Chapter 1: The Glass Wall

Wake up, throw up. For as long as he could remember, that was what he did every morning. That was his ritual. Of course, it was nothing so material.

His bed was a futon laid flat on a makeshift wooden frame. He had pieced it together quickly in his spare time when he first moved in. It hadn’t been changed since. It was waist level; slightly higher than traditional box-spring, metal framed beds. He had nailed it into the wall, opposite the east-facing window. It was sturdier that way.

Every morning when he woke, either by alarm or by dream, he would swing one leg around and let it dangle. The air was always cool. This was because, when he remembered, he would open the window a crack before bed. Otherwise the room would get stuffy from the dawn’s sun heating the old dingy carpet. When he finally came to rise completely – as would happen only after some thought – he would linger upright with both feet swinging over the bow. One leg, already cooled, would long for the warmth of his bed. The other, still warm from the cocoon of his down-filled blanket, would long for the refreshment of the air, and the cool tile that awaited in the kitchen. Rarely did he return to the warmth. But every time, he thought about it.

Wake up.

His place was the bottom floor of a house built against the sharp incline of a large hill. It was three small rooms and a washroom. Every room faced away from the hill and towards the ocean, with giant windows. Even the bathroom, which occupied a small space between the bedroom and the all-in-one kitchen/dining room/coat-room/main entrance, had a window where the mirror should be. And once his morning toes had touched the warmed carpet of the bedroom, he started his absentminded round. He stumbled to the main room, and if the day was warm, opened the glass sliding door to the outside world. Then, he would carry on to the third room which he dubiously dubbed a “study.” Though it did contain a number of books on the back wall, none of them had been opened in quite some time. The room had an old couch, a TV, and again, a single large window facing the ocean. Having visited every room and assessed that everything was, indeed, exactly how he had left it the night before, he returned to the main room and filled a kettle with water.

While waiting for the water to boil, he would go to his bathroom and fill the sink with water. The countertop was long and broad, spanning the entire length of the ocean-facing wall. His things, the accumulation of male bachelorhood, littered it haphazardly. Once the sink was full, he would turn off the tap and look out the window at the scenery below: a road winding around the bend of the incline, further down still a handful of houses surrounded by trees, and then finally, a very long but very narrow beach divided midway by a long pier.

Children often played on the pier. It was one of those old wooden ones that jutted onto the ocean defiantly. It had a couple of off-ramps that led to smaller platforms where little boats were tied. They wooshed and wobbled with the water. The older kids would jump off the very end of the pier, despite all of the clearly marked “at your own risk” signs. It was hundreds of meters away, perhaps even a kilometre, but the sounds of their laughter and happy screams always carried right up the hillside.

Wake up.

The water was always a shock. Even if he turned on the hot tap, it took a while to warm up, so the first sink-full was always cold. As he splashed his face, his mind would wake up, and his stumbling disappeared. He became aware of himself and his surroundings. The kettle was often boiling.

He would then empty the sink and return to the main room to stop the whistling. Reflexively, he emptied the brown teapot and put in a fresh teabag. When he poured the water into the pot, he would lift the kettle high in the air, and watch in silent wonder at the waterfall. He didn’t have a tea-cozy, and so he took a hand-towel and wrapped it around the pot.

While he waited for his morning drink to brew, he would go into his bedroom and turn on his laptop. He wouldn’t check anything yet, not before his tea was poured, but it was old and needed a while to turn on. He’d unplug it and bring it into the main room – there was a table and 3 chairs that he would sit at, and start up a little morning music. He usually used an internet radio station, unless it was one of the rare rainy days. In that case he would welcome it with some soft classical music from his archives.

Somewhere, between his one leg dangling and the bottom of his first cup of tea, he would wake up. Sometimes it was the laughter from early morning-ers on the pier. Often it was an email waiting in his inbox, or a story on the internet radio. Once in a while, it was just the view from his bathroom window. But slowly, his eyes would open, and he would start to realize just how far he was from the going’s on outside his little glass house. To an outside observer, he was sure to appear just like everyone else. But he could not help but feel this tremendous, invisible barrier blocking him. He was somehow disconnected from the world. How easy it was, for the birds to fly, for the sun to rise, and for children to laugh. How easy it seemed, for people to buy houses and build businesses and for the traffic to get backed up. Everything in the world seemed at ease in its place. And, though not everything went as planned, everything went.

