by Russell Moon
She is down on her knees, and has unlaced both of my shoes. She has, without my even noticing, removed one shoe and one sock, and as I look down at her, she looks up at me. I lift the second foot so she can finish.
“There,” she says, rising, taking back the pipe, and standing toe-to-bare-toe with me. “Isn’t that nicer? You wouldn’t want to be the only one in the place with shoes on anyway, would you?”
I look all around us and listen hard.
“We appear to be the only ones in the place, shoes or no,” I say.
Eartha giggles. She steps a bit closer, then stands with both feet on mine, and kisses me lusciously.
“There are spirits all around us,” she says then, gesturing theatrically. She laughs again, looking at my feet.
I look down and see one silver ring, knotted much like the railing, on the second toe of each foot.
“Thanks,” I say.
Eartha puts her pipe down on the onyx shelf and leaves it there like just one more open-house party favor waiting for the next arrival. Then she takes up two more flutes of champagne.
I finish off my glass, take the new one, then follow as she leads me by the hand.
“You ready?” she asks as we approach a door.
“I haven’t the slightest idea whether or not I am ready.”
She turns, for the moment darkly serious. “Before…before anything, know this—nobody here wants to hurt you or do you any kind of harm whatsoever. You have absolutely nothing to be afraid of here. You are ours, you are us, and you are special. You understand that?”
I understand nothing.
“It seems to me that if somebody is going to really hurt you, the first thing they do is to say they’re not going to hurt you.”
She is serene. “Is that the way you feel now, Marcus? Is that what you feel is going to happen now?”
I am looking into her eyes, into Jules’s eyes, even if she is not Jules. I am looking into them so deeply, more deeply than is probably wise, so deeply I am in danger of toppling in, disappearing headlong into the unreality there. I know this is not wise. I am powerless.
“I want Jules,” I say.
“If you want me to be Jules, I am Jules.”
“I don’t want you lying, is what I want. I want you honest. I want you to stop feeding me nonsense.”
“No lies, no nonsense. What you want here is what will be.”
The smoke still hangs in the air. As does the silence.
“I want my dog,” I say.
“So be it,” she says. “Pick a door.”
I look up and down this impossible hallway. The doors are all the same, nine feet tall, narrow, and grainy matte black, like they are constructed of stone. It is all neat, orderly, utterly unpromising, and scary.
“I pick,” I say dubiously. “Any one.”
“Any one,” she says.
“That one,” I say, pointing to the one that actually faces us, at the far end of the hallway.
“No. Sorry. Pick another.”
“Jesus,” I say. I then pick the one closest to it, at the end of the hall, on the right.
“Off we go,” she says, taking my hand in her over-warm, creamy soft one.
When we get to the door and still I hear nothing, sense nothing like a party going on beyond any door, I turn to Eartha. She is no help. Grinning, squeezing my hand, gorgeous. But no help.
I throw the heavy door open wide, to reveal nothing.
Nothing, that is, except what I was after. My dog, sitting at the center of a huge, empty, black-walled room. Licking himself.
I turn again to Eartha.
“How did you know I would pick the right door?”
“Because any door you pick is the right door.”
“Cut the crap and give me real answers, will you?”
“That is the real answer. It is as I told you. There is a lot more power in you than you know.”
I pull my hand away from hers. “And I don’t wanna know. I’m outta here. Come on, Chuck.”
Very casually, Chuck finishes grooming, and saunters out of the room as if he is stoned. His eyes are red and droopy, he’s grinning, and he’s in no hurry whatsoever.
I slam the door shut, hand my empty glass to Eartha, and head for the front door.
She is not trying to get me to change my mind, which is surprising, and a relief. And maybe a bit of a disappointment.
But as always with these people, there is a reason. As I am almost out, I hear it. It comes so much out of nowhere that I stop short in front of the front door. Where before the house was a great silent spooky nothing, another joke waiting to spring on me, this door holds something different, even though I know it’s the door I came in through. It sounds like a party.
Another door slams behind me. I turn, and she is gone.
The door immediately in front of me has a peephole in it, the way a normal house would have on an outside door.
I take a peek.
There is fat and ornate overstuffed furniture scattered about the huge ballroom. The colors are rich—burgundy drapes, gold-leaf wallpaper, cobalt-and-black oriental carpets that look about four inches thick. There are forty or so kids my age swishing around to some weirdly compelling music, something baroque played on electronic instruments. The scene looks to me like what I’d imagine a state dinner at the White House would look like if they had one for only under-twenty-ones.
Chuck is scratching at the party door.
“You really think we should?” I say.
He continues scratching.
“Stop that,” I say, then try the fat brass knob. “When did you get to be such a party dog?”
Before I am even fully through the door, I am locked in a mad embrace. I am squeezed, then I am kissed, by Marthe.
“I am so glad,” she says. Then she lets go and turns to reveal the room.
Which is a different room from the one I saw through the peephole.
It is filled with smoke. It is a quarter of the size I thought it was. There are four mismatched sofas that look like they were rejected from everybody’s basement. The walls are not gold leaf but are, instead, blackboards, with writings scrawled all over, maps and caricatures and mathematical formulae and a recipe for Arj’s Wondrous Oatmeal Wormwood (WOW) Cookies.
