Shudder (20 page)

“Beep, beep.”

“Come in.” Anton said, and for the sake of politeness minimized the torrent site on which he was examining the most downloaded torrents.

Although it was not specifically a porn torrent site, nevertheless, there were various animated commercials all over the place, which outside the world of the Internet were still in the category of ‘indecent'.

Of course, these days even the most serious site in the web was at the most four clicks away from porn. You open the site of a respectable news agency, follow a news link to a less respectable agency, and when you follow a third gossip link, you are then confronted with a choice between ‘demented Alzheimer piss grannies' and ‘autistic vampire Filipino she-males'.

The door opened and Chen and Michele entered, with printed out reports in their hands. They looked at his boss and he looked at them.

“What do you bring me, children?”

The female child obliged first. Her black, shoulder-length hair did not sparkle fashionably and her minimalist makeup did little to hide her paleness. “I bring you the summary of the most viewed shows for this month, and Joe's report, together with pics and a dozen small videos which he shot psych-walking.”

Anton made a politely interested face, “Anything out of the ordinary?”

“Not really, at least not anything I saw,” Michele reshuffled her papers and saw what she was after. She extended the paper to Anton, “On the
Movie Talent Reality Show
, the viewers voted for the guy who impersonated a robot. One of the weaker contestants, I myself thought.”

“Harrumph. Okay, thanks, Michele.” Anton took Michele's papers and placed them on his desk, with the one she had singled out as most interesting on top.

“Chen? What have you got for me?”

Chen would probably lose his chronic, classically Chinese cheery smile only after being cremated, and now as always he beamed at his boss as he passed over the papers. “The mayor's office has agreed to enforce from January first the ban on music in parks, which we proposed last year.”

“Ah, splendid. At last the citizens will have a small oasis of comparable quiet.”

Chen pushed his spectacles in place with his forefinger and blinked at Anton. “Boss, I've thought about this. I rather think that if the law is really enforced, the parks will empty of everyone except seniors. No one can take to be in a place without some sort of music anymore.”

“So. You see right through my master plan.” Anton winked at Chen and took his papers as well.

After the junior analysts left, Anton leafed through Joe's reports looking at the new graffiti and stills from clips of some slaphappy kids. Everything seemed to be as usual.

He reached for his pack and fumbled with it for a full minute, without taking his eyes off the report, before it finally downed at him that he had no cigarettes.

Ten minutes later, he was in his favorite small Lebanese shop and told the plump brown owner to give him four packs of Marlboros.

“Will that be the red ones, Sir?”

“Er...” Anton struggled with himself, “two reds and two whites please.”

“Ah, a healthier lifestyle,” noted Fadi approvingly, “congratulations. Here you go.”

“Thanks,” Anton had already developed the habit and just stood for a few seconds, but did not receive anything else with his pack. “What, no pamphlet today?” he inquired.

Fadi nodded, “We have new rules since yesterday.”

“Really? What now?”

The owner smiled with exasperation, “Apparently smokers just throw away the leaflets without reading them.”

“Surely not?”

“Hard to believe, I know. So anyway, now I must quickly recite what will happen to you if you smoke.”

The man smiled sheepishly, leaning on his fists on the center of authority of the small cramped shop—the wooden counter littered with bits of papers and paperclips, and small bottles lined up by a calculator.

Anton returned the smile, “Sort of reading me my anti-rights? Go ahead.”

The shopkeeper glanced at a small note stapled to a cupboard box by his side, no doubt to refresh his memory, and recited the text, “You knees will dissolve, your teeth will fall out, your lungs will collapse, your heart will stop, you will be impotent and your sperm will be disappear. Scientists have proven that it makes no difference if you smoke five cigarettes a day or five packs a day. They say your genes will degenerate five seconds after lighting up and an hour later you'll probably be dead. You will also do this to everyone else if you smoke near them, or on the street. Buy Nova Rosh mood lifters and smile the blues away.”

“Well, see you later, Fadi.”

“Later, Mister Martorino.”

Back in his office, Anton checked the news. How could he have missed this development? There it was, black on white: new law takes effect from such and such date, blah, blah, save lives, ease pressure, national health program, international effort.

Anton squashed his cigarette with unnecessary ferocity on the little longship's hull and immediately lit another one.

