The Killer

And so he ran.

He ran through midnight streets, past houses that looked like phony facades, so little did they say to him, running, running, constantly expecting to see something that spoke. Though he had to change direction seven times, he made sure he was always travelling west, where certain illumination would come to him soon. He saw a tall building ahead of him, and he adjudged that it would become familiar as he neared it, and so he ran for that tall building with all his strength. The top of the building became lost to his field of vision as he realized it was a hospital of some calibre. He slowed so as to not alarm the doctors and nurses and administrators, and he got inside, breathing heavily though not wheezily, and sat himself down in one of the green plastic bowl seats that lined the wall facing the intake desk.

The clock spoke to him. It said 03:26. His left palm was sticky, with blood. His fingers were cut, on the insides, laterally, the cuts lined up, they'd all been sliced at the same time. Seeing as he was in a hospital, in the emergency, he went up to the desk and spoke through the glass barrier.

And now. in the middle of this story, it cannot continue, despite how intriguing it is.

I intended it to be quite long, and (if I remember correctly, for I wrote the above twelve days ago) it would have to do with memory, the memory of a crime committed, by the He of the story, about which he has no memory. So basically it was going to be ambiguous and Oedipus, with plenty of characters and none of them appearing more than once (except for He, who would be present throughout). I often work that way, with just a general idea of what the effect is meant to be; in that, I follow Poe that there should be one big effect to a short story. There's always some special effect involved.

However, it is not going to continue, because about an hour after I wrote the first half of this strip I got routed a message from my sister, that my mother, who'd been in the hospital for a little over three weeks, had taken a turn. I went to the hospital, and the following day my mother died.

I've been getting volumes. Every month, a hardcover journal arrives at my door. They all look the same on the outside, but the insides often differ wildly. One of the contained an illustrated epic ballad running to some six hundred pages with colour and illustration everywhere. I now have in my hands a volume that seems to be an engorged issue of The New Yorker, complete with high-end advertisements and cartoons with typically interchangeable captions. However, there are a couple Thomas Ligotti stories in it, so on balance it's a good thing.

The covers, as I said above, are all the same in that they are black with text that manages to reflect the contents briefly and accurately, like a catalog entry more than a showy display, as if they were already classically archival. I stock them away reverently, lining up their spines, dusting their uppermost edges....

How many false memories inhabit me? I remember, I like to think, signing up for these deliveries; perhaps, I even sought them out--or I am fabulating the whole thing? It's simplest to go along with accepting that I did want these volumes to show up: for I am living with interchangeable captions.

It snowed all day today, from ten o'clock on, and coming home was difficult but not impossible; however, I found myself on a street I didn't recognize because the snow was blowing all over the place and the sidewalks were obscured and though I turned out to be on the street I mostly thought I was, for a moment I was confused about where I was and in what direction I was heading, and though I was not wrong it was a curious feeling; and I've been out shovelling the sidewalk and I did a pretty good job of it, for the snow was light and fluffy and it didn't hurt a bit to get it all done (which only took about twenty minutes anyway), and it's still snowing out there so I'll have to account for a bit of time in the morning to put the finishing touches on the tidiest walk on the street, and I'm wondering how much snow there is up in Brooklin, probably more, and I was to pick up the phone and call my mother in Brooklin to ask how much show they have up there, but I can't call my mother, never again.

I copped a consultation with the King through my close connection with my cousin the courtier.

I stopped at the stairs to steady my stick, sticky with sweat. How would his highness reply to my proposal to measure landmasses with the meter I'd made? Fortune, would I find faith in my principled proposal to proceed with production?

"Your Greatness," I began, "with craft I've created a cunning corrective to the nonsense I see so seldom seriously ... corrected."

"Enough with the flowers," said my King. "Show, don't tell."

"Ah, yes. Here it is." I handed over my stick.

He weighed it in his hands. "It's a stick."

"Yes, it is a coarse representation of the ideal line, which, as you know, is the shortest distance between two points whose shadow can be reduced to a point in itself. How would one represent a point passing through time? Why, with a line!"

Crickets.

Finally he said: "Don't you have something better to do?"