Nobody’s dancing. People mostly flop on the sofas, on the floor, on each other. The entire place is one large makeout scene in various forms of grapple.
“Come on in, mingle, feel your way around,” Marthe says. “I’ll go get you a drink and a cookie.”
“Just a drink,” I say quickly. “I had wormwood for supper.”
She is gone, and I do mill around. I walk the room like a ghost, a ghost and his dog, as nobody seems to appreciate that we are here. I can vaguely figure out who some of these people are, but most are unfamiliar to me. I figure they are all Key Club members, but none, besides Marthe, are from the Council of Youngers.
“Here you go,” Marthe says, handing me a cup of something that may be blue. The lighting in the room is sort of four giant lava-lamp columns burbling in the corners, so shadows and definition come and go.
“What is this?” I ask.
“Arj’s Blue Brew,” she says, motioning me to try it.
“I don’t think so,” I say.
“Don’t be like that,” she urges. “We love you here. We wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”
I gesture around the room, toward all the writhing bodies. “Love is kind of devalued around here, if I may say so.”
Marthe’s ever-present smile falls away. She nods grimly. “You don’t approve of us, do you?”
This, I think, is a bit much. Not only am I not used to large groups of people seeking my approval, I have trouble even comprehending how my opinion could matter to them at all.
“Approve of you? I don’t even know what the hell you are.”
“Yes you do.”
“No,” I say, defiant. “I do not.”
She is looking at the dri
nk, and pouting.
I take a sip.
I feel, instantly, the blood rushing to my head, my eyes getting blinkered.
“Damn,” I say, handing the glass back to her. “Sorry. No offense, but your drink is nasty.”
“Oh, this isn’t going very well at all, is it?”
“Don’t worry about it,” I say. “I wasn’t planning to stay long anyway.”
“Your dog seems to have gone off again. Maybe you better go find him.”
“Crap,” I say, looking back at the open door.
I can’t say I am sorry to leave that room, but I have no interest in exploring Arj’s funhouse.
“Chuck,” I call from the hallway, and though he refuses to answer, I catch sight of the end of his tail as he heads up to the second floor.
“Damnit, Chuck, no,” I say, as I follow reluctantly.
I get to the top, and find no Chuck. I find no doors. I find no light. It is as black as blackness gets, and I find myself frozen in place with fear. I am suddenly very cold, though it is a hot, sticky night.
“Chuck?” I call softly.
“What?” is the reply.
“Who is that?” I ask. “Who’s there?”
“I am,” the voice says. It’s a guy’s voice, and I have heard it before, but I cannot place it.
“All right, that’s very funny, but I just want my dog. Can I have my dog, please?”
With a pop, lights come on, so bright it is like I am on television, and I have to shield my eyes and wait for the spots to go away. When my vision clears, Baron is standing in front of me. We are in a glistening porcelain room, a sort of oversized bathroom but without the fixtures. The bright harshness of the place highlights the hard angry angles of Baron’s gaunt face, his prominent pointed jaw, his severe, slicked-forward hair. We stand about eight feet apart, like gunslingers.
“Didn’t think you were going to show,” he says.
“Neither did I,” I say.
“Glad you did, though.”
“Really?” I say. “That doesn’t appear to be true.”
“Well then, you’re mistaken. I’m more anxious than anyone to see you. Because I can’t wait to prove you’re not what you say you are.”
I spit out a bitter laugh. “What I say I am? What the hell do I say I am? I never claimed to be anything, and you know what, if you freaks will just leave me and my dog alone, I’ll just disappear all over again, right on out of your little Dungeons and Dragons game.”
“I wish it were that easy. But nobody else is going to let that happen. You’re too special.”
I have a building pounding feeling in my chest, a feeling that if I do not get out of here as soon as possible, I am going to regret it.
“Where is my dog, Baron?”
“He’s that way, bro,” Baron says with a leer. He is pointing behind him, where there is, of course, a door.
“Oh, what,” I say, “tough guy, big man, I have to go through you to get there, right? What are you trying to prove?”
“I got nothing to prove. You’re the one. The One, I should say.”
“One what?”
“It. The Man. The Chosen.”
I don’t care what he is saying, what he is expecting, what he is challenging me to do. I am walking around him and getting my dog.
“You’re an ass, Baron,” I say, attempting to brush past him.
He steps into my path. “I ain’t kidding you. You’re supposed to be our Messiah, man!”
He has me frozen, his face right in mine.
“You are pathetic,” I say. “The whole bunch of you.”
I make one more move toward the door, but he won’t let me get to it. He has me by the shirt and is hissing vile ammonia breath in my face.
“Great, you’re a big man,” I say. “What do you expect me to do?”
“Something!” he yells. He sounds almost as if my failure disappoints him. “Look at you. Arj thinks we can’t do better than this? Do something, Messiah. Something. Anything.”
I decide I cannot disappoint him.
I spit at him. I may not be The Chosen whatever, but I can hock a chunky spit with the best of them. I catch him right in the mouth.
