Doreen's Room (ajc) (part 2)

[Andy J Campbell]

Andy J Campbell a...@ajco.demon.co.uk
DOREEN'S ROOM /means/ italics.

V

The Sun, shrouded behind an enormous, curtained window, was projecting
a softly undulating pattern of shadows which swept diagonally across
the room. I was thus fed the impression that my surroundings were under
attack by some vast, air-breathing jellyfish; its translucent tentacles
formed from sunbeams, alive with bloodcells of dust and suspended as
long, ghostly wrists above the bed. The haggard walls, concealed where
ever possible by contrastingly dark paintings, were animated with
sluggishly moving shadow-diamonds which, my imagination would have it,
looked like the jaded reflections of some immense, rotating crystal.
Breathtaken by the dramatic and vivacious room, I jumped when I heard
what sounded like the croak of a dying old woman, snatched my head left
and caught the door easing closed on its own. A slight glimpse of
movement made me whisk my head back again, and then down a little, so
that I was staring at the elegant, golden lamp atop the chest of
drawers.
"Hello?" I called apprehensively. Neither the room nor the lamp
offered any form of reply. "I ah... I believe that I am about to see
you," I added in a loud voice.
Drawing from past experience, I waited for the lamp to flicker, the
quilt to slash back, the door to whip open. But nothing happened...
Nothing, that is, except for the barely noticeable, slothful approach of
shadows. Like a noxious, fluid disease, they began to creep along the
carpet... Consuming an abandoned pair of slippers... Warping as they
seeped down the face of a small, bedside cabinet... And flickering...
Flickering madly at the edges as if alight with invisible flames.
I staggered around this languidly approaching menace and made my
towards the bed, where there was a long, triangular section of the
quilt which had managed, somehow, to remain completely untouched by the
oncoming swarm. Upon reaching it, I sat down, put my splayed fingers
together, shakily held them about six inches away from my face, and
closed my eyes. I had to relax. I had to feel cool and concentrated to
be able to enter the Alpha state of consciousness.
Something scraped and hit floor with a loud clink. I flicked my eyes
open. The golden lamp now lay on its side on the carpet. I looked over
my shoulder. The veil of blotchy, billowing shadows was gliding sound-
lessly towards me, eating away the bedcovers, closing up the triangle.
I looked straight ahead again - and then blanked out my vision with
cupped hands.
"Poltergeist... No problem... No problem at all," I whispered. "One...
Two... Three..." The room began to fill with the sounds of grating,
banging, toppling objects. A hard item fell against my leg. Something
rubbery bounced off my back. "Four... Five... Six... Breathe... Come on
Holmes old boy, /breathe/..."
Gently, I drew my left and right fingers apart, focusing on the
gradually widening space and the minute radiations of energy stretching
like strands of mucus between them. Through all the watery, twisted
transparency there emerged hazy smears of vibrant colour, gaseous and
glowing like brilliant, sun-set clouds. The immediately opposing wall
was suddenly bleached in rich, vivid red; the chest of drawers
concealing its bottom third shrouded by an aurora of murky, faded
orange. More to my expectation, dark, thunderous greys and swirling,
corroded browns enclosed these blazing hues like smoke.
"Now we're cooking," I whispered in a slender voice. As if curtailed
by these words, the smashing of objects and the grinding of furniture
came to an abrupt end.
Calmly, my breathing still slow and systematic, I unzipped my nylon
pouch, extracted my specially-designed glasses and slid them carefully
onto my face. When viewed through cobalt blue lenses, the colours that
can be seen during the Alpha state of consciousness appear less
blinding; their glaring edges dissolved by the neutralising tone.
Although it is true that to reach Alpha (and indeed to see human auras)
one must initially discover and penetrate a certain condition of mind,
the actual perception of imagery does not entirely come from within the
entranced beholder; light and colour still dance across the retina,
hence the necessity of what I have privately nicknamed "psychic
sunglasses."
Clenching my fists, I rose up from the bed and began to turn, anti-
clockwise. Mrs Chambers room - as seen through my extrasensory eyes -
was an over-whelming enclosure of darkly-stained, kaleidoscopic chaos,
almost every inch of it obscured by shadowy, vaporous smudges. Imagine,
if you can bare it, an old and expensively decorated dwelling that has
been gratuitously vandalised with garishly coloured blotches of spray-
paint. Such a depraved vision unerringly describes the appearance of my
surroundings - although it has to be said that none of the furniture
was in any way /physically/ corrupted.
(Perhaps now you are able to comprehend why the pastel blue front
door of the house, with its starkly opposing visions of cleanliness and
filth, has perfect relevance here in my story. We humans inhabit a mere
one, single, limited point of perception through which we believe we
are forced to view our surroundings. But who is to say that our
dimension and our sensory methods of perceiving it are inexpandable?
Who is to stop us from attempting to alternate the frequency to which
our eyes and ears have become so mundanely accustomed?)
The colours did not disturb me in their variety and quantity, but in
their rich and consistent murkiness. Perhaps the darkest room I had
visited before this one, was that of a sexually abused child's, where
the bed and virtually the entire of the wall next to it had been coated
in a thick, jet-black curtain of pure void. Of course, black - often
associated with ignorance and anger more than suffering and depression
- is not the only negative colour in the psychic spectrum, nor does it
consistently symbolise the most intensely painful or distressing of
human emotions. Mrs Chambers room was a complex and unsettling
conjunction of angry, smoky grey, poisoned indigo, passionate, raging
red and avaricious brown.
It was when I turned to face the window (which was concealed not only
by the curtains now, but also by a grimy, greyish mist) that I laid
eyes on the ethereal presence of the hostile visitant. Despite its
phantom-like form - which hovered two feet off the ground - I did not
experience any further anxiety, for I had, as Berry would put it, "come
up against" such militant manifestations several times my dramatic
past. In opposition to popular belief, like most non-material "beings"
the one in Mrs Chambers room possessed absolutely no gruesome or
frightening features whatsoever. It was simply an accumulation of
dreary, metallic smoke, divided from the other misty, multi-coloured
stains only by its levitational qualities and ambiguously humanlike
appearance. (Alpha consciousness, I believe, is not the exact visual
frequency on which ghosts and suchlike operate; seeing ghosts through
Alpha is comparable to watching a television programme through an ocean
of silvery static.)
"It seems that your bark is considerably bigger than your bite,"
announced the fully-restored Holmes, advancing bravely in the direction
of the floating fiend. There was no reaction to my verbal commentary,
nor to my bold steps across the darkly-clouded carpet. I might have
been approaching some lifeless, three-dimensional shadow of one of the
room's previous inhabitants or... Or /perhaps/...
It suddenly came to me that this motionless thing might be some kind
of "phantasmal Red Herring": a distraction from the rooms true, possibly
quite deadly, inhabitant. Hypothetically, this made sense, for - in my
experience - poltergeists are the most cunning of all hostile spirits,
and never before had I been able to get so close to such a being without
my witnessing some form of violent, panic-stricken response.
As if triggered by these deductions, a breeze of icy air blew my
untucked shirt around like a small cape. I heard the tinkling of glass,
the gentle scrape of ornaments and the ruffle of bedcovers.
"Shit," I whispered flatly.
Holding one corner of my glasses between finger and thumb, I took a
sharp breath, bent at the knees and whisked around. It was then that my
eyes plunged into the pulsating mass of a bioplasmic organism of
unparalleled grotesqueness - a huge, black, terrifyingly shapeless
monstrosity, of the kind I have never before seen in Alpha, nor in the
most dreadful of my nightmares. As repugnantly vivid as if it were
hovering in the normal, everyday world, and shining with a sleek, insect
-like plasticity, the deathly creature resembled a giant, charcoaled
brain; a boulder of thick, oily sponge; it's circumference glowing like
a dead star against the fountains of colour behind it.
Before I could even begin to comprehend it's nonsensical existence, it
lunged noiselessly toward me like some gigantic, wide-open mouth. I
stumbled backwards until my arms cracked against the windowsill. My
glasses sprang up and landed cock-eyed; bright streams of multi-colour
flooded into the top half of my vision.
But it was during the last few seconds before I came tumbling out of
Alpha that I saw the true horror of the titanic thing: it was all but
upon me - I could see absolutely nothing but darkly rippling flesh -
when suddenly I noticed a blemish; a tiny, purple, humanoid face,
plugged deeply into the surface of the demon like some kind of severely
discoloured boil or belly-button. It's expression was tortuously
deformed, its jaws frozen wide in a hopeless, wretched scream.
It was the face of Mrs Chambers.

