like that scalpel in your hand.”

  Decker looked down and was shocked to see a surgical blade in his palm.

  Seth held up his hands. Where his baby fingers should have been there were only bloody stumps.

  “Tell me what to do,” Decker demanded.

  “Help me.”

  “Anything. I want to help you. I need to help you.”

  “You will. Before we get to the end, I have a battle to fight. And I’ll need your help.”

  “Tell me how.”

  “Are you waking dreaming yet?”

  “Like this?”

  “Yes, like this.”

  “Sometimes.”

  “No good. Can you waking dream on command?”

  “No.”

  “Then figure out how, dammit.”

  “Okay.”

  “When I need you I’ll find you there, in a waking dream. Now pick up the scalpel, Father.”

  Decker hadn’t realized that he’d dropped it. He reached down and picked up the thing. He held it out to Seth, who took Decker’s right hand and put it against his own heart, then with his right hand grabbed his father’s left hand, his knife hand, and plunged the blade hilt-deep into his own chest.

  Blood covered Decker’s right hand.

  “Seth.”

  “Don’t cry, Father, we are not really even here.”

  Decker stumbled back and looked past Seth. Two giraffes were outlined against the rising sun, and a herd of oryx were moving slowly to the east.

  Linwood came up behind him and put a huge hand on his shoulder.

  “Did you see—”

  “What you saw? No. But I felt the shift.”

  “The sliding, you mean,” Decker said, suddenly calm.

  “Sliding? Yes, why not call it sliding. It’s worlds trying to align themselves. The one I see and the one you just came from. And the place of meeting—the junction—is always complicated.”

  26

  THE SLIDING—NEBRASKA

  LINWOOD WAS NOT THE ONLY one who felt the sliding of worlds.

  In the Nebraska cornfield in which he had slept, Martin Armistaad felt the movement and knew his time to act was short. He took a long piss, painting a seven-foot-high cornstalk with his urine. Then, after a grateful sigh, he began to work on a dangling piece of barbed wire fencing. Back and forth, back and forth until the heat came and the wire broke free in his hand. He headed towards the farmhouse where his pi-generated calculation told him Viola Tripping had to be.

  • • •

  The sliding literally threw Viola from her bed. But when she hit the floor, she made no effort to rise. She skittered like a crab across the coarse floorboards of the farmhouse to the corner, pressed her tiny body against the walls and allowed her thoughts to splay out across the landscape. She sensed him out there, moving towards her like a monitor lizard after an injured fawn.

  Sora came in and saw Viola on the floor. She’d seen Viola agitated, but never like this. “Viola.”

  “Shh! He’s coming.”

  “Who is—”

  Then Viola was crying.

  “Why are you—”

  “Because, dear Sora, you will—”

  She never got out the word “die” because Martin Armistaad’s barbed wire garrote slipped around Sora’s neck. The woman struggled and managed to land an elbow to Martin Armistaad’s face. Martin spit a tooth to the floor, then applied real pressure. The wire bit and cut so deeply that her head fell to her shoulder.

  Viola did not move or cry out.

  Martin Armistaad tossed his blooded garrote wire aside, cleaned his hands on his pants and spat another tooth to the floor. But he wasn’t concerned about his teeth. He turned to Viola. “You feel it?”

  “Of course.”

  “Do you know who I am?”

  “Not by name. But yes, I know you are of the clearing.”

  “As are you.”

  Viola nodded.

  “Do you know the way to the glass house?”

  “No, I only saw the path once.”

  “When we were together?”

  She nodded.

  Armistaad crossed the room to her and held out his hand.

  Viola didn’t take it.

  “Only together can we find the glass house—isn’t that true?”

  Viola got to her feet. “You are the enemy.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “You are the enemy of the clearing.”

  “Again, I say perhaps. But for sure, you are stuck in the clearing as I am. Only together can we find the glass house.”

  Viola knew it was true, had known it for a long time. She was stuck in the clearing and could not find the glass house by herself. She’d hoped that Decker Roberts could lead her out of the clearing to the house. That’s why she’d agreed to help after the bombing at Ancaster College, but he didn’t seem even to know that he was in the clearing.

  At least this man knew that. She watched him as he knelt down and picked up his teeth. One he tossed aside. The other he pocketed. Seeing her questioning look he smiled, a gap-toothed smile, and said, “Damned thing hurt like hell to put in my mouth, so I’m keeping it.” Then he grabbed Viola by the hair and dragged her towards the door.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Away. Away from here.”

  “But where?”

  “A portal. Don’t we need a portal to get to the clearing then the glass house?”

  She freed herself from his grip and said, “Yes, but they’re closing, can’t you feel that?”