Natalie nodded to the driver and closed her door. The taxi veered back into the main flow of the traffic. The inside of the cab smelled of sweat, pine freshener, dusty old leather, and of the driver.

Natalie looked at the city outside the window and felt her stomach knot more and more. All was not how it should be. She wished she could define the trouble as everything looking unreal. Unfortunately the opposite was the case. Everything was far too real.

More real than it had any right to be.

The sky looming over the buildings, the buildings looming the pavements… the nightmarishly irrefutable trees, the depressingly corporeal pedestrians, the terrifyingly substantial streetlights…the sickeningly indubitable pavements...

Without any warning all these sensory properties had grown to vibrate with a disturbingly authentic inherent existence, a clammy nauseating realness, which for some reason pushed and strained at Natalie and made her feel like a small, helpless child.

As if unnoticed to herself, she had managed in the years of her life to construct some sort of parallel reality, based on certain points of the world as such, but nevertheless a dream.

Smoke and mirrors.

An intricate fabric, which she had weaved on top of her environment, an additional layer which she had begun to believe was the world itself.

Now, today, the world seemed bared—her lovingly weaved cloth swept off by something, an accumulation of somethings. Gone was that veil that made contrasts gentler and objects less imposing.

The emperor was naked and was not a soothing sight.

This was the world in high-definition.

Natalie felt a choking sensation and realized that her own right hand was squeezing her throat.
I must be terrified,
she thought.
What work? What responsibilities? What elections? What Natalie the genius?

Natalie the train wreck more like it.

I need a doctor,
she informed herself,
I need a pill to make this go away. I want be like I was before. I don't want all this to be like that anymore.

“Did you say something, lady?”

Oh God, I must be talking aloud.
“No, no... I mean yes. Yes, I was. I changed my mind. We have to go back.”

With a shrug, the driver changed lanes, heading towards the nearest U-turn. The journey back took forever.

The streets were teeming with machines handled by nervous drivers on the verge of being late for work.

Natalie was desperate to not be late for home.

As if some infernal clock was counting down the minutes before her collapse.

What form her collapse could take was unclear, but it generally felt either like she would explode in some manner, torn apart by her internal pressure, or that she would crumple inwards, crushed by the outside world.

Of course, at times less abstract visions flashed past: her heart stops; she swallows her tongue; her smoker's lungs finally collapse; her brain seizes up and turns her into a vegetable; a fantastically powerful seizure wrings her out like a wet towel, crushing every bone.

And the pedestrians...

My God,
Natalie thought,
am I a creature like this too? I must remember, whatever I do, to not look at myself in the mirror once I get home. If I'm like that I simply would give up.

Back in her bed, completely covered by her blanket, Natalie lay on her back hugging her knees. A sticky terror throbbed insidiously not only inside of her, but outside of her as well.

The whole world pulsated with the terror and she pulsated with it.

Before she escaped to the comparative safety below her blanket, the very walls seemed to house unspeakable loathsome things, ‘forces' maybe. Tottering on the verges of visibility, they converged on her even as she entered her bedroom.

In spite of these presences, she tried to read a book, a bestselling urban-paranormal-sleazepunk-romance. Instead of submerging into the story, she only saw the sentence structures and the pathetic attempts of the author to create and maintain characters.

Five minutes was the best she could do, until finally there was no more time to lose before the unthinkable terror would arrive. She took final refuge in that safety cocoon that every child knows and uses. The mighty blanket, which now sagged from all sides, held her in a protective embrace.

She tried to divert her attention by stroking her clitoris but it didn't work. She couldn't concentrate.

She tried again, putting a finger into her mouth, then squeezed her breasts slightly. In desperation she pulled at her own hair and gave herself a little slap. Nothing.

Nothing worked.

Maybe nothing will work
, she thought, and the tension jumped another level.
Maybe nothing will ever work. Maybe I will remain like this forever.

After another half-hour, she lifted one side of the blanket slightly and peered at the world outside. It was still cold, sinister, and completely evil in its lack of point.

She knew she would probably lose her position with Eberstark, and maybe Blonski too. Who would tolerate a worker that keeps not showing up?

Tight now this knowledge was insubstantial; it barely flickered on the fringes of her immediate fear.

The left side of her chest hurt like from a dozen tiny needles.