IV

About five minutes later, after wandering down the staircase in the
manner of a drunken idiot, I reached the door of the livingroom, where
I paused to tidy my hair.
"Is that you, Mr Dean?" Mrs Chambers called, sounding as cheerful as
ever.
"Yes," I replied, shakily stuffing my glasses back into their pouch.
"I'm just... Looking at your paintings. Won't be a moment." I got the
glasses in, zipped up the compartment and tugged the bag around my
waist. "I ah... I knocked a few things off the bathroom shelves, I'm
afraid. Ah... I got a little claustrophobic." I winced upon reciting
that last addition. "Well, I mean..."
"You really do enjoy lying through your teeth, don't you?" said the
woman, laughing. "Nobody - except perhaps /King Kong/ - goes to the
toilet and produces such a horrendous racket. Come on in, Mr Dean, for
goodness sakes."
I entered the room like a scolded child desperate to rejoin Birthday
festivities. Mrs Chambers was still slumped deflatedly on the settee,
her empty coffee cup resting against her belly at an odd, slightly-
skewed angle. She was drumming her fingers on the arm of the furniture
and looking excruciatingly bored.
"Sorry I took so long," I offered her a weak, foolish smile. I tip-
toed back to my place, sat down beside her and began to toy with the
damp collar of my shirt. "Wow, its rather warm in here isn't it... Ah
Right. Lets see, how far had we got? Oh yes, the business cards. Did
you find anything you liked?"
"Mr Dean... How about we resume with what you experienced whilst you
were poking around in my spare bedroom?"
"I ah... I have no idea what you're talking about. Oh, look, maybe
you'd interested in these wonderful new luxury designs. Ah, this one,
look, how about this one, surely this one would be just-"
"Don't make me slap you, Mr Dean! Or should I call you Mr James S
Mahoney? That's your real name, isn't it? Oh don't look so alarmed, of
course it is! You were interviewed for a book entitled Light out of
Darkness, edited by Charles Ray, published in '93 by Blake & Forrest!
I know who you are! I recognised you about a second after I opened the
front door... Standing there with an expression to match the photo in
the book. You don't /really/ think I could have forgotten that /James
Dean/ was coming to my house, do you? Why, I just needed a moment to
fit your face! Perhaps now we can cast side the innocent flog-me-a-
business-card balderdash, what do you say? Hah? Do you think that would
be possible, Mr James S Mahoney?"
I had stopped breathing. I don't know why I was so shocked. Thinking
back it seems quite staggeringly ludicrous that I thought I might lie
through my teeth for much longer. Perhaps it was hearing my real name
and one of my biggest credentials screamed out so suddenly and
dramatically like that which... Tipped the scales, as it were. I
honestly didn't know what to do. I considered grabbing my case and
running for it; pompously denying the woman's recognition - hell, even
telling her I that had escaped from a /mental institution/, so scrambled
and delirious were my thoughts. In the end, however, I simply nodded
and took a shaky mouthful of tepid coffee.
"I'm sorry, Mrs Chambers I... I don't know what the hell you've got in
this house but," I wiped my mouth and glanced at her. "I've never seen
or experienced anything remotely like it. Never. Not even in the halls
of West Castle Church. What in God's name happened here? What the hell
happened in that blasted room?"
Mrs Chambers produced a high-pitched laugh which made me jerk as if
I'd been brutally prodded. "You... You talk to me as if your true
identity doesn't matter!" she exclaimed, her eyes like two prodigious
pearls. "God save us, perhaps you're right, perhaps it doesn't matter;
obviously you're not the only notorious lair around here, Paul must have
been in on it too. What an intriguing setup. I'm impressed. All that
trouble to which you two... Remarkable gents must have gone. Pardon my
ignorance Mr Mahoney, whilst I'm sure you've been through nothing less
than a nightmare during your invasion of my privacy - believe me, I
heard most of it loud and clear - you must understand that our
situation has altered somewhat drastically."
"Ah... A-altered, Mrs Chambers?" I visualised the woman ringing the
Police - knocking at the door, coming in for coffee, dragging me away -
and felt my lower lip tremble.
"Yes. Altered, Mr Mahoney. I can no longer trust you, can I?"
Although I knew it to be a perfectly acceptable conclusion, I was
distressed by this comment. I leaned forwards, quickly. "Mrs Chambers,
please, listen to me-"
"No, it is you who must do the listening. Even when I dragged your
plans kicking and screaming into the air you still clung on to your
feeble, ridiculous lies. What were you thinking? That if you told enough
of them they might somehow bond together and become believable?" She
laughed in that same incredulous, piercing tone. "Well... Let me tell
you this: you are going to listen to what I have to say - and don't
think for a moment that you're going to enjoy it because I can assure
you it's no pretty little fairytale - and then you are going to tell me
what you think I should do about it. After all, isn't that what you're
here for? To help me get rid of that... That /evil/ upstairs in my
bedroom?"
"Ah... Yes, yes it is," I said, lacing my fingers. "Mrs Chambers,
listen... I-I admit that I'm both a... A double-crossing... Pisspot and
ah... Ah, a hopeless, pitiable liar, but you must understand that...
That people... /normal/ people... Don't realise what I can do for them.
If they were to sit down, open-mindedly, and permit me to... To talk
them through the principles, then yes, yes, maybe there'd be a chance.
But I've tried this approach and it doesn't work... It doesn't work, I
tell you. If the reaction is not one of impatience or disbelief or
laughter its one of full-blown confusion. Ah, panic, I mean. People
don't know how to handle these things. I just... Do it all for them,
privately, without any fuss, I-I always have done, and, well... Up
until now it's always seemed to /work/... I'm a good man, you must
believe me when I say that... I-I meant no harm... I can but offer my
deepest and most sincere of apologies. And yes, God yes, by all means,
tell me your story. I absolutely /must/ know what happened here. The
comedy is over, Mrs Chambers, I swear. No more lies. No more messing
around. Tell me... Right now, please I'm listening."
Mrs Chamber's face appeared to darken. She turned away from me and
looked down at her hands. "How much has Paul told you?"
I shrugged and tried to recall Berry's letter, but all of a sudden I
couldn't think of anything except for the black, throbbing flesh of the
hideous being. Even when I attempted to concentrate on something as
stupidly insignificant as picking up my drink, I saw the creature's
engulfing mouth rising like a tunnel above my glasses.
"I-I really don't remember," I stuttered, gently massaging my
temples; I could feel a violent headache approaching. "Not much... Just
that you were a... Ah, a dear friend in need of my help. He phoned
yesterday evening and said a few other things, but I don't... Remember
any relevant details. It was a very brief call. In fact, it sounded like
he was calling from a phonebooth in a railway station or... Or maybe an
airport or something."
"He did not tell you about Pandora's Box, then, I take it?"
"No, ah... No, I don't think so. Pandora's Box? What does that mean?"
Mrs Chambers placed her cup onto a nearby table and folded her arms.
"I`ll tell you, Mr Mahoney," she said. "I'll tell you everything."

