* * * *
The darkness is changed, enhanced and even deeper than before. I’ve woken up in the basement alone; there is no sign of Meknok, but many strange things have been left in his wake.
Even my own appearance has changed. In the mirror, I see my normally fair hair is darker and my eyes cast deep shadows back at me. It’s as if my soul is reflecting back its darker side.
Outside, the moon hangs in the sky like precious silver, yet it fails to illuminate the city below. From my window the street is a long black line stretching out into nothingness. The cars on the
freeway are as slow as hearses and the people I see are silhouettes of themselves.
The street corner is an abyss and the whore standing upon it is a two-headed serpent dozing on its edge. The darkness has clogged my mind like tar and nothing can free me from it—except perhaps, this act of scripture. Each thought and corresponding word inside me is pouring out onto the page and it is bliss.
Meknok has granted me a gift and I must use it. As I try to make sense of my thoughts and purpose, my mobile phone rings, but its tone is amplified, like a thousand death knells
in the small confines of the basement. I answer it and a voice that I had spent years forgetting strikes my senses.
“Hey buddy boy.”
Oh, God. How—how could it be him? I hear his voice again and
I am wracked by certainty.
“Aren’t you going to talk to yer old Dad?”
Dad—how did you find me? I say, my throat dry.
“What—can’t I speak to my son? After all these years?”
My head hurts with visions of Meknok and now my father’s voice. I struggle to determine why my father would want to seek me out after more visions, much darker—of my mother and sister,
eyes cold and vacant, blind me. I push them back down and ask my father, Don, what he wants.
“To talk,” he tells me. “I need to talk to you.”
Talk? Why would I ever want to speak with him? Twenty-five years on and he just thinks he can pick up where he left off—like nothing ever happened? With clenched teeth I tell him that now is not a good time. I want to say ‘never’.
“I’m dying, lad,” Don says. “I want to air…my grievances.”
Don uses the word ‘air’ as if he’s referring to dirty laundry. I feel the pull of the darkened city on my back, as if Meknok himself is attempting to drag me away. I want to hang up the phone,
but my heart wants to hear Don out; he sounds so different, so benevolent—so unlike Don.
“Did you hear what I said, Simon?” he asks. “I need to see you. I need you to come to the jail.”
No, I can’t, I tell him. I tell him I never want to see him again and that I hope he rots in his cell. Forever more. He tries to speak, but I cut him off, with almost guillotine-like precision. I toss the
phone away, imagining it’s still infected with Don’s voice. After a moment I turn to my living room window to behold the night.
Mulling over the sudden reunion with my father, I leave my home behind and head for that cursed street corner. The whore greets me with a smile and casually runs her hand from her throat and over her right breast to her crotch in one silken movement.
My mind’s eye gazes upon her; what I see should sicken me, but my emotions and sensibilities are now infected with Meknok’s blood. The whore’s skin is cracked and bleeding; her breasts—of which there are many—are misshapen and stretched. The hole between her legs is rotten with death.
“What can I do for ya, honey?” she moans, tossing back her blonde curls. My mind’s eye shows hair black and singed.
I tell her that I am lost and need some direction. She leads me to an alleyway around the corner.
The alley is filled with more devil whores delivering delicacies to the depraved. My whore promptly drops to her knees and considers my trousers while wetting her lips with a forked tongue.
“No,” I tell her. “This is not what I want. I need directions.”
The whore is blonde again and the other customers are only getting blow jobs from other human harlots. Confusion reigns in my head—am I just imagining it all again?
“We don’t give directions,” the whore says. “If you ain’t here to pay then you’d best fuck off!”
“I know what I saw, I tell her. You’re all demons. I saw you.” The whore laughs and straightens the narrow piece of hot pink leather around her hips.
“Get the fuck outta here, you crazy jack-off!”
I stagger out of the alleyway, back into the night. I don’t understand.
Didn’t Meknok want me to see his world? Reeling, I walk to the coffee shop on the other side of the street, the one I frequent most mornings. The door opens and I see regulars sipping
on lattes and laughing. Marci, the owner, gives me a nod from behind the counter, but not her usual cheerful wave.