I am laughing out loud when he punches me with a straight left hook that drops me to the floor.
I reach up to my mouth and feel the split in my lip. But there is no blood.
“So what’re you gonna do?” he asks, standing, waiting. “Huh? Go on, throw me out the window.”
“There is no window.”
He is shouting now. “So make a window and throw my ass out of it! Do something to show me that you are The One, and I swear I’ll be the first bastard down on his knees kissing your feet. I swear it.”
As enticing as that offer is, I cannot do it. Because I am not it. Just like he says.
What I can do is get to my feet, get to that door, and get my dog. I need, need my friend Chuck.
I walk. Baron warns me not to, and still I walk. He bumps me hard with his chest. I back up, squint my eyes, push forward, bang into him again.
I don’t know what to do. I am in this catacomb of blackness and perversion, I am lost and I am alone in a way I never in my wildest imaginings ever dreamed of, and I am very scared and my friend, my dog, my true spirit companion is on the other side of that door and I cannot get there to save my life.
I squeeze my eyes closed and wait for the worst, hope, perhaps, for the worst, for Baron to knock me into some province of oblivion where at least nobody is going to ask me what I’m going to do next.
Instead of the fist through me, I feel arms around me.
“I can’t do too much of this,” Mr. Sedaris says. “The physical contact thing. This can get a counselor into some hot water.” He is patting my back firmly.
I push away from him, step back. I am in his office.
“Maybe you should sit,” he says.
I fairly crash into the seat. Mr. Sedaris calmly takes the seat next to me.
“What is happening to me, Mr. Sedaris? Am I raving? Am I gone completely?”
“No, I think you’re fine, and you will remain fine. Unless you drank the blue stuff. You didn’t drink any blue stuff, did you?”
“Mr. Sedaris,” I snap.
“Listen, Marcus, you just need to calm down, first of all. You’re so freaked you’re not listening, watching, feeling what is going on around you. Yes, there is something serious going on. But you can handle it.”
“I don’t want to handle it.”
“You, above all, can handle it.”
“Stop saying that. I want you all to stop saying that. Don’t make me out to be something I’m—”
“Marcus,” he says, much more sternly than usual, and seizing my face in his hands. “Your first job is to believe it. Get out of your own way and believe it.”
I blink, exactly once.
And Arj is the person in front of me, holding my face in his hands. He kisses me.
“What the hell?” I snap, pulling away. “If these are my choices, just bring back Baron so he can finish killing me.”
“We love you, Marcus.”
“Yeah? Well I’m not interested, so stop loving me.”
“You have to believe me, Marcus. This is all for you. We really want what’s best for you.”
“Why do I have to believe you?”
“Because…you recognize me. You know me.”
A shiver trills up and down my back. But I must not react. I must not let it get to me.
“I don’t know you from Adam.”
“Yes, you do. And you know there aren’t a lot of people like us. You are afraid and alone and aching for an explanation that makes sense.”
“And you have that for me?”
“Nope. I have an explanation, all right. But I’m afraid it’s not going to make a lot of sense. I’m going to ask for faith.”
“I don’t believe in faith.”
“Fair enough. But I’m going to ask you to stop hiding from w
hat you are seeing. To stop denying what you don’t like just because you don’t like it. It’s time for you to come over.”
I wait. Am I giving myself up to my enemies when I open up?
Enemies. There’s one right there. Enemies. Do I actually have enemies, and if so, are these them? What the hell am I doing with them? Or is my enemy whatever the hell is hiding behind the attic door? Or are they all one and the same?
“I haven’t done anything to you,” I say grimly.
Arj hangs his head. He is getting exasperated, but he is not giving up. I wish he would reconsider.
“Of course you haven’t, Marcus. Nobody is saying you have. Nobody means you any harm.”
“Baron does,” I say quickly.
He is about to dispute me, but then “N-no,” he stammers. “Okay, Baron does. But that’s his problem. Nobody else wishes you any harm. If you will just listen to what I have to tell you.”
“Yeah, tell me…. You said I was going to meet the head guy tonight. What about that?”
Arj nods. “Sure. You ready?”
“No. I want my dog.”
Instantly, the lights bang out again. Then they come on. We are still standing face-to-face, but we are in a whole different room. It looks like a basement rec room, with a pool table down one end, a Ping-Pong table immediately in front of us, and an old Rock-Ola jukebox in the corner. The walls are corkboard, the floor Astroturf.
“Which one’s yours?” Arj asks.
We are surrounded. There are ten cats, Siamese, Persian, marmalade, pacing the periphery of the big room. There is a huge white cockatoo clamping his claws to the edge of the pool table, while a full-bearded pygmy goat licks and nibbles at the felt. An iguana waddles across the tennis table, settling under a light, while a fat Nile monitor looks up at him from flat on the floor. There’s a Great Dane the size of a Clydesdale standing next to a woolly sheepdog with a ridiculous ponytail in the middle of its forehead. There is my dog, Chuck, leaning his droopy face so close to the cheek of a sheep that he has to be hitting on her. There are other, smaller creatures here and there, but they do not stop long enough for proper identification, and I think I would just as well have it that way.