VII

"I got married when I was twenty nine," she began. "It was a most
unexpected event. Marriage, I mean; never previously written down on my
life's agenda. Having been graced with a youthful, childlike appearance,
even in my late twenties I had a tendency to attract emotionally
immature teenagers - eager little boys, as I came to call them, that
were far more interested in removing my clothes than developing any
sort of loving partnership. I don't ever remember dating a man who was
older than me; nobody above twenty seemed to find me attractive. I
certainly never fell in love with any of my dates, that's for sure, nor
did anything worthwhile above sexual fulfilment evolve out of such
shallow, meaningless relationships.
"When I met Cameron, however... All that frivolous, uncontrollable
nonsense seemed to flutter away. Cameron, too was in his late teens
when I met him, but, unlike his peers, he was wonderfully calm, caring
and hugely self-sacrificing. He was also a budding musician and a
talented poet, though he lacked the confidence to share his work with
anyone other than me... I had never met a man quite like him, let alone
been aware that I could develop such... Emotionally intense feelings. I
became intrigued, then involved, then obsessed with Cameron, until, at
last, I married him in 1985, when I was thirty and he was nineteen. We
spent twelve years of our life together, Mr Mahoney. Twelve happy,
satisfying years. Then... Then I met Paul."
"Paul Berry?" I inquired. "I'm sorry to break in, but... You had an
affair with Paul Berry? The man who told me to come here? Is that what
this is all about?"
Mrs Chambers offered me a sad smile. "What happened between Paul and
I was like nothing you could possibly imagine, Mr Mahoney. I met him
at an Adult Education class in New Penton around January last year. On
the first day of the course, upon laying eyes on some the canvasses he's
brought with him, I made the embarrassing mistake of assuming that Paul
was the leader of the group. I approached him, introduced myself,
complemented him on his amazing work, and then recited to him the
details which are usually required to enrol upon such courses My name
and address, my telephone number, my age and qualifications, for
instance.
"But instead of telling me that I had made a mistake and that the
leader had yet to arrive, Paul extracted a piece of paper from his coat
pocket and made a note of all these personal details. He then said
thankyou, that he'd speak to me at the end of the class, and that I
could sit down again now, if I wanted. When the real leader walked in
about ten minutes later, I felt not only embarrassed, but also
frightened, for I had given my address to a complete stranger. I spent
the entire session barely listening to what was being said, but rather,
pondering over ways in which I might approach Paul - to ask him why he
played me along, what he might wish to do with my personal details and,
most of all, why it was that he kept glancing back at me and frowning
as if my stupid mistake had invoked rage or deep offence.
"He came to me, though - just as he had said - at the end of the
evening, and revealed himself to be a softly spoken man of virtually
unbearable charm and intelligence. Although his observations were
surely correct, he had an unpretentious attitude towards everything,
from the apparently inaccurate and dimwitted tutor of the course to the
fact that he found me inexplicably attractive. `I should wish to meet
you tomorrow night,' he said, walking backwards along the pavement just
ahead of me. He had three enormous canvasses under his right shoulder
and a small bag over his left. `You are as beautiful as your paintings,
Doreen Chambers, I must see you again. Please, forgive my unacceptable
behaviour. Can't you understand that I simply had to know more about
you? Come out with me. Give me a chance. Let me show you the pleasures
of the Gods.'
"I did not agree that we should meet, though I must confess that
neither did I reveal to him my wedding ring. There was something...
Mysteriously alluring about those final few words: 'Let me show you the
pleasures of the Gods.' What on earth did he mean by such a melo-
dramatic statement? Was he rich beyond my minds understanding? Was he
referring to his sexual abilities? Or was it a simple case of verbal
trickery? I kept visualising his paintings - the mythological creatures
and heros they so skilfully portrayed - and wondering if he had matched
the face of some tragic, Greek Goddess against my own. `I'm sorry Some
other time, perhaps,' I said, quickening my pace, holding my hand
against my forehead as if I were deflecting a powerful flood of light.
`Goodnight, I'll see you next week. Oh, and best of luck with the
painting.' I disappeared into the awaiting door of a taxi.
"Even then, Mr Mahoney, I was aware of what might eventuate. For
reasons I do not understand, Paul invoked within me a desperate passion
...A burning ache to return to the empty, mindless lust of my younger
years. The following week, I considered failing to attend the course,
for the sake of my marriage and quite possibly my sanity, but I did
not. After another wasteful session of wandering thoughts and suggestive
glances, Paul and I emerged from the building together. `I want you,' he
demanded. `And I can see it in your eyes that you want to give me a
chance, but there is something stopping you. What is it, Doreen
Chambers? What stops you?' At last, I held up my hand, splayed my
fingers in front of his face. `Settled? Now goodnight, Mr Berry.' I
shouted and stormed off into the night. He followed me, leaping from
flag to flag and waving his arms like a demented idiot. `A ring is
nothing!' he shrieked. `Not when measured against powers such as these!
