Dystopia

by Richard Christian Matheson

  He was asking her to follow him.

  She didn't acknowledge it for a moment, glancing away, absorbed in her tears and the insane, kayak-paddling of morning traffic. But she finally looked over at him and nodded, and together they fought the steaming freeway for another quarter-mile, taking the next off-ramp.

  They parked under a huge freeway bridge, and he got out of his LTD and ran through puddles to her car, shoes soaking, schedule in irreversible jeopardy. She had her window re-closed, and when he peered in, she looked out cautiously at him, then slowly slid it down; a defensive barricade being lowered. Her engine was idling and the exhaust pillowed them in oily white.

  He stood there, not knowing what to say, and they both stared at each other, seeming to sense the condition of the other's life. The trapped, contracted-for agreement of jobs and marriage and relationships with people who didn't care about them; what they were deep inside, where no one could see. The arrangements of time and convenience that a life, any life, could become. The empty experiences and decisions that most often served efficiency, rarely a heart.

  He saw those things in her face.

  And he was sure she saw them in his.

  And under that bridge, with hundreds of tons of cars and lives and people and schedules and emptiness roaring overhead, they smiled at each other and he got in her car, and they drove away together.

  ORAL

  "What do you want me to do?"

  "Seashells. Have you ever touched one?"

  "Yes."

  "In a detailed way?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Describe it to me."

  "The shell I touched was on a beach in Florida. It was a nautilus with a pearly spiral. Rough and sharp on the . . . skin of it."

  "Analogy of touch. Good. Go on."

  "It was heavy."

  "How heavy?"

  "A pound. Maybe a pound and a quarter."

  "Tell me about the inside."

  "There were . . . slender twists. Corkscrews. Glassy surfaces like. . ."

  ". . . yes?"

  ". . . the interior of an ancient bottle."

  "Did you put your hands into it?"

  ". . . three fingers. I reached them in, and they moved as if sliding on curved glass . . . they felt like they were gliding into a glove, they fit so perfectly. The walls were cool, and there were grains of sand that scraped my fingertips."

  "Did your fingers get wet?"

  "The interior was a little moist. I forgot that."

  "Try to remember everything."

  "I will. It felt . . . petrified. Is that the word?"

  "Yes. Like rock. Hard and cold. Dead."

  "But still alive. Able to sustain temperature and color. The contours were like a body. The textures seemed to be . . . feeling me."

  A pleased stare.

  "I made you feel something when I described the shell?"

  "Yes."

  "Like it was real?"

  "Yes."

  "Were you excited?"

  "Yes."

  "You could buy a shell."

  "I don't come near what others have touched."

  "People have touched everything. It's life."

  "No. The opposite. Fingerprints signal oncoming death. Germs cling to surfaces. Waiting to cause illness, suffering. Disinfection is impossible."

  Silence.

  "But you miss touching things. You must."

  Silence.

  "Is that why I'm here?"

  "Let's go on." Points. "The pencil."

  "It's wooden. Painted to feel smooth. No heavier than a sugar cube. The name of the hotel is etched into the side like . . . inverted braille."

  "What about the curves? How does the rubber feel on the eraser? Sticky? Firm? Angular? And the tip?"

  "Well . . ."

  "Frayed? Shredded? Or softly worn? Rounded? There's a difference." Impatient. "How about the sharpness of the point? Somewhat blunted and oval-ended, or almost pinpoint? And the lead. Soft? Chalky? Hard like bone? Cracked on one side? Does it bend between fingertips?" Almost angry. "You didn't describe the metal collar that anchors the eraser. Is it serrated? Grooved? Does it have a curved rise? Several rings? A sharp edge at the seam where it anchors the eraser. Could it draw blood if you ran skin over it? Is the pencil tubular, or seven-sided as is common design? Are the painted letters and numbers, on the side, more smooth than the painted section?"

  "It's very. . ."

  "Generalities. You have no feel for it."

  "I'm sorry."

  "I felt nothing."

  Eyes downward. "Do you want me to go? You don't have to pay me anything."

