Mushroom.Man

  Back home I sat with the lights off. Moonlight flooded through the windows, bright enough to see by. It was an irresistible light. I put on my jacket and walked outside, toward the henge. I saw it in the moonlight, as real, as tangible as anything else. I touched the stones, letting my fingers explore their every crevice, feeling their massiveness, their coldness. I sat on the wet grass, my back against the central trilith. It was soft, giving, like an armchair. I turned and touched it. It was warm, like flesh. I moved and the moonlight caught it in full. An enormous face in the stone. Greg’s face. I felt his cheeks, his lips, touched the eyes. The eyes opened.

  ‘Greg?’

  ‘I hear you.’

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘I’m going back, old buddy. Back to the earth. For a while I floated like you, on the surface, now I’m going back to be a part of it again.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Of course you do. You always say that when you can’t think of anything else to say. It’s a meaningless mantra.’

  ‘Can I ask you a question?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Are any of these visions real?’

  ‘Look at the moon.’

  I turned to look at it. High in the sky now, it had lost its yellowness and had shrunk back to its normal size. Thin cloud high up gave it a halo, I was sure I could see a moonbow. It was so bright that no stars were visible anywhere near it. I turned back to the stone. The face was gone. I touched it; it was hard and cold. Did I imagine the face? I started to laugh. Absurd. Of course I had imagined it, I was imagining these stones. They weren’t here, they didn’t exist. They were lying on their sides in the ditch, not standing here casting shadows in the moonlight.

  I walked to the ditch, to where I knew at least two stones were. I could make them out in the moonlight, part of the wall, as I knew they should be. I looked back toward my house and the henge was gone. Just as it should be. Slowly I made my way back, enjoying the bright night. I was in front of the house when headlights shone up my lane. A car pulled in, a large and shiny one. It was Hartfield. He got out and came up to me.

  ‘So this is where you live. Very nice.’

  ‘You’re welcome. Come on in. I was just out walking.’

  ‘Sucker for punishment, eh?’

  ‘Suppose so.’

  ‘I’ll just call the girls.’

  He went back to the car and opened the doors. White Cloud and Yelena got out, still dressed in their walking clothes. They walked in, making much of wiping their feet on the mat.

  ‘Neat place,’ said Yelena.

  ‘Thanks. Would you like a drink? I’ve got some beer.’

  ‘Not for me. Got any mint tea?’

  ‘I’ve got some mint growing outside. That OK?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘I’ll have some too,’ said White Cloud.

  ‘Beer for me,’ said Hartfield.

  I got Hartfield a beer and then went out to pick the mint. When I came back the women were looking at a photograph on the wall of Greg, Jane and me.

  ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘Jane. She used to live here with me.’

  ‘And this?’

  ‘An old friend of mine. Greg Holder.’

  When I think back on this moment I’m sure that the two women exchanged a glance. Maybe not, but I think they did. Yelena put the photo back on the wall. As she raised her arms, I saw damp sweat marks.

  ‘She’s pretty.’

  ‘Yes.’

  I made the tea and while we sipped our drinks I waited to hear the purpose of the visit. Hartfield began.

  ‘The girls think you might be interested in some news.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Tell him, White Cloud.’

  ‘OK. Remember I told you about the Church of the Immortals this afternoon? Well Jerry Konstad is coming here. Next week in fact, to our church. We thought maybe you’d like to come.’

  ‘Oh. Right. Yeah, that might be interesting. Sure.’

  Strange. Did they really need to come here to tell me that? A phone call would have done. Don’t see them for two years, then twice in the same day. Hartfield got up abruptly.

  ‘Thanks for the beer. We’ll leave you to it. Girls.’

  Before I’d got my thoughts into order they’d gone. I watched Hartfield negotiate the potholes on the lane until I could no longer hear the car. I sat in my favourite chair and enjoyed the silence. Far away a nightjar called.

  Connections. Real or imaginary? I tried to analyse them, tried to ascertain if my perceptions of connections running through my life were actual, or whether they were a product of my wish to find them. The first problem I had to deal with was conceit. Was it really possible that this odd group of people that had affected my life were entangled because of me? Unlikely, surely. If I were honest with myself I could see that my life was uneventful, fruitless, and possibly purposeless. Given that, why should anyone’s destiny be linked to mine? Jane through Greg, Clair through Dave and some ley-line. White Cloud and Yelena through Greg. Or maybe not. I might have imagined the last one. A turbulent picture of links real and imagined. Maybe the only reason they appear to be connected to me is because that’s where I see it from. My point of view; an egocentric universe.

  A maxim of Cicero came to mind. Verœ amicitiœ sempiternœ sunt, real friendships are forever. Maybe that was the point. What defines friendship is the binding of destinies together. Once linked, the bond is forever. Across the years, across realities, maybe even across lives.

  Amanita phalloides. The Death Cap.

  Cap 2–6 inches. White with white gills. Smells of potatoes.

  Recognised by ring on stem and egg-like base.

  In deciduous woods, occasionally coniferous, especially under oak.

  Summer to early autumn.