Doreen you must listen to me! The Gods have foreseen our coming
together! We are darkness and light, Helen and Paris, Epimetheus and
Pandora!' `You talk absolute rubbish, Mr Berry, leave me alone,' I
said, but Paul would not listen. `Here, take this. You wont listen to
me, fine. Take this.' He snatched what looked like a small, silver
lunchbox out of his inside pocket and demanded I accept it. `No,' I
said, `I don't want anything from you. Just leave me alone.'
"I did not take Paul's mysterious container that night, though I
might as well have done, for it arrived in the post a day later, along
with a card, the back of which read `you are utterly forbidden to open
this box'. Cameron questioned me over breakfast about what was inside
the package he`d seen on the doormat. Without any hesitation, I told
him it was just boring, artists equipment, nothing to get excited
about.
"If you don't come out with me I will begin to phone you, Paul avowed
on the third week. `What's in that box? I demanded. What's in there?
And why did you send it to me? Why?' `Do you have it with you?' he
inquired. `No I don't have it with me, why did you send it?' `Then where
is it? Where is it Doreen?' he began to laugh. `It's out of the way of
my husband, of course, you stupid fool. I don't know what to do with it.
There seems to be no way in, and yet when I shake it, there is
something inside. What is it? What are you trying to do to me?' `It
seems that I do not need to pester you with phone calls,' he began to
walk away. I stopped and stared at him. `Where are you going? Come
back, I haven't finished.' `I know you want to open the box, Doreen,'
he told me, his flesh and clothes streaked with pale moonlight. `And I
know that you will. It's only a matter of time. You will. You will open
the box.'
"I spent the next four days contemplating forcing my way into the
container. You must understand, Mr Mahoney, that what was inside Paul's
box mattered so little; it was the act of breaking into it that was the
key to his enticement. If I were to smash my way inside, I would be
his. I knew perfectly well what he was doing, and yet, like Pandora
herself, I was consumed by passion and curiosity.
"It agonises me to say it... But eventually, I gave in. One morning,
when Cameron was at work, I went down into the cellar, found the
toolbox, dug out the biggest hammer I could find and began to batter
the hell out of Paul's metallic mystery. It squealed and dinted and
jumped around as it were alive and being perpetually tortured, until
finally, on the ninth blow, it exploded, spilling contraceptives and
ghastly yet mesmerising images all over the cellar floor. Scribbled in
black on the underside of the lid, there was a phone number, and the
words `ring me' and `I want you'.
"I rang. Paul arrived within half an hour, almost broke the door down.
He carried me into the spare bedroom and threw me onto the bed, where
he proceeded to slash off my clothes as if I were a prize Christmas
present... The pleasures of the Gods, Mr Mahoney, that's what I wanted.
And yet what I got was only a completion of the circle: I was back to
square one, whimperingly submitting to uncontrollable desires. But
there was more: I was now stuffed to bursting point with all of the
horrendous greeds and contradictions that come bottled with the human
condition. I wanted the passion of Paul and the love of Cameron... I
wanted the thrill of secrecy and the relief of admittance... I wanted
everything.... Every emotion in the world forged together and rolled
into one, so that I might taste and enjoy it."
"That would explain why your room was so colourful," I interjected.
"Again, I apologise for interrupting, Mrs Chambers, but... This is
making perfect sense. In the room upstairs, I-I detected a whole
spectrum of feelings and emotions. I could only think that whoever had
created them had suffered terrible despair and confusion."
Mrs Chambers nodded. "Despair and confusion... Yes, Mr Mahoney,
correct. I don't know if you are familiar with Greek mythology, but the
legend has it that Pandora removed the lid from her forbidden box and
evil was scattered throughout the world. An evil which mingled with
good so that humans could no longer distinguish one from the other.
Pandora was of course terrified by all this, and quickly replaced the
lid again. Unfortunately, however, she was too late. All that was left
inside the container was a weak and pathetic little thing which cowered
at the bottom, consuming barely an inch of space. That thing was hope,
Mr Mahoney, and it remained in Pandora's box as if it were too
frightened - as if it had no /right/ - to leap out.
"I knew nothing of hope, it seemed. I could not help myself. Paul
came to this house every other day for three months. During that time,
I began to grow tired and lose weight, to suffer black moods and acute
depression. I craved for every passionate morning or afternoon, and yet
I was aware that these secret, sexual encounters were destroying me. I
wanted and wanted until the event occurred and then afterwards and I
hated and hated... Until one morning, after Paul had carted me upstairs
and thrown me onto the bed, I saw Cameron staring at me from across the
room. His eyes were massive and his tongue - abnormally huge and pale
pink - was flopping out, like a dog's. I screamed and flew upright, and
then screamed again. My husband was hanging by his neck from the
bedroom light - gently swinging and... And /twitching/ as if it had
only just happened. In one of his hands he clutched an unopened condom
packet and a gruesomely perverse black and white image - both of which
I must have missed when I'd swept the cellar floor. In his other, he
held a piece of yellow notepaper, on which he'd written three powerful,
soul-shattering words:
"`I forgive you.'"