With a helpless whimper, Natalie massaged the hurting place.

Anton picked up the phone on his desk with a puzzled frown. It was from a number he didn't know.

He pressed ‘pause' and minimized the window in which autistic vampire Filipino she-males were just about to do something disturbing with a demented Alzheimer piss granny.

“Hello?”

“Hi, I'm looking for Anton Martorino.”

A young man's voice. Who? Why? Anton didn't generally get calls from people he didn't know.

“Him speaking.”

“Hi, my name is Kurt Baule. I'm calling from the election H.Q. of the National Patriots. Today Natalie should have come to work, but didn't show up, and doesn't pick up her phone. We have your number as a contact.”

Anton's stomach immediately wrapped itself into a small tight knot, “Of course, I understand, thank you for calling.”

“Yes, we hope everything is fine with her. After all the things which have happened—”

Some ‘things',
Anton thought, remembering Jane's demise. “Yes, yes, thank you very much, I'll check up her and have her call you.”

Click.

Anton stood up in agitation. What could have happened? A quick succession of nightmare scenarios galloped through his head, before he managed to shut them out with an effort of will.

He dialed Natalie.

“The number you have dialed cannot be reached at this moment.”

Damn.

With clumsy hands he patted himself to make sure he had everything of possible need on him, and then left the office, leaving Michele in charge.

As he drove to his daughter, nosing his way impatiently through the thick traffic, he couldn't listen to music or to the news. His inner voices shrieking in fear took up all his attention.

He didn't even remember getting out of his car. Suddenly, he was already in Natalie's apartment building.

In the creaking elevator Anton again told himself to calm down.

Get a grip, hold it together. You don't know what has happened. If anything.

Of course something has happened, otherwise why would she— Shut up, shut up, nothing has happened.

Anton shook his head.

Don't try to guess. Don't fill your mind with possibilities. Just try to be prepared for anything and pray that she is at home.

At long last the elevator stopped with a final lurch and Anton went out. The door of Natalie's apartment looked all right.

No signs of forced entry, nothing.

Anton pressed his ear to the door. He thought he heard the faraway murmur of a switched on TV. He pushed the bell button, and a crude electronic version of a Mozart piano sonata played inside, behind the locked door.

He knocked too, “It's me, Anton, Natalie, open up, it's me, Dad.”

He heard the shuffle of footsteps coming towards the door. He heard locks unlocking and latches being unlatched. The door opened inwards slowly, as if with reluctance.

“Dad, what are you doing here?”

Natalie.
Her voice was normal, but slightly on edge. She was pale, and there was something in her gaze. Fear.

Fear barely under control.

“No one knew where you were and they called me,” he said, instantaneously covering up his own fears. They had their time, their fifteen minutes in the spotlight of his attention, now they were edged out by his daughter.

“I'm sorry you were bothered, Dad,” she said wearily, quietly. “I never should have given them your phone number.”

“No bother, Natalie, but I was worried. Now invite me in, and make some coffee.”

“Of course, of course, come in, Dad.”

* * * *

They were sitting in the kitchen, facing each other across the table. Anton watched the shaking hand with which his daughter held her cigarette.

“So, what happened?” he asked. “Why didn't you go to work? No—” He put the first question on hold with a flick of his hand. “First tell me why you switched off your phone?”

“I don't know,” Natalie said carefully, evenly, “I guess I felt weak. I felt I couldn't handle a conversation with anyone, least of all—trying to explain why I didn't show up at work.”

“Why didn't you show up at work?”

Natalie shrugged her shoulders and picked at her thumb. Her breath was so shallow she seemed to be in stasis.

Anton squared his shoulders and spoke in a deep fatherly tone, “You need a vacation, dear daughter.”

Natalie flinched, shot him a quick glance and returned her gaze to her hands. “What? Now? Absurd, Dad,” she said a tad uncertainly or maybe just powerlessly.

“Why is it absurd?”

“We are in the middle of an intense campaign. Everyone is counting on me.”

“Natalie,” Anton said sternly. “Natalie. A civilized person knows his limitations and takes breaks when they are needed in order to not break down. You are in the process of breaking down. In are in the middle of a breakdown as we speak. You are a day or two away from a hospital.”

“That's not true.”