  Virulently poisonous, kills by destroying liver and kidneys.

  No antidote after symptoms appear.

  fourteen

  This last message pleased me more than any other that I’d got from the mushroom.man. He had finally acknowledged, however tangentially, something that I had written. He had responded to my assertion that he dwelt almost to the point of pathological intensity on his relationships with Greg and Jane – although I hadn’t put it as strongly as that. He had also described his interactions with people in the present sufficiently for me to get a real impression of his interpersonal relationships.

  By any standards this was real progress. What could well have been described as two sequential monologues was verging on becoming a dialogue. Well, perhaps not completely. There was still the difference that asynchronicity makes to a dialogue. It was a dialogue with no grace-notes, no spontaneous asides. But that was dictated by the format of the exchange, not by individual volition. I felt as if we had been singing two different melodies in different rhythms, and that now they were somehow moving into phase.

  I really believed that we had crossed some kind of Rubicon; or rather he had. Whatever had first prompted him to correspond with me, now his motivation appeared to be the content of my e-mails. I was sure now that the strategems I had pursued were apt to the task and had shown themselves to be effective. I resisted the temptation to be totally direct from now on, but the thrust of my enquiries became more invasive.

  By the end of September preparations for the new university term were under way. I wanted to have the bulk of my research completed soon, leaving me free to devote my energies to my job rather than to the peculiar relationship I had developed with the mushroom.man. So in the hope of learning more of what I wanted to know I sent him this:

  Attn. mushroom.man.

  Subject: philosophy.

  27 September.

  Tell me this. I understand that your attachment to the daily world is as tenuous as you can make it whilst keeping body and soul together. However, you presumably have some kind of rationale that dictates the hows and the whys. You’ve made it plain that you don’t take mushrooms for recreation, only for explorati
on, and I accept that. What I don’t know is why you do it. Where do you think it’ll lead? I’d be grateful if you could try to answer that.

  That was about as direct as I was prepared to be. He could be evasive if he wished, but with such direct questions it would be an obvious evasion. I was sure that he would give me some kind of reply based on my questions. I was so sure of it that I began collating and organizing everything he’d sent me in preparation for the first draft of my paper. I had my answer in a few days.

  Attn. mushroom.seeker.

  Subject: immortality.

  2 October.

  I was preparing Petri plates when the phone rang. It was Hartfield and he wanted me to come to his house that afternoon. I had no reason to refuse, so I accepted. Also I was curious about the Church of the Immortals. He didn’t say as much, but I was sure that was the reason for the call.

  I’d been thinking about this idea of immortality as a sort of prize for living well. I couldn’t take it seriously and anyway, I was by no means sure that I wanted to live forever. Not if it meant giving up tobacco.

  It all depends on how you perceive death. If you sanctify life then you have to demonize death, since it puts an end to a state of sanctity. Yet as far as we are aware it is unavoidable and therefore our state of sanctity is temporary. Preserving sanctity means postponing death for as long as possible. And yet most religions insist that a better state awaits after death. Valhalla, heaven, nirvana are supposed by many to be a better place. If that’s true then perhaps we should be rushing toward our death rather than seeking to avoid it.

  I can’t help believing that life and death are like light and dark. One state is dependent upon the other. They can’t be separated; one is simply the absence of the other. This relates only to the physical state: a body lives and breathes and then a body dies. But somewhere in this equation you have to make room for transcendence. The spark of awareness seems to be linked to the body, but is also in some way separate. I have experienced travel without the hindrance of my body. You may say that is a hallucination, but the experience differed in no way from experiences like taking a bus. There were actions and reactions, sensory stimuli – a sensation of being there. In any sense of the word the experience was real simply because it was experienced.

  So believing that the mind can exist apart from the body in life means that I have to consider the possibility of the same being true after death. Certainly my apparently real, recent conversations with Greg have forced me to think about it.

  If the Church of the Immortals has anything to offer it seems to me that it offers stasis. Remaining alive forever allows for no change in experience. Would you want to be an infant forever? A teenager forever? Why an adult forever? Because death is so bound up with life it has to be part of the process of living and should be embraced as such. Whether it’s part of a personal continuum I’m unsure, but that it’s part of the process of an evolving life-form is certain. Because death leaves room for birth, new life, new vigour, new ideas, new mutations of the basic pattern. Without death everything remains still. Individuals would survive, but what of the evolution of the human race?

  When I can no longer cast a shadow on the world it is my time to make room for another. My path must be the quest for the universal consciousness. In the billions of galaxies life assumes a myriad of forms, millions of strategies for perpetuity, millions of chemical combinations that allow for the support of thought. There is a real possibility that even were we to meet a non-human intelligence, we might not recognize it as such. Our extraterrestrial icons are culturally hidebound. We imagine bipedal beings that organize matter into technological societies because that is what we do. The mushroom experience shows us that intelligence can be supported by biological systems vastly different from the human organism. Haldane’s universe is not only stranger than we suppose, but stranger than we can suppose.