VIII

The woman's tragic tale came to an end so abruptly I felt my entire body
quiver. My imagination had been forced to a skidding standstill only
inches away from plunging over the edge of some vast, mental abyss. Now,
I was scrambling exhaustedly to my feet again, in the hope of surveying
the terrible panorama.
"/Christ/," I hissed. "How... Jesus Christ, how long has it /been/
since all this /happened/? Did you actually get together will Paul? I
mean... What did you /do/?
"It's been twelve months now, and no, I most certainly did not permit
Paul to take Cameron's place. I gathered my senses and did all that I
could to rid the man from what was left of my battered life.
Unfortunately... I was pregnant to him. Yes, I know, it seems ridiculous
doesn't it, the silver box being crammed full with what it was... Still,
during the heat of our passion, I was in no state of mind to consider
protection. I was just lost, Mr Mahoney. Empty. Sometimes I wonder if I
had any control over the situation whatsoever. When I remember it - any
part of it, it doesn't matter which - it's like... Like a hideous horror
film being played back in my mind's eye. I can see, hear, touch, taste
and smell everything... The lust, the fire, the excitement... But I can
not recall doing anything of my own free will. It's almost as if Paul
was Zeus and I a mere mortal. He had total domination over my thoughts
and actions... Was manipulating... /playing/ with me."
"What did you do about the child?" I breathed. "Did you have it?"
"No. I had an abortion."
"But... What about Paul?"
"I thought it a form of revenge to tell him after I'd killed it, as
appallingly bitter as that might sound. Oh, he was angry alright - he
even threw a punch at me - but I could tell that it was a pantomime,
that he didn't really take it to heart. Paul is an incredibly self-
indulgent man, Mr Mahoney. He considered my own attempt at being
cunningly cruel and calculated as a new stage of the game. There was the
guilt and the pity, of course - he isn't completely inhuman - but the
only real way I could avenge him for the part he'd played in Cameron's
death was to not let him have me. It took him weeks to get the message.
Months for the visits and phonecalls to slow down, the pressure to
ease, the bitterness to weaken...
"At first - as with the child - I said nothing about the bedroom.
What was beginning to happen. The noises, the moving of the furniture...
The dreadful apparitions. I considered the haunting my own, personal
punishment. Sometimes, Mr Mahoney, I would go up there and force myself
to stand in the middle of that frightening room just because I thought
I deserved it. Whatever it was - is - I could feel it feeding off me...
Eating... Draining... Sapping me away as if I were its only source of
nourishment. It may sound rather preposterous but I began to produce
paintings of flowers with which to cover the walls. I must have finished
ten, twenty, thirty of them, in the desperate hope of... Of somehow
/concealing/ the horror that now pollutes this house. But one cannot
hide from one's darkest secrets. The paintings have changed nothing, Mr
Mahoney. Nothing.
"Only three weeks have passed since I rang Paul and told him the
truth of what was happening here. It was an act of pure desperation, I
assure you: I thought the man would ridicule me - that after such long
periods of time without communication he would have moved away or found
another, but... He was still at the same address, `more than willing
to listen' he said, and his reaction when I told him about the room was
one of serious concern. It's hard to explain but... It was almost as if
Paul /knew/ that such things could happen. He came to visit - it was
the only occasion since my husbands death that I was actually glad to
see him - and, after a poor attempt to console me, disappeared upstairs,
alone on request, much like you did. A while later, he came back down
looking rather pale and unsettled. When I asked him what he'd seen, he
said, `nothing sweetheart. Not a damned thing, I'm afraid.'
"We talked for a while about... Well, life I suppose. For the first
time we actually seemed to get along as friends rather than sex-
obsessed animals. `You need a direction, Doreen,' he told me. `Something
to focus your life on Why don't you approach a few shops in the town
centre, advertise your paintings? Start a business? Take your thoughts
away from the past?' The idea of setting up a business is something
that has been suggested to me repeatedly over the years by friends and
relatives - even Cameron wanted me to do it... But...
"God, I ought to stop there," she coughed. "I've gone far enough. I'm
sure you can fill in the rest for yourself."
"Yes," I said, quietly. "Yes, I can. Thankyou."
"He's haunting me, isn't he, Mr Mahoney," Mrs Chambers finalised,
watching her thumbs weave in and out of her fingers. "Cameron, I mean."
"Cameron? I jerked in my seat. "Good God, no, of course he isn't."
The woman ceased fidgeting and looked at me, sharply, as if I had
given her a stunning or impossible answer. Her eyes, as they widened,
appeared to contain something other than a deep, impenetrable ravine.
"Mr Mahoney," she near-whispered. "You can not even begin to
comprehend how desperate I am for that to be the truth."
"It is the truth," I assured her. "Ghosts and hauntings, Mrs Chambers,
ah... In-in contrast to modern belief, have virtually nothing at all to
do with the dead. They are to do with the /living/. You are not being
terrorised by your husband - and even if such things could happen, based
on his character and the message he wrote prior to committing suicide,
I-I would still come to the same conclusion."
"Which is?" my eager listener prompted.
"Which is that Cameron himself is in no way connected to the hostile
being you have accumulated upstairs. In no way /whatsoever/. Admittedly,
when I entered Alpha I saw... What one might call the shadow of a
hanging, human body, but that's all it was - a shadow, a-a static
recording, no doubt, of your husband's final, desperate act. God no, Mrs
Chambers, Cameron has not arisen from his grave to torture you. No. What
lurks upstairs is something... Altogether different."
"But I don't understand, Mr Mahoney. If it is not my husband who is
haunting me then... Then who is it? Or... Or /what/ is it?"
"Mrs Chambers... It's /you/." I told her.

