I found a black room without windows or mosaics. It was painted so dark that it seemed like an endless cavern, without shadows or corners. I thought if I entered the room I would fall down into like an abyss.
Yet when I touched the floor the room lit up. A storm of living fire blew from one end of the room to the other, and an immense cloud heavy with lightning appeared on the ceiling, swirling with white light.
I jerked back as if I would burst into flames. When I stepped out of the room back into the hallway the light and the storm shut down, casting the room back into black. Only then did I realize the fire had passed through me without hurting me.
I stepped back into the room and the fire once more blew through the room. This time, I didn't go back into the corridor. The cloud appeared once more and the lightning struck down upon the center of the room. The glowing fire danced upon the walls, the floor. I pressed my hands into the storm and it flowed straight through me.
In the center of the room shapes emerged out of the fire and the lightning. The shapes appeared to have no beginning or end, no discernible identity. They kept shifting in and out of different forms. One minute the figures seemed to have wings or the heads of animals. The next they dissolved into abstract shapes, wheels and intersecting locks and glittering curves.
A voice emanated from the center of the room.
“Stand on your feet and I will speak to you,” it said.
“Hello?” I called out.
I grasped at the front of my shirt and my face and hands broke out in sweat.
“Stand on your feet and I will speak to you.”
“Hello?” I repeated, “I don't understand.”
“Stand on your feet and I will speak to you.”
“Who are you?”
“Stand on your feet and I will speak to you.”
“What do you want?”
“Stand on your feet and I will speak to you.”
The fire continued to blow through me. The cloud of lightning expanded until it filled the entire ceiling. The light in the center of the room grew so intense that I had to shield my eyes. A whining hiss filled the room, like gas escaping from a valve. The cloud shook with thunder.
I stepped back into the hallway. The room dropped back into blackness. Into silence.
“Are you still there?” I called to the black room.
No reply.
“Hello?”
No reply
I left the black room and went down the hallway. Soon I found the way out of the temple and back into the pale desert. I kept touching my arms, my face, as if afraid my skin would soon blow away.
Chapter Eight
An electrician approached me while I lay half dead on the steps of his office. I did not remember traveling through the desert to that town. I did not remember collapsing on the steps. I only remembering dreaming I kept bending down to drink from pools of water that turned into Leda's dead body, dreaming that wherever the sun burned me the girl I murdered in the pagan temple touched me with her crumbling tongue.
The electrician bent down and cupped his hand under my nose to see if I was still breathing. He woke me up from my half dead stupor, with the creaking, of his bones and the smell of leather.
“Did the monsters get you, son?” the electrician asked me.
I reached up and grasped his hand. He squeezed my wrist gently in response. I tried to speak, but could only gasp.
“What was that, son?” the electrician said. His words were slow and cracked. They moved around him like a fragile relic.
“Have I made it yet?” I managed to say.
“This is Stonebrook. And this here is my electrician office. Where were you hoping to make it to?”
“The sea,” I said.
The electrician gave my hand another squeeze. “No more than a few hours to the east.”
“Thank you,” I said.
I passed out in his arms.
I woke up a few seconds later, sick and lightheaded, with my head against his chest. His hands were against my back, and he attempted to pull me up off the steps. I tried to speak, but passed out again.
The next time I awoke I found myself lying inside the electrician's shop, on top of his desk beside an industrial fan. I sat up on the desk and the electrician gave me a glass of water to drink.
“Sip it slowly,” he said, “you look like you've had quite an adventure.”
“You're crazy for helping me,” I said.
“I know, but I already checked you for weapons when you were passed out. I learned my lesson when the last one tried to steal my kidneys.”
I moved to get off the desk.
“Hold on there for just a hot minute,” the electrician said, “You better slow down unless you want to pass out again.”
I sighed and lay back down. My fingers twitched, as if trying to reach out and hold tight to something.
“Just stay there and don't make any trouble for me,” he said.
“Okay,” I said, “okay.”
The electrician turned to his work desk, which was cluttered with wires, busted light boxes, gutted out appliances. He picked up a screwdriver and started unscrewing the plate off the back of a television.
“What's your name?”
“The electrician,” he said.
I said nothing for a while after that. I closed my eyes and passed in and out of unconscious several times underneath the cooling fan. After a while the electrician brought me more water to drink. Then some of his dry rations. I took slow bites and chewed a long time before swallowing.
Two cats walked into the room. A large calico and a brown kitten. They wrestled each other beside the desk, mewling and spitting. The electrician tossed them a small mechanical toy resembling a horse. The mechanical horse fell on its side and tossed its legs, moving on its back in circles against the floor. The cats batted the toy and then stopped and stared at it until it ceased moving.
Something about the mechanical horse made me feel uneasy. I thought the mechanical horse might be kicking me in the teeth. Something about the way the cats slunk around the toy, like it was a stranger, a monster, made me think that a fundamental rule of physics in the universe had been suddenly and inexplicably altered. The mechanical horse seemed enormous and everything else small.
I got down off the desk and left the electrician's office. While I was walking down the steps the electrician caught the door behind me and called after me.