I'd gotten off on the wrong foot. I started again. "It's called a meter, and it can measure things all across the kingdom to the same standard."

The King said: "That's not important." Then he ordered my execution.

I'm going to crib a lot of information from my sister-in-law's eulogy here. My mother, Janet May, was born in Peterborough but almost immediately was moved to Oshawa. She worked at a golf course and a library. Then she became a nurse, graduating tops. She met my father that same year, on New Year's Eve, got engaged on Valentine's Day, and married in August. Then came along five babies, of whom I was the last. During all those years she worked at the Oshawa General Hospital, until 1993, at a variety of stations. Her husband, my father, died in 2009.

Such are the details. I can't provide you with much in the way of anecdotes, but she was one of my best friends. I remember getting ridiculous about a stupid haircut when I was seven or so, and she sat calmly, waiting for my tantrum to beat itself out. We'd play miniature golf in the summer, go to the library a lot, and I learned how to read well mainly by reading aloud to her. I also stole from her; a dollar here and there, the odd cigarette. If she ever suspected anything, she never said so. Too much trouble.

In the basement student lounge, I bent down and opened the beer fridge. Nine tidy clear bottles of ale stood behind a can of some de-alcoholised rubbish and two open stale pints of Germany. I thought ahead, to the three assignations I was destined to keep that evening: with Duchess Kate (dinner and a hotel), with actress Donna (drinks and a motel), and with triathloness Hilde (dessert and a sauna). I'd come down to the beer fridge knowing I'd put a couple cans in there earlier in the day only to find out that I'd misremembered, and I believe my misremembrance took place during the tryst with Ellen in a halted elevator. I thought then unthought of going to the beer store; I looked at the clock. Let it come down, I decided, scooped up two clear bottles, and thrust them into my knapsack. If questioned about the missing, I would rectify gladly, but I would certainly not selfishly volunteer the information. I donned the knapsack and ascended the stair to street level. It was a nice summer day, and Kate was waiting hardly for me at La Maison. Surely I won't get caught, I thought. Surely not, surely not.

I didn't go to work the day after the funeral; I had some vacation days to burn and besides I didn't want to see anyone. I had a curious feeling, and it took until early afternoon to realize: Hey, I'm not worried about anything.

Having no parents left changes a person. I've been wondering almost daily: Who am I performing for? I have no parent left to disappoint. I can do whatever I want! Oddly enough, this has made me not want to throw my cares to the wind. I feel like I have to straighten up and fly right, now, finally. (I may get back to this later.)

I can't go crying to Mommy, even if I wanted to.

I'm thinking of the dining-room table. Six of us sat around it for a decade or more. If I remember correctly, Mom was to my left, David was to my right; across from me was Joanne, and Paul was beside her. Dad sat between Paul and David. And now three--half--of those people are gone.

The night before Mary's father died, I said it wasn't just a matter of one death; it was the dying of a family, too.

Once upon a time, we had different water. Its melting point has been estimated to be a comfortable twenty degrees Celsius (this was before the codification of any measuring scales), and all the people could skate to business and to pleasure. They didn't have to use skates, either; simply by exerting themselves, perpetual motion was possible. There was no point to racing, or to sports in general, for everyone was the equal (in skating as in everything else) or all.

With just one kicked of a perpendicular foot, we could all easily circumnavigate the globe. Distance (though not time) lacked having meaning. As a consequence of this, shipping costs were non-existent. The average woman could have an average man delivered to her boudoir with handling only. This logic extended even unto salaciousness.

I was but a boy at the time, but it was a wonderful time. Imperceptively, things changed. Ice became somewhat seasonal, and unreliable in its slickness. My friends seemed to move away, as 'distance' came into itself as a concept. Oceans appeared and continents formed. It's another world now.

Distances increase daily, imperceptively. Soon enough, all distances will approach infinity. It'll forever be the end of the ice.