IX

Explaining to Mrs Chambers the basic principles behind the Alpha state
of consciousness was nowhere near as difficult as I had imagined. Often
I felt as if I were talking down to her - as if the simplified approach
I have developed over many years of laborious and secretive
communication was somewhat childish and patronising. It did not occur
to me at the time that, having read the book Light out of Darkness (and
probably many others like it) and indeed being the /owner/ of a haunted
house, Mrs Chambers was already a good deal more than just slightly
aware of the "supernatural".
"It's very fascinating, Mr Mahoney, but how do you actually get rid of
these colours?" she inquired. "Say for example you locate a... A large
stain of blackness, what is your procedure for removing it?"
"That is a very good question," I replied, putting one finger against
my lips. Sherlock Holmes, it seemed, was once more back down from the
shelf. "Usually it is a matter of applying a contrasting colour to the
affected area. Comparing and counter-balancing emotions is a difficult
enough task in itself, but ah... Once I have chosen the correct emotion
I must then actually /feel/ that emotion. First, I put my hands out,
like this," I held my arms at full length away from my body and
flattened my palms. "The way you might have seen... Psychic healers and
other such people perform their miracles."
"Or traffic wardens direct the traffic," Mrs Chambers intervened with
a smile.
I laughed a little. "Ah, yes, quite... And-and then I close my eyes
and attempt to invoke - either from real life or an imaginary situation,
the former being the most powerful and successful method - ah, feelings
within me which are directly associated with the emotion. If I have
enough time to work at it, the existing colour transforms. More often,
however, it just... Disappears into the atmosphere, you could say.
Slowly begins to fade like... Like water sinking into sand. When I
return to my client, however - and this is the important bit - I can
immediately detect changes within them. They might feel... Energetic or
refreshed or - or even, /reborn/."
"Can you do this for me?" Mrs Chambers sat forward. "Mr Mahoney, I
would be happy to give you a very large sum of money if you-"
"No, please," I wafted my hands. "Don't be silly, I never charge for
these things and besides, I don't think, ah, scraping down your emotions
as I sometimes call it, would work in this instance. No, Mrs Chambers,
I think the answer to your problem lies within your own heart. It is
/you/ who must go upstairs and face the demon, not me, for it is a part
of your own consciousness. I-I can do very little except advise you...
Put you in the right state of mind, as it were. Releasing tiny amounts
of colourful, bioplasmic energy is one thing, but facing a-a creature
such as this will require your direct participation."
I could see that Mrs Chambers was still enormously confused. She
continued to stare at her hands as she fidgeted, to breath uneasily, to
lick her pale lips with an unsteady tongue. "Well, this afternoon has
been quite extraordinary, Mr Mahoney," she said. "My intention before
your arrival was to settle down for something to eat, browse the
contents of this month's Watercolour Magazine and catch up with my mail.
Instead, I have come to learn a great deal about myself, both through
the telling of my own story, and from your surprising and rather
discomforting response. Personally, I do not see why it should have to
come to an end here. How is your schedule?"
"Ah," I glanced at my watch. "Well, time /is/ cracking on, Mrs
Chambers, but ah... As you say, why stop now after we've come so far?"
The woman looked at me, and again I saw strange new things in her
brilliant eyes. "Then what do you say we go upstairs and sort this mess
out once and for all," she declared, rising to her feet. I nodded and
stood up beside her, knees cracking. "As I'm sure you are aware, Mr
Mahoney, I have never done anything remotely like this before. Facing
my own fears is something I am not particularly good at - even under
relatively /normal/ circumstances."
"Well, try not to worry, I'll tell you everything I can," I said,
moving towards the door. Mrs Chambers followed me, looking thinner and
more vulnerable than ever. She began to scratch her pot belly again,
furiously, as if it were a gigantic, irritating boil. "But you must
remember that I too have never come across a force quite like this," I
appended. "The most important thing to keep in mind, no matter how
painful, is the fact that, whatever it is, it has come from within you.
Think of it as a-a... A sort of physical manifestation of some deeply-
rooted, inner conflict. Find that conflict... That, ah... That hostile
fusion, Mrs Chambers - and you will destroy the ghost."

We ascended the staircase in single file, like toddlers creeping up on
their sleeping parents: whispering, clinging on to the bannister as if
the ground might slip away, and wincing at every creak and groan as
though the noises were emanating not from the boards, but from our
empty stomachs.
Although it had been surely less than an hour since I had scrambled
up here, alone and using both arms and legs, I felt a very different -
and, it has to be said, better - person. Through her stark and
uncompromising persistency to reveal the truth, Mrs Chambers, it seemed,
had ventured into - and meticulously cleaned out - my own, metaphorical
"room". (Permit me to explain: had I not visited her, armed with my
false name and ineffectual excuses, I might still regard the invasion
of privacy I so commonly practice to be entirely acceptable. I deal
with dangerously powerful emotions which belong not to me but to others;
and with despair-fuelled phantasms which are unable to be destroyed by