“Where are you going?” the electrician asked me.
“Your horse toy is scaring the shit out of me,” I said.
“What?”
“Forget it. It doesn't matter,” I said.
“Why don't you stay for a while?” he asked me.
I stopped and looked back at the electrician. He stood in the doorway touching his throat. On his throat was a white scar.
“You remind me too much of my father,” I said.
“I remind everyone of their father,” the electrician said, “you shouldn't leave so soon. Come home and have dinner with my family. I'll see you make it onto the bus tomorrow to get where you need to be going.”
I wanted to protest. I wanted to tell him I wasn't falling for his tricks, I may look young but I wasn't born yesterday, oh no sir, that he probably wanted to take me home so his family could murder me and store my body with the rest of the dead young idiots in his smoldering attic.
Instead I collapsed again in the streets because of the heat and the weakness shaking through my head. The electrician picked me up and took me back into his office. I lay on the desk underneath the fan while he wrapped a bandage around my bleeding head.
“I'll stay,” I said, my voice a murmur, “I'll stay. Just put that horse where I can't see it.”
He picked up the horse toy and put it into a closet, then shut the door and went back to his workbench. I stayed on the desk until he closed his office and took me to his home.
By the time we got to his house I could walk as long as I clutched his shoulder
for support. When we got to his front door he stopped for a moment and I wobbled, trying not to fall.
“I should tell you something,” he said.
“What?”
“Just brace yourself for what’s about to happen next.”
He swung the door open and at the opposite end of the room sat his daughter and wife, waiting at a candlelit dining table.
A prepared meal of breaded catfish, jelly, fried bread, and wedding cake lay out on the table in front of the two women. The wife wore a necklace with an eye sized, pale green jewel, and a black smock and animal red shoes. She sat with her arms folded in front of her on the table, the silverware in perfect alignment with her needle thin fingertips. The daughter wore a wedding dress.
“Where did you get all this food?” was the first thing I asked.
"We're so glad you’re here," the wife said, "ever since my daughter's fiancé died we haven’t had much company. Would you like to see his ghost picture? We purchased it from a psychic."
I looked over on the wall to see a framed picture of an almost indiscernible figure floating in a black space. Brilliant light of all different colors swelled on the figure's body. Thin filaments of hair splayed out from the figure's head in all directions. Hair colored orange and blue.
"It's a fake," I said.
"No, I'm positive he was a real psychic. Won't you sit down?" the wife said.
"What is this?" I asked.
“Sit down for a while and have something to eat,” he said.
I hesitated. The electrician touched my shoulder. Then he touched the white scar on his throat.
“Eat. I’m sure you’re hungry.”
I sat down at the table in the chair opposite of the woman in the wedding dress.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
"Call me Mrs. Fredrick," the woman in the wedding dress said in a scarred, scratched voice. I couldn't see her face, hidden behind the veil. She picked at her wrists until they were red.
I picked up a fork and grabbed a biscuit, trying to hide the fact that my fingers were shaking, that the blood swelled in my ears like a swarm of bees.
“So where are you from?” the electrician’s wife asked me.
“Edgewater,” I said.
“Edgewater, I’ve never heard of it,” the wife said.
“Mother,” Mrs. Frederick said, and she shook her head, “we’ve been through this before. You know where he’s from.”
. As her daughter spoke to her, the wife’s needle thin fingers touched the jewel on her necklace.
“Don’t ask questions like that, mother,” the daughter continued, “not when you know the answers.”
“Darling, settle down,” the electrician said, “let’s try to enjoy our dinner, shall we?”
We ate for a while in silence. Even though I was hungry and couldn’t remember the last time I’d had a proper meal, I felt like I couldn’t swallow the food in front of me. I couldn’t drink the water, as if I was dying of rabies and the sight of it sunk me with fear. The air around the dinner table shook with heat.
"How did Mr. Fredrick die?" I asked. I turned to the electrician.
"The shuttles took him," the electrician said.
"I think it was all the pre-marital sex," the wife whispered to me.
She picked up her fork and knife and cut up her fish in precise, triangular shapes. She watched her food as if it might attack her.
"Would you like some wine?" Mrs. Fredrick asked me.
I said nothing.
Mrs. Fredrick uncorked a bottle of wine and poured me a glass. I took a sip, but the wine turned rancid once it hit my stomach.
"Aren't you hungry?" Mrs. Fredrick said, "you've barely touched your food."
"I'm fine," I said, “I don’t think I can eat anymore.”
“But we have all this wedding cake,” she said, “it’s a special occasion.”
Mrs. Fredrick’s face slipped down. In her wedding dress she seemed less of a person and more like a dolled up broken light bulb.
“Well, then you must stay the night,” Mrs. Fredrick said, “It’s too dangerous out there for you to leave.”
“Where am I going to sleep?” I asked.
“In my room, of course,” Mrs. Frederick, “it’s too cold to sleep out on the couch.”
I glanced at the electrician.
“Is this why you brought me here?” I asked.
He said nothing.
“Come upstairs,” Mrs. Frederick said, “you can get undressed and I’ll make the bed up for you.”