“You okay, Simon?” she asks and there is much uncertainty in her voice.
“Yeah, why shouldn’t I be?” I reply, lying through my teeth.
“What were you doing on the corner before?”
I turn to look at the corner. The blonde whore is gone. I didn’t realize that I could be seen. I presumed that I was…somewhere else.
“You went round the alley with that prostitute,” Marci continues, stifling disgust.
I was just asking her a few questions, I tell Marci—for my latest book. I was trying to experience the other side of life. It’s all just research. Marci plays my explanation around in her head and thankfully her pleasant demeanor returns. I don’t know why I lied; perhaps I am beginning to doubt my own sanity again.
“I thought you were up to something else,” Marci says, chuckling with embarrassment. “You want a coffee?”
I do. As Marci’s making me one I glance around the room again, looking for a sign, anything to assure me that my experiences aren’t just delusions. Scanning the patrons in the café, I
notice all the regulars, but there is one newcomer. A man of about fifty, squat, but solidly built. His face bears deep scars and his head is crowned with a short crop of greying hair. He’s too busy eating to notice me noticing him.
Then I notice what’s on his plate.
The meal is wriggling and bloody and the man stabs at it with a rusted two-pronged fork. He swallows it in great greedy gulps. Suddenly nausea attacks me as I imagine he’s eating my insides. I look around to see if anyone else is seeing what I am, but they’re happily chatting or reading the newspaper; oblivious to the horrific spectacle.
The stranger finishes and wipes his bloody mouth on a napkin.
He washes it all down with a pint of Guinness. All of sudden he looks at me and winks. He stands and tightens the belt around his old grey trench coat. He looks so sure of himself, like he knows something I don’t. Then he approaches.
“You must be Simon,” he says, offering me a gnarled hand. But the hand is more than gnarled; it’s twisted in a claw-like shape. I don’t take it.
“Suit yourself,” he says with a shrug. He sits down on the stool next to me and starts to roll blackish tobacco into cigarette paper.
You can’t smoke in here, I tell him, but again he shrugs. He lights the cigarette and bluish smoke slowly crawls around the inside of the café.
“Where’s here anyway?” he replies. “I mean, how the hell do you know where you are right now?”
I watch Marci frothing milk; she can’t hear the conversation I’m having with the awkward man and she can’t smell the smoke from his cigarette. I wonder if she can even see me anymore. I
finally ask the stranger who he is. He offers his clawed hand to me again and smiles, revealing perfect dentures.
“Henry Schiller, at your service.”
This time I shake his hand; it’s dry, almost desiccated. Schiller seems to have accomplished something. His name sounds so familiar, but I can’t place it.
But who are you? I inquire further. What are you doing here?
/> He draws deeply on his smoke and his eyes brighten.
“It’s a free country, Simon. Can’t a man enjoy his last meal?”
His ‘last meal’ wriggles in my mind. I ask him what he means and remind him that he hasn’t answered my initial question. He pats my shoulder with his claw.
“All in good time, my boy,” he says. “We’ve got plenty of that— in case you haven’t noticed, time isn’t exactly relative for you anymore.”
He looks me up and down and sniggers. I ask him what’s so funny.
“I remember when I was you, all young and fresh and ripe for the picking—so full of ideas, but not quite sure what to do with them. I can see why Meknok is so interested in you.”
He knows Meknok? How?
Schiller takes another puff and twirls of smoke linger about his face.
“Oh, yeah, I know Meknok. Smug bastard. He and I have a long history together. How do you think I ended up like this?” He holds up his mangled hand for emphasis. “Let’s just say I entered into a business arrangement with him—the deal was much more profitable
for him though.”
I urge Schiller to explain who Meknok is and what he wants with me.
“We haven’t got that much time,” Schiller replies before finishing his smoke and flicking it into my coffee cup. “C’mon, let’s get outta here. I know somewhere we can talk.”
The Noctuary is available in paperback and e-book formats from Damnation Books!