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21 March 2008
31. I Visit General Proximity
The next morning I awoke cautiously, slowly, sluggishly. Cautiously, in case I prompted some peculiar event in my head by a sudden exertion of mind or body; slowly, because I wanted time to think and listen, but also so that anyone beyond my bed might think that I hadn’t quite awoken - but also because I was unsure if I wanted to wake-up at all; sluggishly, because I was mentally and emotionally exhausted – even my senses were frazzled, almost seared by too many impressions of a nature that could not be understood. I kept my head under the covers for so long, tilting in and out of sleep like a boat on rough waters; listening, sensing, and then dipping back down into a cold exhausted sea of numbing disquiet.
Was she there? I heard nothing. Was it there? Nothing. Was she a thing or a someone, anyway? Gradually I moved my head out from the covers and looked around. Nothing at all. Or should that be no-one at all?
I knew straightaway that I had to get out of Mordan House and regroup inside. And as quickly as possible. I don’t think I’ve ever dressed so quickly. I didn’t care what I wore, so long as the items covered me. There were colours and fabrics of different shapes and textures; some artefacts clashed viciously and began to battle to the death, some cringed at the contact of the others and hissed and snarled at each other. I, for my part, gave it no thought – while at the same time aware that I was giving it no thought! – and headed out of the front door, car key in hand. No looking back, or sideways, or up. Down was the only direction for me. My limited vision didn’t fail; the car appeared before me, I got in and started the engine.
One last look at the house. One last look? Why did I do that? I’d been doing so well! So incredibly well! I was so close to getting away from the ghosts of Mordan House for a time. Why break a good habit and look back at the blasted house?
And there she was. Kidman. Standing on the door-step and waving at me. Same look, same dress. No different really from the previous night. I must have looked stunned. Later, she told me I’d looked at her as if a man had just put his cock in my ear.
She called out to me.
“Steph! Listen: If you face any problems, remember three things - eyebrows, nose, puppies!”
When she said this she pointed to the first two anatomical items, then jutted out the third in almost military fashion.
“Always remember the ENP! They’re the Kidman rules, don’t you know!”
As I drove away, I saw her repeating the ritual, this time without words, and not even looking at me. She was totally immersed in the distinctive world of the Kidmania Theme Park! Not here at all. In the rear-view mirror I saw her repeating her mantra as my car entered an alleyway of tall, overhanging trees, that seemed, for a while, to protect me from all things unnatural.
There was only really one place to go: into town to visit my old friend General Proximity! Who else in the world does this kind of thing? Hangs out around people just to be loosely, generally, where other people are. No real consideration for who they are or what they’re about. What sadness. What desperation. But, at the same time, how fundamentally, beautifully human to feel this way – to have this need.
I watched the people of this town from the proximity of a café window. From the inside, how still and uneventful we humans can appear to be to ourselves, how wound-down and how dreadfully near to stopping. But look at us from the outside and we all appear so full, so incessant, so charged-up. Over-wound humanity, eternally and loudly ticking. General Proximity is a good teacher, he reminds the jaded veterans of what’s really going on inside of us all: bustle, noise, clamour - eternally rolling wheels of stone, the sound of their turning booming across every landscape.
Some, however, boom more loudly than others.
“That’s the woman there who’s a vagrant – lives in a car and is in love with my James!”
Ormsley! My nemesis! Another freak with garrulous eyebrows! As if Kidman wasn’t enough! I immediately bristled at the sound of her voice and the knowledge that she was talking about me.
Her voice came from the door of the café. I hadn’t seen her enter. From the corner of my eye I could see that she had entered with a much older lady, diminutive and hunched, and with an angled poise about her that makes the entire body look like an ear trumpet that’s trying to hear the world around it.
I didn’t turn round. I daren’t. I could hear the older woman making murmuring sounds of agreement and dismay at Mrs Ormsley’s description of me.
All of a sudden, an idea formed in my head and it was lovely; I had made my mind up and it wasn’t for changing. I would leave Mordan House – to get away from myself and the Kidman inside of me and the dead astronaut too - but, before I left, if Mrs Ormsley spoke to me again, then I would hit her. Hard. Right across the face. And with a fist clenched. And not the way women usually clench a fist: with the thumb sticking right-up and all the fingers looking like they’ve been caught in some piece of industrial machinery, and with the clear indication that what they actually plan to do is hit you with their wrists! No, a proper punch. Well, dammit, as best as I could muster!
Mrs Ormsley continued: “I’ve heard also that she squats in Mordan House.”