anyone other than their human originators - hardly the kind of job
description which could tolerate a corrupt investigator, I'm sure you'll
agree.)
"Assuming I survive this," Mrs Chambers murmured. "I would like you
to promise me you will stay and have dinner."
"Yes... Yes of course, that would be lovely," I replied, in a
slightly louder and more positive voice than hers. I could see the top
of the landing now; bare and uninviting.
"Could you possibly move a little /faster/, Mr Mahoney? It's not like
we're in a scene from a horror movie. I'm eager to get this over and
done with."
"Ah... Yes, of course, sorry," I skipped up the last few stairs.
Although I was quite sure that I had closed the door of the room
behind me, it was now wide open, a narrow triangle of sunlight forming
a crude arrow which pointed inside. Mrs Chambers and I approached it as
if in slow motion, like two intrepid astronauts missing their
spacesuits.
"Mr Mahoney... I don't know if I can do this."
"Of course you can. Of course you can do it. Just stay calm," I
promptly thought myself a complete hypocrite and wondered whether to
retract that statement.
"But what can I possibly do?" Mrs Chambers took a few strides back
toward the top of the stairs. "Perhaps we ought to eat first, what do
you say? Change of plan?"
"No, I don't think so," I said, reaching out for her. "Come on,
you've got to go through with this. If-if-if you don't... It'll get
worse... It-it might even kill you, Mrs Chambers. Now is the time.
Please."
"But what can I possibly do?" she whined repeatedly. "I can't do
anything, how can I combat such a force?"
"Just going in there armed the feelings you know to be the truth is
more than enough," I said, pushing her around by the shoulders as
though trying to pack her into the seat of a rollercoaster. "Monsters
such as these thrive on guilt and fear - sometimes to the extent that
they can actually be destroyed by a lack of it. You must forgive your-
self for your wrongdoings, rid yourself of the pain and guilt... And-
and take it easy, don't rush... I'll be right here, right at the door."
Rubbing her gut, Mrs Chambers nodded, and walked slowly into the
room, each footstep fearful that the ground might collapse, or that
somewhere, hidden in the carpet, there was a switch - a secret pressure
pad - which would trigger the roof to grow spikes and begin a
mercilessly rapid descent. Two meters from the gripper rod - where my
shoes rested like slick, black racing cars on a silver starting line -
she glanced back at me, her mouth stretched open, pulling down the rest
of her face. Her slender figure, dark against the glare of the afternoon
sun, together with the space between us, reminded me of a scene from ET
- me, the tearful, helpful human, waving, wiping away tears; Mrs
Chambers the adorable xenomorph, big eyes blinking, reluctant to return
to her mothership. I found myself waiting for a dramatic, physical
transformation; for the incandescent skin around the woman's starved
body to peel away like some unearthly form of rubber - to reveal the
supreme veracity behind her emotional condition in all of its powerful,
radiant glory. Then, she returned her attention to the room, as if she'd
seen or heard something, and said in a voice which cut sleekly through
the silence: "Mr Mahoney... The shadows... They're... They're /moving/
towards me..."
I poked my head in. "Yes, I know," I told her, clinging onto the
framework as if the carpet was not some harmless material but an
expansive lake of bubbling acid. "Move over there Mrs Chambers," I
pointed. "Over there, can you see where I mean? By the bed... Just...
Yes, that's it, over to the bed."
"What? Here?"
"A little further."
"Mr Mahoney I shouldn't be doing this..." She continued to stalk
across the carpet, head down, arms held out as if she were on a
tightrope. "There is something I... I made up in my little story."
My breath suddenly stung my throat. "You-" I coughed. "You mean you
/lied/?" I was now leaning so far into the room I could feel my body
beginning to lose balance. "After all that you-you-you /lied/?" I
couldn't believe what I was hearing. "Mrs Chambers, for Gods sake! You
must tell the truth! Speak it, now! Aloud! It could be very important!"
"I'm frightened, Mr Mahoney," She sat down precariously on the quilt.
"What if it /is/ Cameron... What if he wants /revenge/?"
"Revenge for /what/, Mrs Chambers? What is it? What did you lie
about?"
"I can't say."
"You /can/ say. You-you-you /must/ say."
"Sweeping the cellar floor I... " She shook her head, as if in shame.
I could see the shadows rising over the edge of the quilt behind her; a
thick, swirling sea of black fungus. "I-I planted that condom packet and
the picture, Mr Mahoney... I knew Cameron would go down into the cellar
sooner or later..." The light in her face began to diminish. "I left
them... I-I left them, don't you see? I-I wanted... Some part of me
actually /wanted/ Cameron to find out..."
This I simply could not comprehend. Such a confession only brought
into the light the hellishly unweaveable chaos of human emotions; the
insatiability of greed, the self-indulgence of defiance, the depth of
disillusionment and the absurdity of contradiction. Even before the
shadows broke into a raging, oily rush, consuming the screaming Mrs
Chambers from head to feet, I knew that no hope remained. I saw faint
glimmers of the grotesque creature I had encountered so vividly in
Alpha, gasped and staggered backwards over the gripper rod. The door
arched round and slammed shut on my nose, staining the paintwork with
a diagonal slash of dark crimson. I gargled, moaned and stumbled, hands
cupped over the lower half of my face, until, at last, my vision
blurred, my knees gave in, and with a defeated cry, I collapsed against
one of the many other doors.