From the child's point of view, mother is the beginning of the whole world. Everything that follows is tied to and proceeds from mother. Everything good and everything bad is from mother. When I cover my head alone in bed to escape from the monsters, mother is the monster and also the one who could protect me from the monsters. I cover my ears and cannot hear. For many years, father was the monster, and mother did not protect me. She abandoned me. I cowered in fear under an orange blanket, entirely alone. How could she sleep with the monster my father? They looked together almost normal during the daytime, loving, yet I had to cover my head so as not to hear the monster ay night. My mother must have been part of the monster, no two ways about it. She let him terrify me; she was absent as I slid to the wall-side bed-edge. The child lives in this ambivalence through his life; loving her, hating her, depending on her, and sometimes giving up on her. Mother is the beginning of the whole world; and it's not easy to be the mother of a child of a mother.

I present to you space. I can show you borders within my borders, mountains in my folds, and waters made from ink. Find yourself with a pinprick, cross land with walking fingers, scan the span between Czech and Slovak with three degrees. Put me in your glove compartment whenever you go anywhere at all. Don't trust those new-fangled computers; this is the date now--4 February 2019--and this is what it looks like. Who knows when modernity becomes obsolete? You're better off knowing that what is is is what is is now. I'm ready for the transparent tape across my creases, in the careful index on my verso. I promise: You'll never mistake me for the territory. Does a fissure of a tear separate the west half of Hay-on-Wye from the east half of Hay-on-Wye? Do their citizens have to call across this abyss? There is no rip through Hay-on-Wye. You know it's not there. You know what contingency is. You know who I am. You cannot mistake me for something I am not, which is something I wish I could say about you. Look down there. It's the mark of my make-believe. It's called SCALE. Aren't you envious?

There's a common fallacy called the naturalistic fallacy. It's the belief that if something is natural it is simultaneously good. You see it all the time.

My mother died what can be termed a natural death. This is to say, she had an infection in her blood that starved her entire body and gave her extreme pain for more than two weeks, and there was nothing I could do. She was repeating words to make the pain controllable; she cried out: "Help me! Help me!" but I had to tell her there was nothing I could do. Only near the end, when death was inevitable, did she get narcotized to a complete sleep. The day she died, in the palliative ward, she was breathing strenuously. The nurse said she was giving oxygen to her inner organs; her limbs were already cold. Her eyes opened, slightly, blankly, for a few minutes, then closed again. (I had seen Mary's father do the same, precisely four weeks before.) I was holding her hand, which was moving slightly; then the motion slowed, then stopped. Some fifteen minutes later, all motion stopped. It had happened. Nothing was left to do; all we did was cried.

 

March 17, 4:08 pm.

Hi, it's mom, as you probably know. Just returning John's phone call. There was a concert this afternoon and so I didn’t get it right away. Anyway, I'm fine and I'll talk to you later. Bye.

April 1, 10:34 am.

Hi guys, it's mom. I know you're not there but I'm just calling to wish you a happy Easter. You'll get this message when you get home after having a good time in in the glorious United states. Anyway, love you guys. Bye now.

April 3, 8:43 pm.

Hi guys, it's mom. I just thought you might be back by now. But anyway, give me a call sometime. There's no emergency or anything. Thank you, Bye.

July 24, 2:28 pm.

Hi John, I found my email address for the Kindle. It's Jan May Skaife at Gmail 9621.

July 30, 4:20 pm.

Hi guys, it's mom. I just didn’t know when you guys were leaving for Halifax, whether it was today or tomorrow, but anyway maybe if you're still around you can give me a call. Thank you, bye.

August 5, 4:02 pm.

Hi John, it's mom. I just wondered how you’re doing, how Mary's dad is getting along. Give me a call if you’ve got the time. Thank you, bye.

August 26, 2:39 pm.

Hi, it's just mom calling to say hello. I'll talk to you later. Bye now.

October 5, 9:52 pm.

Hi, John, it's mom. It's for lunch on Sunday. Jo and Carlo are coming too. I hope that’s not too inconvenient for you. Anyway, see you Sunday. Okay, bye honey.

October 27, 9:13 pm.

Hi John, It's mom. I'm just returning your call from last night. Maybe you're not home from work yet, but anyway that’s all I'm doing. You can call me back if you want to. Thank you honey bye.