“Squats?” said the older lady. “That’s a long way to go just for a pee!”
“No, squats. You know, lives there illegally!”
The older woman replied: “Ah, yes. Illegally.”
I prepared myself for the words that would surely come, close at my ear and unmistakeably directed at me. So direct that there would be nothing that I could do but welly her, lay into her with my handy fists, clock her a hard one, perhaps in the gut, perhaps to her middle-aged woman’s highly susceptible glass jaw. I felt my fists tighten into spindly balls of hard fire. Okay, they were more like welts of irritation - but I suspected that I could do some real damage with these little baby hammers!
“Hello, luvvie!” she said insipidly. At the same time, I felt an insistent couple of taps on my shoulder. I was amazed at how quickly I reeled around in my seat; eyebrows, nose and puppies aligned threateningly in true Kidman fashion – only to be stopped instantly from laying into the little old bitch by a sight I hadn’t expected.
“How are you today?”
Smack her, Stephanie! Do her right there where she stands! I can hear you, dear reader, I can hear you. But you don’t understand …
“Uh, fine. Thank you. And, uh, how are you?” I replied.
Fine? Thank you? Nail her. Flatten her. Get stuck in right now with the little baby hammers! No, it’s not like that, anymore, reader. You see …
“Oh, dear! You look as if fashion crept up on you during the night and shot you!”
“Um, yes. I dressed rather quickly this morning.”
What do we want? Little baby hammers! When do we want them? Now! No, reader. I can’t. I can’t possibly. It’s all gone wrong!
“Behind some anaemic bush just before a police car drove by with a searchlight on? Yes, that’ll get you to throw just about anything on quickly for another mad-cap scramble across the hills, eh! Especially in your precarious social position! You’re like the woman in ‘Bonnie and Clyde’ – but you’re nowhere near the Clyde!”
I didn’t reply. I was too busy staring. Staring at the woolly scarf around her neck. The subtlety of tones, the straightness of its edges, the perfection of its length. She must have seen me looking.
Did she just put them away? The little baby hammers? Did she really just put them away?
“Oh, the scarf! Yes, I hear you helped James to make it for me! That was so very kind. Very kind.” She fiddled with it and cocked her head about like a vain budgie perched at a mirror in its cage.
Then she sniffed it. “Still the slightest scent of something like over-ripe badger’s arse, when the sun’s high in the sky and it’s eaten some dodgy berries for breakfast! But I’m sure that won’t stay forever!” She giggled fakely as if at a garden party.
The little old lady had sidled up to us by this time and was nodding her head. “Oh, aye, badger’s arse! That’s what I said!” Then she pointed at herself purposefully. “And I should know!” And then she fell back into listening with everything from her ears to her feet.
There were other things said. Little compliments tempered by little insults. One eyebrow stuff, then the other eyebrow stuff. You know the Ormsley script by now. But all I could think of was that James had received my scarf and had liked it enough to pass it on to his aunt! He’d held it! He’d liked it! He’d given it as a present!
So, here I was, finding once again that my plans to leave this part of Scotland had been scuppered. But my confidence in myself was damaged, almost beyond easy repair. If I was to win the affections of James then I needed my self back again. And not my empty self. A replete, sumptuous, exotic, shining self, full of diamonds, pearls and all manner of other scintillating baubles!
One possible path occurred to me: if I could find one clue to tell me that Kidman was right about the mystery of the dead astronaut, then I might begin to recover. If I found the key to the cellar, and found something in there that was useful to the mystery, then maybe I would begin to affect a return from the outside of the great City of Madness. This was the methodology I hit upon to turn away from Madness before the doors opened and invited me in with a long grasping hook. And to begin to construct an attractive self that James might love. Yes. Love. Love was very much in my mind, and fizzing though my entire body more deliciously than something illegal.
Huh. Blog would have been better with a slap!
<Yes, reader. I hear you. Just forget about the slap, will you. It didn’t happen. Okay?>
Want to read more? Read the whole story by clicking on the first blog called Prelude and start clicking forwards using the tabs above the title.
11:45 Posted in Part Two: Getting Some Answers | Permalink | Comments (2) | Email this | Tags: haunted house, ghost story, horror story, astronaut, space, nicole kidman, journal
Comments
Blog wood huv bin better wif a slap.
Posted by: guy who likes slaps in stories | 11 June 2008
Thanks for that. Watch now! Don't let the cupboard door close over before you've climbed back in.
Enjoy your dog food, you dweeb!
Posted by: Steph Fey | 11 June 2008