  “Yes, I feel that—all of us from the clearing feel that.” He thought for a second and then said, “Then we go to where the two worlds meet, the source—the one portal that never closes.”

  She nodded, freed herself from his grip, then headed towards her bedroom.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “To get a sh
awl. I hear it’s cold up there.”

  27

  THE SLIDING—MARINA AND HER FRIENDS

  AS MARINA FELT THE SLIDING she pulled a sweater over her head. She now knew that it was finally time to begin, so she said to her father, “It’s our turn.”

  Eddie sighed deeply—Fourteen years old and still with the imaginary friends, he thought. Then he corrected himself: Fourteen and on her own path. But at least we are together here on Indian Road—in the Junction.

  He allowed his mind to drift to his friend Decker and wondered where exactly he was. He hadn’t seen him since their brief time in San Francisco when he’d saved him from that cop. Of course he’d also removed the hidden transponder he’d placed in Decker’s copy of that odd little play Love and Pain and the Dwarf in the Garden, so that, as he had so cleverly put it, Now, Decker, you’re finally really on your own.

  He thought back to Decker in high school—what a snot—then to Decker finding him homeless on Yonge Street and offering him a place to live, then to Sarah, Decker’s wife, whom he had nursed through her final torturous months on this plane.

  “It’s our turn,” Marina said again.

  “So it’s your turn now, is it?” he asked the empty air.

  “No, our turn,” Marina said.

  Eddie turned from his computer to the door of his study, and there stood Marina, gangly and blond. To her left was a grossly fat young man with the clear facial markings of Down syndrome, while to her right was a tall thin boy, maybe eighteen or nineteen, whose head moved in a constant figure-eight pattern as his feet tapped on the hardwood floor. His eyes were closed. All three held hands.

  “And who are—”

  “Friends, Dada. These are my friends.”

  He smiled. “Your friends are always welcome here, Marina.”

  Then she said the oddest thing, “Of course—because it’s our turn.”

  “Your turn for what, Marina?”

  Instantly he was sorry that he’d asked. She was retreating, her shoulders turned in, her head down. “Sorry, Marina. Daddy’s sorry, sweetie. Of course it’s your turn.”

  “Sad,” she said.

  Carefully Eddie asked, “Why, Marina? Why is it sad?”

  “Because, all that you in your heart of hearts believe is true . . . is all not true, Father.”

  Eddie didn’t know what to say. He’d never heard Marina put together a sentence anywhere near as cogent as this one, nor had he any idea what she meant—and, oh yes, it was the first time ever that she’d called him Father.

  28

  DREAM CRASH

  WJ WATCHED AS SETH LITERALLY fell from the sky and landed with a hard thud on the LED floor.

  The boy’s eyes snapped open—and he smiled.

  “What?” WJ demanded.

  “Nothing. Nothing the likes of you would ever be able to understand.”

  “Is that so? You underestimate me.”

  WJ stood. The boy watched him closely. Then without saying another word, the grey-haired freak flipped off the lights. In the total darkness the thunk of the deadbolt sliding to had an ominous sound.

  But Seth didn’t care. The battle lines were drawn—and now he had to prepare. Besides, darkness had always been his ally.

  29

  YSLAN ON THE WAY TO SAN FRANCISCO

  ON THE PLANE TO SAN Francisco, Yslan called up the synaesthetes’ website and was quickly greeted with the pop-up videos of Daniel Tammet learning Icelandic in less than a week and the Human Camera painting the Paris skyline from memory. She waited for a prompt to use Harrison’s private password, which the forensic guy had given her. She waited for several minutes, but there was no prompt, just random lines and swirls crisscrossing the screen. She closed the website and called it up a second time. She closed down the two pop-ups when they came up. But she still couldn’t find a box to enter Harrison’s password. In frustration she closed the website.

  She looked out the window at the clouds over the Rocky Mountains. She saw them swirl and crouch as they obscured her vision of the peaks. She watched them closely, her mind automatically trying to find a pattern, but there was none—at least no pattern that she could discern.

  She thought about that—no pattern that she could discern. But that didn’t mean that there wasn’t a pattern—only that she couldn’t find it.

  After a moment’s hesitation, she tapped Emerson on the shoulder.

  He leaned across her to see the screen, his body way too close to hers. “At your service, Mistress.”

  “Cut it out.”

  She pulled up the synaesthetes’ website for the third time and once again quickly closed down both of the pop-ups. “Can you see a pattern on the screen?”

  Emerson watched closely for almost a full minute, then said, “The pop-ups didn’t just blink out—they both vacated the screen to the lower right-hand corner. Move the cursor there.”