X

It has been three hours since Mrs Chambers walked into her haunted
room, and yet still I remain here, holding a tea towel to my broken
nose, humming television theme tunes and toying with an oddly-shaped
key. (Did I lock the door? My mind chunters. Oh Christ did I lock the
door?) I never noticed it before, but there is a tapered window at the
very end of this long, white landing. It's blank with faded daylight,
but through it I can hear the sounds of footsteps, car engines, clapping
and loud voices. The neighbourhood, it seems, is returning home from
the festival... A celebration of masks, makeup, illusions and trickery.
Of the foolishness of humankind. How agonisingly close such things seem
to me now; how deadly realistic.
I have tried everything. Pulling the handle, kicking - punching -
bashing open the door, but it will not budge, and not a single sound
has escaped from within. About one and a half hours ago, I went down-
stairs, burrowed through Mrs Chamber's phone book and rang Paul's
number. A young girl answered, told me there was no Paul present to
talk to; that she had only moved in two days ago. "If you want the guy
who lived here before," she squawked in a London accent. "I'm sorry
mister, he's buggered off to the south of France... No, you don't under-
stand, I don't think he's /coming/ back- what? Errrr... No, sorry, he
didn't leave one, but if you hold on for a second-"
I slammed the receiver down and cursed. Picked it up again, tried my
own number. I wanted to speak to my wife, desperately, but there was no
answer... I rang again... Again... And yet again - but still there was
no response. Why? I thought. She's pregnant! She's not going anywhere!
Why doesn't she - or Patricia - pick up the phone? Why for Christ's
sake? In a frenzy of madness previously unknown to me, I ripped the
whole machine of its socket and threw it across the floor. Everything
was falling to pieces... I just couldn't focus... I just... I
couldn't... /Focus/...
But I'm back upstairs now, waiting calmly. God knows what shades of
colour I will leave here opposite the door. My emotions are churning: I
want to stay and yet I must depart and go home to my wife. I know there
is no hope for Mrs Chambers - that her own confusion, fear and guilt
has completely destroyed her - and yet I still cling on. The key grows
hot in my hand as I turn it and squeeze... Turn it and squeeze... Turn
it and squeeze... (Did I lock the door? My mind chunters. Oh Christ did
I lock the door?)
The key...
The key to my own spare bedroom, where the air is as cold as a winter
gale, and the moving of furniture grates like a tomb's lid in the dead
of night...

--------------------
-)(- Andy J Campbell
a...@ajco.demon.co.uk
--------------------