  A moment. A sigh.

  Gesturing.

  "The drinking glass."

  She delicately picks it up.

  "It's light, almost no weight at all. Cylindrical, warm from the hotel room heater. So smooth it seems to have no surface. So hard it has a brittle strength. A kind of tension like it could explode unexpectedly from the compacted frustration of the molecules."

  "Interesting. Keep going."

  "The edge, where you touch it to your lips, is rounded."

  "Touch it to your lips."

  She slowly does it.

  "It rests on my mouth. Presses down my bottom lip. The upper edge of the glass touches my nose. It fits into my hand. Separates my thumb and index finger by two inches. It feels good to hold it. The weight and shape are comforting."

  "Pour water into it. A little at a time."

  "Alright." Pouring. "It's getting heavier; I can feel the weight in my wrist. My fingers have to grip more tightly."

  "Can you feel the coolness of the water through the glass?"

  "Yes."

  "Describe it to me."

  "It feels the way it feels when you take your glove off on an early winter day. The first seconds your skin can notice the cold."

  "Vague. Give me another example."

  ". . . the sensation of adding cold water to a hot bath and feeling chilly tendrils, struggling through the warm liquid to find you."

  "Better."

  "Can you remember that?"

  "Yes."

  "The water is climbing higher in the glass. A quarter-inch at a time, splashing softly against the glass, spraying my hand with tiny, heatless droplets . . . can you feel it?"

  "Yes."

  ". . . as it fills the glass, I feel the rising coolness climb my palm. . ."

  ". . . yes."

  ". . . there's a dew forming on the outside of the glass. I can feel it with the sponge of my fingertips."

  "Keep going."

  "I feel the droplets from this moist film seep between my fingers. And I feel the weight of the glass shift, as the water tips from side to side."

  "Drink it."

  She leans the glass back, against full mouth, swallows; a voluptuous drain.

  Looks at him.

  "I can feel it going down inside me like. . ."

  He breathes harder. Tightens; bends. Releases.

  "Do you want me to describe it?"

  "Later. I need to rest now."

  Silence.

  "We'll start again in a few minutes."

  "Alright."

  "Think about the lamps. The phone. The faucet handles. I want to hear about them." His voice shrinks; a whisper. "Before I forget." He closes eyes. Leans back on the motel bed.

  She watches him from her chair. Wants to gently touch him. To reassure, stroke his sad face. Calm his heart. She wonders what happened to him. What hurt had crept inward; shaken his world.

  As he rests, with eyes shut, she moves to him and slowly reaches. Then, as her warm palm nearly touches his cheek, she looks at her hand.

  All at once, she sees the small, healing cut, on one knuckle, that provides an unlocked door to the viral body within. The fingerprints that provide soft alleys and canyons for the poisons of mankind; infinite hiding places for illness, invisible beginnings of pain and plague. The immeasurable death affixed to the underside of her nails,
barnacled in the deep creases of her palm.

  She quietly withdraws her hand. Sits back down in her chair, waiting for him, staring at her reflection in the mirror; slowly becoming afraid of the epidemics in her perfect skin, the death and misery. She watches him rest, her heart going black.

  Region of the Flesh

  I bought a bed at a garage sale.

  It was all I could afford; I have a dead-end job.

  A man was murdered on it three weeks ago. His wife hated him; went into a trance. Tied him down. Slaughtered him. Face slashed into a red Picasso. Limbs severed while he struggled. Throat bled until he couldn't breathe; drowned without sea.

  The first night I brought the bed home and lay on it, I thought a lot about the murder. How it happened. What it looked like. How the fevered mutilation must have sounded. The neighbors said he screamed for an hour. They did nothing, thinking it was sex, frozen in horror; wax witnesses.

  Staring at dark ceiling, far past midnight, I thought about the washed bloodstains beneath me; uneven Clorox freckles that hid the torment. Dead rorschachs.

  I couldn't sleep.

  The second night was better.

  But after I fell asleep, grisly visions tiptoed-in.

  They knelt beside my ear; described themselves with shocking adjectives. I saw the argument in my dream. The twisted mood.