“Look at yourself. You're skin and bones, you're stooping, your eyes have sunken in, your lips are parched. You look like someone who has crossed the ocean in a fifteenth century ship. Do you have the scurvy?”

“Do I have what?” Natalie asked alertly, as if waiting for someone to finally give a name to her condition.

“Never mind,” Anton suppressed him smile of affection and covered it with fatherly sternness. He leaned towards her, propping an elbow on the table, “I can tell you why you didn't go to work today. You stayed at home, because you couldn't take the pressure of the outside world. You have gone to pieces, you have no strength left, no defenses, and you simply can't handle going out through that door.”

He underlined everything he said with small thumps of middle and forefinger on the edge of the table, except the door, which he indicated with an incline of his head and a swerving of his eyes.

Natalie said nothing. Then she said, “Yes.”

Finally. A board loose in the fence of denial. Anton allowed a brief respite for both while he lit a cigarette, then continued emphasizing his words on the table's edge, “Since you can't go through that door, and you are days or maybe hours away from being in a hospital, I, as your father...” he illustrated himself with a thumb, “...am taking you...” a forefinger quickly stabbed into her direction, “...for two-three days out in the open. Somewhere out of town.”

“But Dad, the elections—” Natalie protested feebly.

“Forget the elections for now. What do you think? That you will stay at home today, and tomorrow will be magically better?”

His daughter was on the verge of tears but he knew that he shouldn't let up. “Even if you do accumulate a minimum of strength in the night and do force yourself tomorrow to go to work—what will that achieve? You will not be capable of doing anything. You will be a hindrance, not a help.”

“I thought I'd go to a doctor,” half sobbed the thin wretch who was his child.

“Yes, but you won't listen to a doctor who will tell you to take a break, will you? I bet you mean the other kind of doctor, who will give you a pill to make the fear go away. The problem is not the fear. The fear is a signal of something wrong.”

He was gesticulating with his smoking cigarette, hissing through his teeth as if in anger. His anger was of course directed at himself, for not noticing where things were going with his only daughter, for again having allowed himself to not see what he did not want to see. It sounded to Natalie like he was admonishing her for her own stupidity.

“Your job is not to suppress this danger signal,” he hissed. “Your job is to act upon it and fix that which is broken. Not later—right now.”

Natalie didn't answer but turned away as if to look at the window. She was silently crying, biting her lips, her right hand clutching her left elbow. She looked like she was ten again.

Anton had broken through. He ran a damp hand through his hair and allowed himself to relax a little. Now he could afford some kindness and a hint of ego boosting here and there.

“Now,” he said kindly. “I know that you are a very responsible girl, and I am proud of you. You must remember that your first responsibility is to yourself and to your family, and that's me.”

He let that sink in before continuing, “no one else cares about you enough to be able to see facts. Instead, they prefer to see what suits them. This is how people function. Even if you are an inch away from dying, they will keep using you, and when you snap and fall on the floor, they will all act surprised.”

A memory resurfaced, a painful memory. A painful memory before, now—a tool.

“I knew a girl once, and she was diagnosed with cancer. Yet instead of retreating and concentrating on herself, she continued going to work, pretending that nothing out of the ordinary was happening. No one told her to get a clue, to just go home, sleep, meditate, eat honey, watch favorite cartoons, do anything to try to get the body and soul back into life mode.

“No, everyone said ‘what spirit, what will, keep fighting', all that bullshit...and then she died, in only two months. Everyone acted surprised—so damn surprised.”

He got up, circled the table and hugged his daughter's shoulders, cradling her head in his hands, “When the body is depleted and the mind is in shambles, my dearest daughter, you must forget all the social posing. Right now other people's compliments, expectations, demands—they don't mean a thing. They have, at this point in time, lost any meaning, and continuing to cling to them is self-destructive.

“You must concentrate on retrieving yourself back from the brink. When you have achieved that, when your body and mind are in good working order again, then you will return back to your social obligations and you will be as excellent as always.”

He kissed her wet salty eyes and ruffled her hair, “In order to reach this stage, first you must take a step back from the brink. A step away from all of this. That is why today I sleep here on the couch, and tomorrow morning we go to my place, where I collect clothes and stuff, and we leave this city for two or three days. I'll call your people and tell them that you're ill.”

“All right, Daddy,” Natalie said and tried to bury her face even deeper into his palms.