It came as questions. That’s why it was “waking up.” He started feeling for the walls of his cage; feeling for the restraints that bound his awareness. How did people do that? How had they survived, day by day, paying off that mortgage. How do those two love one another, in a world of political inequality and sexual discord? How did people work and play together all the while secretly hating each other? How did his plumber swallow being a plumber in a world of dentists and lawyers and doctors? How could his doctor work with such fervour, knowing that all his patients would die? When did the past 4 years go by? What was it that made life so bearable for these people? Why didn’t people cave under the fragility of it all? How on earth did millions of people wake up every morning, walk down their silly little streets with their fake little smiles, and convince themselves that they were happy?

Throw up.

Wasn’t there something more real than this? There was a quote from a movie that he saw once, that he just couldn’t get out of his head. “What if this is as good as it gets?” This one didn’t come to him as a question. It came to him has a statement and a queasy stomach. People cheating on their significant others, that’s as good as it gets. People losing everything in their investments in a freak market tragedy, that’s as good as it gets. People getting mugged at gunpoint, shot in gang shootings, starving and freezing: good as it gets.

If there wasn’t, if this was all there is, then people really did manage to survive, he would wonder. People really were happy pulling teeth or litigating divorces. People survived by cleaning up other people’s shit, and populated the world doing it. And each time, they managed to pass on the lie to their children so convincingly that they would, in turn, go out and actually spawn another generation. What better depiction of Hell was there?

Throw up.

He was never lied to by his parents. He was a strong enough actor that his teachers and his friends’ parents never thought they needed to lie in their stead. In fact, he readily spoke the lie before any of his friends, and was a regular supporter of the happiness of others. But it wasn’t until college that rest of the world started lying to him, and by then it was too late. He saw through the lie. The glass wall was built. Why hadn’t they lied?

Every 5 minutes, someone around the world got cancer. But the sun was always shining. The sun thought it was easy to shine. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know how to shine, and he was so tired of the directionless questions dancing in his head.

At some point, between the end of the first cup of tea and the completion of his commute to work, he would break down. Sometimes it was on the ferry into the city, watching the waves go by and hearing all the morning mumblings and seeing the newspapers. Often, it was right before his daily shower. And on the rainy days, it was always during the classical music. On every occasion, he would give in to his heavy heart, look into the distance and silently admit: “I just can’t do it.”

And then, he would.

The Yearning (Redux)

July 25th

So here I am, keeping a journal like a lovesick 12-year-old. My god, the paper even has little pink lotus flowers and lily pads in the corners.

I mean, I haven’t kept a diary since I was – well, twelve. When I was twelve there were all manner of dramatic moments to capture on paper – first period, first kiss, first time my dad hit my mom in front of me. Some more dramatic than others, I guess. But everything was so momentous back then, everything had significance, and needed to be recorded. I guess twelve-year-old girls don’t really have much of a voice and need to prove that they matter by writing it all down, if I’m remembering my freshman-year ‘Deconstruction of the Female Adolescent Voice’ course correctly. Otherwise they end up cutting and starving themselves, which I never did. I think I just retreated into a quiet corner to watch the chaos from a distance, and I’ve stayed there ever since.

Well, aren’t I pathetic, then?

Anyway – the thing about journals and diaries that I’ve always wondered is, who are they written for? Are they addressed to anyone in particular? Or – if Professor Thiessen was right – are they a cry for help, written to the Void, written for no one in particular, but to everyone instead? I don’t know about that. I don’t know who I’m writing to, or for. Maybe just the cats. They’re watching intently as I scratch pen across paper, and I suspect they are just waiting to pounce.

I don’t know what to write next. There has to be a trick to this that I’ve forgotten.

July 28th

I haven’t written for a few days, mostly because I’m not sure what to write. Has anything momentous happened lately? Well, we had a minor emergency at work yesterday – a patient had a grande mal seizure in the waiting room – but we’ve all seen it before. I put a pillow under her head and talked her through it. She was fine in a minute or two, although the people in the waiting room were pretty terrified. A baby wouldn’t stop crying.

I really wish I liked babies more, I do.

Still haven’t heard anything back from the ad. What a joke. I thought it was really clever, so I think I tried too hard to be clever in my reply. I failed miserably, of course.

Here is what he wrote:

Looking for: a partner in, and against, life. This is a full-time position, and requires nothing less than full devotion. The salary is the same: all my devotion, and my heart, if you wish, on a platter. Save me.

When I read it I thought, my god, he’s speaking to me. I didn’t think it was creepy, not even the heart on a platter part, although when I showed it to Karen (big mistake) she got that look on her face. The look that says, you’ve clearly gone insane and are now courting the affections of a serial killer.

Maybe she’s right, but it wasn’t like any classified ad I’ve ever read.

