cats, or birds, facing off in a territorial dispute? Is a raccoon fending off a dog? Are opossums spatting over scraps in the garbage can? No! Those cries are human! Those are cries for help! Those are cries of terror that tear at my heart! Whose cries are they? The moment I pose the question I realize they’re Clarissa’s cries and she’s very much alive! Yes, that’s her voice—a voice I know as well as my own! Clarissa’s a radiant living woman, just as I’ve pictured her! Why is Clarissa crying out? Again, the answer comes to me instantly: she’s suffered a seizure and fallen into a deep trance as a consequence—a trance that mimics the indications of death—and been mistaken for dead! She’s been buried too hastily—buried alive! And now she’s awakened from her trance, ascertained her predicament, and is shrieking for her life into the weight of the indifferent soil above her! It’s only I, endowed with the attuned senses of a true soul-mate, who can discern her screams! It rends my soul, the knowledge that she’s frantically pounding at the lid of her prison six feet underground with the last of her strength! I can picture her terror-stricken face, flailing limbs!—picture her torn burial gown, disarrayed hair!—picture the blood on her battered hands! Clarissa’s beautiful hair isn’t swishing in the sea-breeze—her sweet eyes aren’t gazing upon the expanses of the sky: she’s thrashing in the blackness of the casket and doesn’t have many minutes of breathable air left and there’s nothing I can do to help her—nothing! How dig through six feet of soil quickly enough to reunite her with fresh life-sustaining air, when there’s not even time to race to the cemetery before she expires? I thought she was dead and now I know she’s alive and is fated to die—fated to die because I’ve failed her! I could’ve saved her had I known sooner she’d been misdiagnosed, buried before she was dead! I’m as good as dead myself now—certainly I’ll languish in a living hell of anguish until the end of my days! Then I’m aware of gasping for breath as constrictions seize my chest—aware of wildly writhing on the mattress, kicking the blankets to the floor—aware of leaping to my feet, dazedly spinning about the room—but that’s where the dream ends: every dreadful detail is suddenly engulfed in darkness.
My next recollection is that my shoulders and arms and waist were being forcibly grasped—that I was resisting but only encountering greater restraint. Had I stumbled into the curtains, voluminous and heavy, which framed the largest window and become entangled? Was I twisting the wrong way, only winding myself tighter in the folds of the curtains, while seeking to escape? Is that why it was becoming increasingly difficult to move despite my greater exertions? The curtains seemed to have acquired movement independent of my movements—it was as if they were not merely enclosing me but yanking at me, pushing back. How account for such? In glancing about to seek to solve the riddle I discovered my vision was unobstructed—that there was no drapery in front of my eyes—that I could feel a strong steady wind upon my face—smell the salt-mist of the sea. Was I gazing out the window? Was the window open? How is it that the curtains were restraining me while allowing me to see? Was I only entangled in them up to my neck? Why were they continuing to push and pull even though I was deliberately seeking to stand still? The separate pieces of the puzzle were refusing to assemble themselves and make sense and I was suddenly reeling with fear. Why was I afraid? Because, upon shaking my head and opening my eyes wider, I discovered I was no longer in the bedroom, or even the mansion, but outside with—somehow—a view of the streets of the town below me.
Certainly I was still dreaming! It was unusual, though, for a dream to be accompanied by vivid impressions concerning the sense of touch, to the degree they strongly resembled authentic physical discomfort: the jerkings at my waist and arms as I resumed endeavoring to extricate myself from the windings of the curtains were extremely distracting—it was almost as if the drapery was alive and had acquired hands. And then one of my arms became acutely uncomfortable, as if being squeezed hard, so that I found myself furiously jerking it away from whatever was inducing the discomfort, and it’s then that strident tones of voice and swift agitated movements became discernable. Involuntarily following the sound of the voices and blur of the movements with my eyes, I perceived that faces were coming into focus—that it wasn’t drapery that was restraining me, but two large men! What did they want with me? Why were they handling me roughly? Why were they yelling? And then my hand struck a hard surface—the sting of impact, jolt of pain, was unmistakably real! This was no dream!
Where was I? Dawn was breaking and I was in an airy circular enclosure, several stories above the ground, higher than the treetops—there were no walls, only a wooden railing about a yard high and support beams spaced a few feet apart. My hand had doubtless struck one of the beams during my struggle with the men. The men, in construction worker clothes with tools at their waists, were pulling me towards a stairwell—a stairwell close to a large bell. A bell? No sooner did I clearly perceive it than I realized I was in the bell tower of the town’s nineteenth century church! Why was I there? Upon pondering the question I became aware of the content and meaning, instead of merely the tones, of the men’s words and began shivering profusely, even though it was still unseasonably warm. They were speaking of the waste of throwing a young life away—of escorting me, willing or not, down the stairs. An ambulance was mentioned, apparently it had been summoned. I heard one of them say I wasn’t going to die on their watch. What? Apparently I asked a question either with words or a glance, because one of them emphatically pointed at the railing: upon it was my night-robe, caught in its spikes! On the opposite side of the railing, where barely a foot of planking was between it and a fall to the ground, were my slippers! I glanced at myself: I was wearing nothing but underwear! When I finally realized I’d exited the mansion in my night clothes, too disoriented to dress, and climbed to the bell tower to fling myself to my death—that I’d been on the opposite side of the railing, poised to plunge until I was seized by the men; and with no recollection of such, as if I’d been guided solely by subconscious impulse—I went utterly limp, fainted straightway in the men’s arms: the last moment of consciousness I recollect is the fancied face of Clarissa Maye Nighting reappearing in my mind’s eye, superimposed upon an image of a moldering skeleton—the unavoidable knowledge that she, although deceased nearly a century before I was born, had gained a deadly hold upon my will!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Robert Scott Leyse was born in San Francisco, grew up in various locales about America, lived in Paris for a spell, and now resides on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Upon arrival in Manhattan he lived in several East Village dumps and worked as a New York cab driver on the night shift, with the aim of atoning for a sheltered upbringing and having adventures the likes of which he'd never had before and he wasn't disappointed; subsequently he acquired over a dozen years of experience in the legal field, where he was pleasantly surprised to find that additional adventures, of the office politics and shenanigans variety, were to be had; presently he works in the advertising field, where he's not looking for any special adventures, having decided to separate work from fun and games and have secrets that are easier to keep. He skis in Sun Valley, Idaho, surfs with board and body in southern California and Puerto Rico, once took a belly dance class in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and the most incandescent yoga class he’s ever had was on a stand-up paddle board in Condado Lagoon during a furious rainstorm. He eats fish heads and insects and drinks blood, but can’t be paid to eat potato chips or cake.
He is a co-founder and the editor of the erotic literary fiction and poetry webzine, Sliptongue (launched May Day, 2001), and the founder and editor of the ShatterColors Literary Review (launched May Day, 2006). His three novels are Liaisons for Laughs: Angie & Ella’s Summer of Delirium (July, 2009), Self-Murder (April, 2010), and Attraction and Repulsion (June, 2011). His two novellas are Penelope Prim and Tallulah Tempest (both February, 2015). The latter was originally intended to be a send-up of volatile relationships but turned out to be an appreciation and celebration of them instead: sometimes a t
ale decides where it wishes to go, the author be damned. Forthcoming is a collection of short stories.
Visit Me Online
Website: https://www.robertscottleyse.com
Novel:
Free Short Story:
“Why Waste English Setters on Dog Shows?”
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/61749
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