  I grabbed at sheets, humid in blackness.

  I saw the electric knife. How deeply she was hurt. How she cried in anger; wounded hopelessness.

  I saw his trapped eyes. Bound wrists.

  I didn't awaken until she'd cut him into pieces.

  I loathed the feeling it left me with; dread-soaked. Yet it fascinated me to know I slept on death; found comfort where there had been indescribable pain.

  Though it confused me, I sensed there was a reason the bed had come into my possession.

  It revulsed me. But I decided to keep it.

  At first, I was afraid to. Afraid to even use it.

  There were endless moments I almost had it hauled away like some septic monstrosity. I couldn't stand to look at it; the death puddles now erased to a silky albino. The quilted surface re-sewn; an ugly survivor of the attack, flaunting its stitches.

  Even its cleansed smell sickened me.

  I slept on the couch, avoiding contact.

  But I could still see the bed, in stark cameo, standing vigil on four legs, alone in the bedroom.

  Watching me.

  I tried, but couldn't stay away.

  I slid silently between the cool sheets, spread my arms in drowsy crucifixion, slowly closed my eyes. I was a buoy, in a blood bay, awaiting cruel currents; lurid, horrific.

  In my dreams, I look down and see his helpless expression; eyes wet, terrified. I see the humming blade nearing his shivering flesh.

  He struggles.

  Begs through choking cloth.

  His fingers are bloodless rakes; clutching uselessly.

  But she ignores him and the vibrating blade cuts, squeezing between compressions of skin. My mouth waters for some reason in the dream, and I watch in deranged silence as his face freezes. I watch his eyes shut in escape, then widen, as the humming knife makes fast, countless incisions; sawing him apart.

  I try to awaken, but can't.

  I am asleep. I know that. In a dream.

  I don't want to look.

  Yet, I can't stop looking. The images compel me.

  First, his face disappears, slice by slice, as his head shakes wildly, from side to side. There is blood everywhere. The room gets very hot; a sickly dampness. The body is sectioned, despite his suffering pleas.

  It's extraordinary: the total commitment she must have felt to do it. The unconditional purpose.

  It seems unimaginable.

  I woke up crying, feeling strangely alive, and sat, knees to my chest, rocking into dawn. The nightmare was obsessing me. Everything else in my life seemed empty.

  Dead.

  After several days, the bed was the only thing I could think about; an irresistible fascination. When I got near it, my whole system felt a sick amperage. When I was actually on it, closing my eyes, drifting into the dream, it was as if I were physically experiencing murdering someone. Feeling the weight of the knife in my hand. The trembling of sliced skin as I severed veins; vessels. Though I hungered for the effect, I became ashamed of how my mind could be excited; the horrid entertainment it accepted.

  By the second week, things got stranger.

  At first, in the dreams, I was him.

  Feeling her weight on me.

  Watching her despising features staring down, sweaty hair brushing my face. Hearing the hateful names she screamed. Feeling parts of my body being cut away. My blood getting on everything; warm dye.

  Then, as I grew weak, soaking in a death pond, I stared up at her face, freckled with blood. She was watching me die. Watching my heartbeat soften, my features lose purpose. Watching red leak gently from my body.

  And through it all, I began to sense she was sorry for what she'd done. Lost so clearly in regret; sorrow.

  As I watched her, and my body became cold, my struggle unnecessary, I began to perceive her broken life. The agony she'd carried forever. The irreversible abuses. How she'd come to this. How life had hurt her. How I'd hurt her. Abandoned her hundreds of times.

  Humiliated her.

  I began to see her insides; the corridors and cul-de-sacs. The shattered futility. The way her insides were butchered and bloody. As I was. I began to see what she saw. Even though I was what she saw.

  Even though I was neither.

  At some point, perspectives had shifted; a random volition. I don't know why. But I began to relate to her point of view. See through her eyes. The dream took on another dimension; departed savage angularity, alone.

  As new nights passed, I craved the dream.

  Wanted to be absorbed by it.

  Become it.