So, I got bold, and sent a reply:

I am writing to apply for the position of partner, as advertised. I see something of myself in your words, and am willing to offer up my heart as collateral. No salary is expected, but love. Save me, and I will save you.

And here it is, a month later, and nothing. No response. Apparently I’m not even attracting serial killers these days.

That’s it for today.

July 29th

Had a bad dream last night. Dreams are so boring – I always cringe (inwardly, of course – I’m nothing if not polite, damnit) when people want to tell me their dreams. All those deeply personal symbols, all that narrative dissonance (there’s a phrase left over from my college days), the desire to be understood and marveled over.

Wow. I am getting wordier and wordier, the more I write. I haven’t written for ten years, aside from emails and the occasional letter to my mother.

Anyway – yes, dreams are boring, but since I have decided that I am writing this journal for myself and myself only – I will try to set it down here, just to make sense of it.

I was standing on a beach, somewhere tropical. I went to Jamaica once – an all-inclusive deal with a friend now long forgotten – and that’s what the beach reminded me of. Miles of white sand, lined with palm trees, the ground dotted here and there with coconuts. In the dream, the coconuts looked like fat sleeping insects; I remember being scared of them right away. Now and then one would heave a deep breath, and its dry, hairy skin would rise and fall. It was nighttime, but the sand was still shining as white as day. I could hear the waves slapping against the shore, and I could smell the salt. I could almost taste it.

I was standing a way’s back from the edge of the shore, looking out onto the ocean. Aside from the moon (which shone weirdly; I can’t explain how, but it seemed off), I could see only one point of light in the distance; there weren’t any stars. The light was a red circle, dancing just above the water. It was really beautiful.

While I watched the red light, one of the coconut-things scurried across my feet. I wasn’t surprised to discover that they were alive, I remember that clearly. I remember how it made my stomach turn, and I wanted to run, because I knew that they were waking up, all along the beach (I could hear their legs unfolding), and they wanted me gone, but I had to watch the red light very closely, for reasons that are unclear to me now.

Something was happening to the light – it was growing bigger and bigger, and the colors pouring out of its center were like nothing I’ve ever seen before. Colors somewhere between purple and pink and blue and green, and colors beyond orange and red and yellow. They were swirling like a pinwheel, moving out and out, coloring the black sky like a Van Gogh painting – it was wild, and beyond description.

The palm trees were shaking wildly now, and more and more of the strange insects were falling, unfolding, scuttling like crabs towards me – some of them were scrambling up my legs, tearing my skin with their sharp legs – and I was staring up into the pinwheel of color, focused on it, reaching for it…

Someone was calling my name across the water. I woke up calling a name back, although for the life of me I cannot remember it now.

So, a bit of a puzzler, that dream. It was unlike any dream I’ve had before. Make of it what you will.

Although, if I am writing this only for myself, who exactly is the ‘you’ in that statement?

I’m not sure I want to go to bed – I don’t think I can take another dream about evil fruit and otherwordly colors in the sky – but it’s late, and I have work tomorrow.

July 31st

Bad day. One of our patients died last week, and we just found out. Mrs Barrow. She was 86 years old. I’ve worked in Dr Eisenberg’s office for four years now, and she was one of the first patients I ever met. She was so sweet back then, well before the dementia set in. She would always, without fail, ask me how my cats were doing.

She gave me advice. She often contradicted herself. One day she would tell me to find a husband while I was still young, another day she made me promise I would never get married. Her husband killed himself almost twenty years ago, after their only daughter died of a heroin overdose. Mrs Barrow hadn’t lived a happy life, I don’t think, but she showed me a lot of kindness over the last four years. In exchange, I always listened to her and smiled, even when she rambled and meandered - and near the end, when she often forgot who I was. One day she called me ‘Heather’ and asked me if I was in Hell for what I had done. She asked if I had seen Harry. She said that if I was in Hell, and Harry was there with me, she would come for us at the End, and bring us home.

I think I cried for an hour that night, after she said that.

What’s saddest is that her death is a cliché. She wasn’t taking care of herself lately, which both Dr Eisenberg and I could see. I was actually in the process of searching for a home that would take an 86-year-old in the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s, with no family and very little money. I wasn’t having a lot of success, but she was on several waiting lists. She was living alone.

A caretaker was visiting her every few days to make sure she was feeding herself, and cleaning up after herself. I guess the caretaker called in sick for three days straight, and Mrs Barrow was forgotten about for a week. Bureaucracy being what it is.