"I don't think this is necessary," I said, my voice quiet.
Mrs. Fredrick stood up from the table.
"I have everything prepared,” she said.
"I'm sure you don't need me to do this."
"There is no one left," she said.
I stood up abruptly.
“You brought me here so that your daughter could play dress up?” I asked the electrician, “a wedding dinner followed by a wedding night?”
“Mr. Frederick,” Mrs. Frederick said.
“Is that who I am for you?” I asked, “Your dead husband?”
"You're so silly," Mrs. Fredrick said, "come on upstairs. I'll undress you myself."
“This isn’t the first time you’ve done this, is it?” I asked, “And you two, you just help her continue her delusion.”
The electrician and his wife said nothing.
"Listen to me. You still have your father. And your mother. Most people don't even have that. This isn't the first time you've done this, is it? Find someone to play husband for you?"
"I'm leaving," I said.
The electrician stood up.
"Please don't go," he said.
"You are helping to make her sick, you know this?" I told the electrician, "don't you see what you're doing?"
"Why don't we all just calm down," the wife said, "have you tried the jelly? Have another piece of bread."
"We're all making this world worse than it needs to be," I said, "God hates us. He hates even his own prophets. He sends the plague machines to kill us and the shuttles to take us away. And what do we do? We become serial killers and madmen. Make each other into slaves. Cut ourselves off from love. We destroy each other more skillfully than God ever could."
"Mr. Fredrick, you're obviously not feeling well. Come upstairs. You're tired," Mrs. Fredrick said. She clutched the edge of the table so hard I thought it might break off in her fingers.
"That was a nice speech," the electrician said to me, "but what do you intend to do about it? You're as mad as any of us."
"I told you," I said, "I'm going to the ocean. My wife is probably gone forever, but I'm going to keep searching for the way home until I'm dead."
I headed for the front door. Mrs. Fredrick ran after me and grabbed my arm. She pushed her veil out of her face, so that I saw her blank, white face, her electric eyes, her pouting mouth - the perfect bride set in stone.
"Please don't go," she said.
"I can't do this," I said, "can't you see what you're doing to yourself?"
"It's dangerous out there."
"I can't stay here," I said.
I pried her fingers off my arm and went outside. Inside, Mrs. Fredrick cried out, but outside the sound seemed distant, muted. Someone turned on the television in the living room of the house.
"These are the ends times, ladies and gentlemen," I heard Teddy say, "A time when the faith of the people will be tested. Slim Sarah is not the only one who has been put on trial, but her exemplary example should be heeded. Only those who prove their obedience, who purify themselves in God's name, will be spared."
The electrician came outside.
"The blood of the sinners will flow through the streets," I heard come from the television. Not Teddy speaking anymore, but God. "There shall be no mercy for those who oppose me."
"Are you following me?" I asked the electrician.
He slipped money into my hand. "I came to give you this. For bus fare. To
get to the ocean."
"I'm a heretic," I said, "did you know that?"
I gripped the money tightly in my hand. After God finished speaking a great noise like a storm of wind rushed out of the television. I thought my body might obliterate on the spot.
"I hope you get where you need to be," the electrician said, "Nobody does, but I still hope you do."
We stood facing each other outside in the dark, with the great noise rushing past us, filling us with static.
"You were brave in there. With my daughter," the electrician said. "I didn't do what you wanted me to do."
"You were brave. She needed that."
I couldn't hide my shaking any longer. It invaded my entire body. It picked me and rattled me like a storm. I stumbled forward. The electrician caught me by the shoulders.
"I'm so scared," I whispered.
"Let that fear push you forward. Let it take you to the very end."
The electrician released me. I stepped back.
"I am the beginning and the end. I am all powerful and all knowing." God said, "and I will bring destruction to this cursed land."
"where can I find the bus stop?" I asked the electrician.
He told me.
"Thank you," I said.
I left the house and the electrician, and headed in the direction of the bus stop. I became lost in the dark. I ended up roaming the woods for a few hours looking for the way back to the road, back to the small town. In a small clearing, under the glare of the black moon, I found a girl thrashing in the weeds.
"Hello?" I called out, "are you okay?"
The girl said nothing. She continued to thrash on the ground, her body paralyzed in convulsions. I approached her and reached out to touch her, but before I could I realized she wasn't a girl at all.
She was a monster. A small, wiry monster with tusks and ragged black claws. Her protruding teeth dripped with poison. She whined and continued to thrash, oblivious to my presence.
I thought of the mechanical horse toy in the electrician's office. I thought of how it landed on its back but continued to move its legs, turning itself into a circle. Like the monster before me on the ground, twitching and thrashing, making small noises of pain as it trembled in paroxysms.
The dread I felt watching the toy horse returned. Stronger this time, pumping me with its poison. For long moments I couldn't move. I could only watch the monster kicking its legs, turning in circles on the ground. A monster seemingly unharmed except for this internal sickness making it spin in wounded circles around and around and around. Turning as if from the beginning of time, it had been in this clearing, trapped forever in perpetual motion. Unable to touch or be touched.
The Crooked God Machine Page 20