Tales of Sin and Madness (37 page)

You turn away from the ghoulish sight. Catch a glimpse of a large sign over your section just before your vision fills with orange. It reads — Fire-related Deaths: Accidental & Deliberate.

The woman lets out a soul shattering scream. You've never smelt human flesh cooking before (you never got the chance), and it's worse than anything you've ever (would have) smelt.

You close your eyes, hoping to shut your mind off from the horror, but you see the spectre of the grinning skeleton, only now it's surrounded by a red glow which infuses its eyes with demonic glee and the only sound coming from the woman now is her sizzling flesh.

The skeleton smiles, says without moving its rotted mouth:

Two by two, just like on the Ark.

The punishment fits the crime.

What crime?
you scream in your head.

The crime you would have committed. Had you been born.

But I remember my life — my wife, my job!

Future events that were projected into your mind. We wanted to show you what would have been, the life you would have lived. You deserve at least that much.

When you feel the sting of fire, you hazard a guess as to what your box reads: 38, fire, accidental (surely not deliberate), number of deaths: 4.

You think you'll miss your wife and kids.

But you'll never get the chance to find out.

NOTES:

This is one of my few sci-fi stories, inspired by some of the more socially-minded sci-fi stories such as
Logan’s Run
and
Minority Report
. And like those stories, ‘Unborn Lives’ stems from a fear of technology; or, more accurately, a fear of the abuse of technology (as well as the Government). It’s a fear that constantly plagues my mind – not only the over-reliance on it, but the concern that it will someday take over our lives to a point that’s dangerous to our well-being and even to our individual freedom.

COME MORNING

…I will be free. Free to taste the sun without a wall of concrete around me. Free to run where I like, when I like, how I like.

But first, the night.

For fifteen agonizing years I’ve been holed up in this room, my life a routine of sleep, shower, eat, shit, play – but not too much play – rest, eat, sleep…

Fifteen years waiting for tomorrow to come and it all comes down to this.

 One night.

One night that, once done, will spell the end of my burden and the beginning of my life.

One night.

For two lovers, parting the next morning, one night feels like a blink of an eye, painful in its brevity. But for a kid waiting for Christmas morning to arrive, unable to sleep, night seems to roll on forever.

One night and then I’ll be free. Gather up my clothes, my belongings, say goodbye to the heavy clanging, the even heavier silence, the violence and the madness, the rotten food, the rotten guards, the crying. All left behind in a capsule of my mind, fading with each passing day, until the memories leave only a whisper of a mark and the long years will seem like no time at all.

But first, the night.

Lights out, like every other night, only tonight isn’t like those other nights for tomorrow brings shower, maybe a shit, but not eat, and not play; at least, not the way they say. No, tomorrow I will eat pancakes or eggs over easy. A pot of coffee you say? Bacon strips, waffles and fresh fruit if you please. And I will play, oh yes I will play, but not on the concrete like so many dogs, lifting this and bouncing that, eyes watching from the towers. I will play, but on a soft mattress in a soft room with a soft lady – or a hard one. Whichever I can afford.

So one night is all I have to endure before I walk out into the light; but night can be long, it can be lonely, and too many thoughts can roll around in too many heads. So though I anticipate the coming of the dawn, it will be a hard night this night, the hardest one of them all.

I lay in my cot, like a good obedient boy, trying to drown out the cries, the slapping, the groaning, by listening to my heart, my breath. I stare out at the darkness, at the bars that have crisscrossed my life for fifteen years, waiting for sleep to overtake me, for I know that when that happens, the night will pass like a bird by my window. I will wake and the darkness would’ve turned to light and then they will come for me and I will be free.

Free.

Such a small word, but one containing all the heartache and joy of all the men, women and children in all the world.

I’m not tired, I’m much too excited, but still I close my eyes, think of what life will be like once I’m out of this prison.

I see trees spreading their wings and long cracked roads leading to somewhere, anywhere. I see bars at night, smoky women, stained eyes and good times. I see a girl lying on the ground, pants ripped, exposing tender white flesh…

My eyes flash open.

I frown.

I can’t think of such things, I’m not allowed to. I’m not supposed to, I’ve been cured, I’ve done my time, so I shouldn’t be thinking of flesh and sex and violence. I’ve left that in another time, I was a different person then. I’ve had fifteen years of shedding my skin. I’m all better now.

Again I close my eyes and imagine simple pleasures: staying up and watching the late show; being able to hop in my car and go cruising; calling my ma on the phone, day or night. These are the things I should be thinking about.

Sometime later I drift to sleep.

When I wake, the room is still gloomy with night. The block is quieter now, only the jab of crying, or a punch of laughter kills the silence. Probably Wilson three rooms down; in for murder, he’s as crazy as they come. But he’s not mad. I remember when I first arrived here, many, many nights ago, how he had cornered me, told me if I gave him all of my cigs, he’d only rape me once. Well, I gave him all my cigs and he did rape me, but more than once. A lot more.

I think of this and I’m all primed to laugh, but it halts in my throat. I almost laugh not because I enjoyed it, but because I’m going home tomorrow and Wilson will still be here, asking the next piece of fresh meat for all his cigs.

I hop out of my cot, needing to pee. As I pee, I turn and stare out the window, see only chalky blackness through the bars. I think of all the times I’ve stared out this window, and a tear drips down my face, into the bowl. I’m gonna miss that window, those bars; my sole companion during my dark times. It was with me when I flew to Rio and danced with all of those girls, also when I traveled to Greece and sat sipping a beer, watching the yachts sail past, whiteness all around me. It was with me when I hitched a ride to Florida, and when I drove to Nevada. It was also there when I opened my wrists using a filed pen lid, and it was certainly there to watch over me when I cried endless tears.