Mrs Barrow fell down the stairs and broke both hips. She lay there for at least five days, alone. The human body is designed to withstand a lot, and doesn’t die easily, so for five days she lay there, alone. I imagine it was cold, although it’s still the middle of summer. She just lay there, at the bottom of the stairs. I wonder if she cried out, and if she even knew she was alone. Maybe she thought that Heather and Harry were there. Eventually she just died, along and broken at the bottom of the stairs. I don’t know if I believe in Heaven and Hell, but I really hope she found her family, and brought them home.

August 4th

I guess it’s a good thing I have this journal (or diary? I can’t figure out which I prefer) because my head is spinning and I need to get this down before I forget it.

I can’t remember the last time I had a recurring dream. Generally I think I have a pretty untroubled conscience, so I’m not sure what to make of this.

This time, I was in my parent’s house, the house I grew up in. I was sitting at the bottom of the stairs. I could hear my parents fighting above me. I couldn’t understand anything they were saying – it was just a jumble of words, my father’s low grumble, my mother’s keening desperation. Something heavy fell with a thud, and my mother started crying.

I sat at the bottom of the stairs, curled into myself, and starting counting backwards from 100. This is a trick I learned early on. I would picture each number clearly in my head, and only when I had studied and memorized every line and curve was I allowed to move on to the next number.

99…98…97…96…95…94…93…

It was getting louder and louder upstairs. It sounded like there was a whole room full of people fighting now, voices rising in a chorus – some high, some low – and the stomping of feet, and a series of sick wet thumps on the floor above me.

I was still counting backwards – 92…91…90…89… - but now the numbers were turning into little black insects, and I could feel them crawling down out of my brain and dropping into the back of my throat. Then they were spilling into my mouth, and I was gagging to get them out, tiny black 87s and 86s and 85s. I started choking, and the insects were crawling out of my ears and through my nose and across the backs of my eyes, and when I looked up the ceiling was red and dripping.

At this point, I remember thinking, ‘Where is the light?’ I had a vague memory in the dream of the pinwheel of weird light that had transfixed me. Blood was dripping from the ceiling, and it was so loud upstairs that I thought my head would explode, and the insects were crawling down my throat now and gnawing on my heart. ‘Where is the light?’ I kept thinking desperately. I tried to call the name I heard in my last dream, but I couldn’t speak, and I realized that I couldn’t even remember the name. The insect-numbers had filled my mouth and were spilling out my nose. No one was calling my name.

And then it ended. One of the cats jumped on my chest and woke me up. I like to think that Stryder is sensitive to my emotions and just knew that I needed to wake up, but I kind of doubt it. Probably he was just hungry.

August 5th

Still rattled from last night’s dream. I’m a little scared to sleep tonight, to be honest.

August 12th

Had coffee with Karen today. She said I looked tired. I didn’t mention the dreams. I’ve had some variation on each every night for a week now. Insects, mostly. Sometimes the beach, sometimes the stairs. Always I am waiting for the light, and never seeing it. A name I can never remember in the morning.

Karen said she had a surprise for me. A phone number, of a man she works with. He’s 35, owns his own condo, likes documentaries and Thai food. Apparently she showed him a picture of me and he’s interested. He’s shy, she said, like me, so it’s up to me to make the next move. She set the little scrap of paper with his number in the middle of the table and slid it towards me. Think about it, she said.

Does he like long walks on the beach, I asked, then laughed, maybe for a little too long. She smiled and made a concerned face. Think about it, she said. Just think about it.

I will, I said.

I think we both know that I won’t, though.

August 16th

We held Mrs Barrow’s funeral today. By ‘we’ I mean me, Dr Eisenberg, and a minister from Mrs Barrow’s church. From my brief conversation with the minister (whose name escapes me), Mrs Barrow was not a regular church-goer, and in fact had stopped going for at least a year now. I suppose that’s why no one from the church showed up.

The three of us stood at the edge of the grave, and the minister said his piece, and Dr Eisenberg said a few words (eloquent and lovely, as always), and I tossed the first handful of dirt onto the casket, and that was it. We left; the minster spoke to a man in coveralls; and Dr Eisenberg and I went our separate ways.

I came home, and here I am.

I suppose it should have moved me more, and made me rethink my life, and re-order my priorities, and all of the things funerals are supposed to do.

There must be something wrong with me, because I don’t feel any of those things. I thought I would, but I’m sitting here reading Sue Grafton and waiting for a re-run of ‘Desperate Housewives’ to start. I think I did most of my crying for Mrs Barrow while she was still alive. When we found out she had died, that was a bad day, but now it doesn’t hurt at all. Maybe there really is something wrong with me, something important missing.

I do wonder if she made it to Hell and back.