  My pajamas seemed to insulate me from the murder's intimacy and detail. I began to sleep naked; an unprotected slave. I removed all sheets and pads. Tore off the mattress's satin covering. Dug through the springs to find bits of dried blood, buried like lodged bullet fragments. Pressed my face against them and felt the storage of pain; excruciating vestiges.

  I slept deeply.

  I do every night.

  I'm starting to feel for the first time. To mean what I say; like she meant what she did. I'm beginning to do what's right for me. Not let other people hurt me, like they used to. Maybe not be afraid to hurt them, if that's what it takes. Violence used to scare me. But it's just another form of emotion. Of expression.

  Sometimes, during the day, I sit and stare at the bed.

  Watch the sun stretching down onto it, taking a hot, yellow nap, warming it for me. I love its shape. The rectangular softness. The perfect way the mattress aligns on the boxsprings; two embracing forms. The accepting still of it.

  Like a friend.

  On weekends, I'll sleep twenty hours a day, filling my mind with bloody images; communing. It's my oasis; the one place that makes sense to me in this terrible world.

  The one place I trust.

  I was taking a nap today and began to think again about murdering someone. I began to think how wonderful it would be to see them struggle and bleed. To have that control. That passion. Then, I fell into a canyon of steep, black sleep.

  I know something is wrong with me. Something really wrong. I'm so tired all the time. All I want to do is sleep and dream about a man who's being butchered. All I want to see, in my dream, is how he twists on white sheets; a human brush, naked and bloodied, painting something horrific.

  But if I'm losing my mind, why do I feel better about things? Shouldn't I feel worse? Shouldn't I feel bad? Shouldn't something be telling me I'm in trouble?

  There's nothing wrong with sleep.

  You just close your eyes and go into your little world.

  The Great Fall

  8:45

  God. Another fuckin
g night.

  Such bullshit.

  I could kick anyone's ass in here. And these bitches? Joke. The Tiffany snatch I used to get. Kidding me? Where I sat, saw it all. 360 fucking degrees.

  And these guys? Nobodys. Micro-twats.

  I need a Scotch. Never enough goddamned ice in my drink.

  What do I pay my bartend for anyway? Pogo on his fucking coma?

  Such bullshit, man.

  9:25

  Showtime in five. What a thrill. Someone fucking revive me.

  Peek through the curtain. Look at 'em. My 'crowd'. Wall to wall scumbags. Gossiping at my framed glossies. Those were big days, Jack. Big. Had the looks. Luck. Breaks. Makes my head hurt worse just thinking about it.

  Like these parasites give a brown donut.

  9:30

  Snare roll. Spotlight. Tape the grin on.

  Ta-da.

  Hello . . . nice to be here . . . where you from? . . . how about this weather? . . . is this your wife? . . . does she mess around?

  . . . you're a nice looking couple . . . I was married for a year one century . . . how about that band? . . . great crowd.

  Sit down at the piano, wink, dimple into the footlights.

  Dangle a smoke.

  Strike a match.

  Let Joe Camel take a crap on my lungs. Flash the caps. Sell it big.

  "Start spreading the news. . ."

  A little patter. Risqué cracks. Loosen the bow tie, make the slits drool. Look deep.

  "Like a bridge over trouubbbled waters. . ."

  I glance in the mirror, over the bar. That really me staring back? That ugly, bloated thing holding a mike? Grim scene, man. Fucking stomach-turner.

  Stay ahead of it. Snap the chubby fingers. Crinkle the nose. "Uptown girl. . ."

  An hour of soul-deadening, nard-liquefying hell.

  I hate my life. And I hate this dump. Major toilet. Hate it, hate it, hate it. My name in neon, crackling over the stage, doesn't help.

  H.D.’S

  Waste of electricity. If I had the plums, I'd jump into a pan; eat the sizzle. End this with some fucking dignity.

  Tell you one thing, pal: the bottom gets addictive. It knows your name, and always waits up for you. But I got bills like the rest of the busted balls with ex-wives and prick lawyers. This place was my investment in my future, after the insurance settlement. My "future."