  She did and hit enter.

  Nothing.

  Emerson pulled the computer over to his tray and watched the patterns moving on the screen. As he watched he slowly pieced together the formations that the zipping and zapping lines were making. “They come from all directions, but they all cross—sometimes after exotic patterns—at a point on the left side of the screen,” he said.

  She watched closely to be sure that he was right. He moved her cursor to that spot and hit enter. A dialogue box came up: Welcome Fellow Traveller. If You’re One of Us You’ll Know What to Do.

  Then the box disappeared. Yslan was lost.

  “Patterns sometimes have two nodes. Usually in diametric opposition to each other,” Emerson said.

  Yslan took back the computer and watched the lines continue their seemingly random patterns on the screen. She placed her cursor where she had before and after hitting enter got the same message. But she wasn’t looking at the message. She was looking at the place on the screen the dialogue box had come up. She moved her cursor to the exact opposite position on the right part of the screen and hit enter. An empty dialogue box came up, then the instruction Enter your private code. If you make a mistake you won’t be able to access the site for a calendar month—so type carefully.

  “What a team we are,” Emerson said.

  Yslan ignored him and typed #1=Seth into the box, then waited.

  Another dialogue box popped open dead centre: It’s been too long since your last visit—supply your second identifier to enter the site.

  Yslan pulled her fingers away from the keyboard.

  “Did the techs give you a second password for Harrison?”

  Yslan shook her head.

  A digital clock appeared in the dialogue box and began to count down from twenty.

  When the counter hit three Yslan typed end of days—and waited.

  Nothing.

  Then the entire screen seemed to do a backflip. When it reoriented, a video came up slowly: a monk—singing notes into a domed ceiling—chords coming down—him rising—turning upside down—spinning in midair. And as he turned Yslan finally saw his face, and blanched. It was Decker Roberts’ son, Seth—number 1 by the blood-red star in the thorax of Scorpio.

  30

  LINWOOD AND DECKER—CONVERSATIONS

  IT HAD BECOME A NIGHTLY thing.

  As the sun set and Decker finished the last of the pies, he left the small kitchen and headed towards the stack of tire rims. Beside it was the compressed air hose, which he used to wash the dust from his hands. He then removed his clothing and cleaned the rest of his body with the compressed air.

  Several of the African workers had taken to smoking and applauding him as if he were disrobing for their entertainment. Even from the start it didn’t bother him because as he felt the air push against his skin he was watching the sun set over the desert and hearing the movement of the lions waking for the nightly hunt. To the west in the hills he sensed the leopards rousing and stretching, the bat-eared foxes slinking from their caverns and the oryx moving carefully as the sunlight, their greatest protector,
sank below the horizon.

  He’d put on the clothes that Linwood had given him. They hung off his body like Spanish moss on an ancient oak.

  But he didn’t care.

  He’d had a day of several hundred kowtows, and with each—each pie—he somehow felt lighter.

  He didn’t remember eating.

  In the first days he had eaten some of the pies he made, but that quickly stopped. The smell of apples never sickened him, but it no longer attracted him either.

  As the last red strokes of the day shot skyward in a farewell to the living, Linwood would enter his tiny room, and without a word they would leave and begin to walk—at night, without protection, without a weapon—amongst the beasts of the desert. But they were never approached. Even the wild dogs seemed to know to give Linwood a wide berth. As they walked, Decker often heard the dogs’ muffled coughing in the brush and always saw their eyes, red rimmed and piercing, watching—always watching.

  Some nights he and Linwood sat on the petrified logs by the dry riverbed, other nights on the red boulders that were stacked against the rise to the west. Some nights they didn’t stop anywhere and simply walked till the dawn.

  Decker couldn’t remember when he’d last slept—or felt tired for that matter. He’d broached the subject with Linwood, but all he ever got back from the big man was, “If you’re tired you should sleep.”

  “But I’m not tired. I’m never tired.”

  “Then surely it would be foolish to sleep.” Decker had nodded. Then Linwood surprised him. “But you’ve learned that you don’t have to sleep in order to dream.”

  He’d never thought of it that way, but yes, he’d been dreaming while awake for some time now.

  So he nodded. Linwood kicked at the ground, and a puff of the vast desert rose to his knees. He said, “Some call it the bardo; it’s just being inside the forest.”

  When he’d asked him to elaborate, he got the usual response from Linwood; “Silly questions don’t deserve answers.”

  That night, though, Linwood didn’t speak for several hours, and they walked miles to the north. Finally they saw the brimming of dawn and Linwood turned to him. “So, when Eve ate the apple, what happened?”