I finished pissing and, tucking myself in, I look to the cold floor and wonder where all the tears I’ve spilled have gone. I picture an underground river flowing with all the tears, blood and semen of all the men who have called this hell home, and I picture myself dropping down into it and floating away.

It is then I laugh; short and breathy. Why think such a thought? I am no longer bound by these walls; come morning I am free, I have no need for a dirty river. That is a thought of a doomed man, not of a free one.

And so I jump back into my cot, thoughts of the morning floating through my head and miraculously I fall back to sleep.

Next time I wake, the block is asleep, it seems only I am awake at such an ungodly hour. But what hour is this? The room is still as thickly black as before, it feels like time has hardly shifted. I sit up, put my chiseled feet to the rock floor and saunter to the end of my world.

I clutch the thick bars and stare up at the clock, its round, watchful face winking at me. One it tells me; five hours till rise and shine, knuckleheads. It feels like it should be later, but that’s the curse of time, and I shuffle on back to my cot to sleep out the rest of the night.

But sleep does not come easy now. My mouth is dry, my stomach aching, and I just wish it was morning so bad my head hurts. I go over and rinse my mouth, take a moment to sigh and at my cot I sit, not lay, head in my calloused hands.

Why does it seem that this night of all nights should be the longest? Why doesn’t sleep just take me and drop me down once morning shows herself, in all her beauty? It will kill me to have to sit here in the gloom and wait out the night, and surely not even the devil himself can be so cruel.

I have spent too long in this accursed place, and maybe, I think with a gut-curling thought, it will not give me up so easily. Maybe the longer you stay, the more you belong to it, the more it owns you, the more flesh and blood and tears it takes.

I shiver. I hear a dog bark from somewhere that’s not here. Sleep is what I need, sleep and a cold glass of beer and a woman lying unconscious on the…

I slap myself; a hearty, stinging slap. As I blink cold tears away, I know it’s this place that’s filling my head with these evil thoughts; it’s not me, it can’t be me, it’s…

“Always been you,” says a voice, deep and dark.

I gasp and snap my head towards the end of my world. “Who’s there?”

A burp, a sigh. And then that sooty voice, bouncing off the hard cracked walls: “Nobody. A friend. An enemy. Whatever.”

The voice feels familiar, but I can’t grasp it. I stand, step one, two, three paces and stop. I can smell the blood-smell of the metal before me. “How’d you get in here?”

The man, sitting cross-legged in front of me, is shrouded in shadows; he smells of damp towels and old urinal cakes. He takes a swipe from his paper bag. “The question is, how did
you
?”

I open my mouth to answer, but instead I ask, “What did you mean by ‘it’s always been you’?”

The old man (how do I know it’s an old man if I can’t see his face?) grinds gravel, but then I realize he’s laughing. “You blame this place for your evil thoughts, but this place blames you.”

“I don’t understand.”

The stranger scratches himself and swishes around the paper bag, a bag that smells suspiciously like wine – and not the good kind. He drinks more of the paper bag. “No, I don’t suppose you do,” he says.

“Give me some of your paper bag.”

“Get your own,” he answers.

“I will, tomorrow, when I leave, but right now, I need some of yours.”

The old man howls with laughter. He remains sitting on the other side of freedom, a dark blob.

“Guards!” I yell. “Hey, there’s a bum here, and he won’t give me any of his paper…”

And I awake. Immediately look beyond the end of my cot, but there’s no old man behind the bars.

A dream
, I think, and smile, but not because of the dream, but because it means I was asleep. But then the fact that I’m thinking this means I’m awake, and because it’s still dark, the smile washes away.

“Damn it,” I mumble, wanting just to wake when the sun does, but it seems I’m destined to wake every five minutes.

It certainly was a strange dream. I sniff the air. I smell old, sweat-stained towels and a smell all too similar to the time I peed my cot.

It’s the smell of the old man, but he’s not there, just an empty space.

I lie back, close my eyes and think about the old man’s voice. So familiar; not unlike my father’s deep growl. His voice used to scare me when I was young – he used to scare me. He opened his veins when I was eleven and what splashed out looked more like red wine than blood. He was barely forty when he died, but to my young eyes, he seemed ancient. Apparently I look a lot like my father – same narrow eyes, full lips and dark wavy hair – but I don’t see the resemblance.

I lie with my hands over my heart, eyes shut to the darkness, and try and sleep, but sleep is like water flowing down a stream – there, but not there. I’m unable to grasp it and flinging my eyes open I heave a heavy sigh and sit up.

This is the ultimate punishment. Somehow the warden has struck a deal with the devil and has made the night twice as long as usual. The beast! I just want the morning to caress the night, even a hint would be a blessing, but no, the night is a leaden thing, unmoving, stubborn, and doesn’t appear to be leaving anytime soon.

I fear looking at the clock, for what terrors it has to show me, so, staying on my cot, I turn and look at the wall, the wall that has been a constant friend throughout my stay. I reach out and finger the multitude of grooves, nicks, wedges – all so familiar, their mystery help keeping me sane. What was the reason behind this groove? Who chiseled this nick? Was the previous occupant crying, laughing, or dying when he carved this wedge? Long days and even longer nights I’ve laid here dreaming of the past, imagining the men who have come before me: their history, their deeds, their personality. I’ve had conversations with these make believe characters; sometimes it seems they’re more real than any of the men locked in here with me. More real than anyone I used to know on the outside. I will be sad to see them go, but alas, time has come to say goodbye (if time hasn’t decided to stand still).