  I walked to Hartfield’s house wondering why I was allowing myself to be drawn into his world. I realized that I had never said ‘no’ to any of his suggestions. But it was like dipping a toe in the water; I was sampling parts of his world, not committing myself to it. As I walked up Hartfield’s drive I counted the cars; they lined the side of his drive and filled his car park. I counted forty-three. A mist hung low on the ground, blurring the outline of trees and deadening sounds. I knocked, and the butler showed me into the ballroom, a huge room that I’d never been in before. It was arranged like a lecture-hall, chairs were placed in rows and faced a rostrum on which stood a lectern. Hartfield came over to me as I walked in.

  ‘Thanks for coming. I think you might find it interesting.’

  ‘I’m sure I will.’

  ‘Sit here.’ He put a pamphlet in my hand. ‘This’ll give you an idea of what this is all about.’

  He left me to greet more arrivals and I sat down and read the pamphlet. Jerry Konstad was going to talk to us about immortality. It was mine for the taking; all I had to do was listen and put preconceptions aside. I looked around at the assembled guests. Every one of them looked prosperous, well-dressed and well-groomed. There was a lot of money in this room. Hartfield walked up to the lectern and welcomed us to his house. He asked White Cloud to say a few words. She spoke in a strong voice, imparting a sense of occasion, a sense of importance to the meeting that we had chosen to attend. She introduced Jerry Konstad, and left him the stage.

  He was a small man, five-foot-six maybe, with silver hair and an expensive haircut. His suit was dark grey and well cut; a large and heavy gold bracelet occasionally appeared from beneath his cuff. He had an infectious smile and pearly white teeth with a perfect bite. He spoke slowly at first, looking up very little, but gradually his speech quickened, his movements became darting, he walked the rostrum, his gestures punctuating his staccato sentences. There was a real sense of evangelism in the room, palpable excitement. We were chosen people; we were being offered extraordinary knowledge long hidden from the masses, known only to a few adepts. Wisdom that had been known through the ages, but kept secret. Now, through the Church, we could become privy to something divine – the same immortality enjoyed by the gods. History was being rewritten, the future belonged to those who would be immortal. The choice was ours.

  ‘To succeed in its mission the Church needs your commitment. I won’t beat around the bush here; the truth is too important. For our church to bring its message to the whole of the human race we need your whole-hearted commitment. We need to buy air-time, print pamphlets, bring together our members in conventions all around the globe, spread the word. Without you, each and every one of you, none of this is possible. Who here will listen? Who will heed the message? You? You? You? Who will become immortal?

  ‘That’s the gift I offer to you today. Not immortality after death, but immortality now. This is no new discovery – from the ancient Egyptian high priest Imhotep to the Count of Saint Germain, there have been immortals. The philosopher’s stone was no trick to transmute lead into gold; no, my friends – the alchemists’ search, the Holy Grail, the secret of the Templars, was nothing more than the knowledge I offer you today.

  ‘It is no easy path that I offer you. When you commit yourself to the Church of the Immortals it is for life – eternal life. We are your family, your support, your staff if you will, upon which to lean in times of adversity. For there will be hard times ahead; there will be mockery and wilful misunderstanding, there may even be persecution. You may waver, you may harbour doubts, you may want to turn your back on The Way; but we will be here for you. Eternally.

  ‘Today, right now, a door is opened for you. A new path will be offered you, a path that only the chosen tread. Initiates will devote much of the next two years of their lives to the Church, studying, working and spreading the faith. Does that sound like a long time? Think, my friends, two years is but the blink of an eye in eternity.’

  The sense of expectation and excitement was by now throbbing through the room. Jerry stood at the rostrum and called for silence. ‘Let the mee
ting begin.’ He paused, and let everyone settle down. ‘You!’, he pointed, ‘what’s your name?’

  ‘Marianne Lesley.’

  ‘Marianne, step up here beside me and profess with me. That’s it, stand there. Marianne, do you want to live forever?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Louder.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Louder!’

  ‘Yes I do!’

  ‘You want to live forever?’

  ‘I do!’

  ‘Do you dare to be immortal?’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘Then welcome to our Church. May the Way grow within you. May your belief be absolute and know no doubts. May your certainty shine out like a beacon for all to see. Marianne, with faith, immortality is yours!’

  Jerry started the applause, and the room shook with it. One by one he worked his way through the gathering, choosing his candidates carefully and professing them in their new faith. Before he had finished, more people were pledging their lives to him. I was frightened; although I believed it was pure theatre, I could feel the strength of the communal will. The gathering had its own momentum, sweeping all waverers along, like a vortex that fed on the crowd, its appetite continually growing. Once again Jerry called for silence.

  ‘There are some among you who have made no commitment today. We feel no anger toward you, no bitterness; but we are disappointed. You have been offered great knowledge; a wonderful gift has been proffered you, and you have not availed of it. Think on this. A chance of enlightenment does not come to you every day. It is rare and precious. Seize the day; take what is offered to you with an open heart. Let the joy of faith and certitude into your lives. I beseech you, join with us, be a part of our movement, take this step on the road to joy, become as us – immortal.’