J. Lennon - Castle

The time had come to act. But I dawdled for at least an hour more, making a pot of coffee, drinking a cup of it, checking the glazing on the windows, examining the winter-bare landscaping plants around the house, for buds. Eventually, though, I grew annoyed with myself. Where was my discipline, my self-control? A strong man, I told myself, did not hesitate in the face of his fears; rather, he took note of them, dismissed them, and got on with the task at hand. Disgusted by my weakness, I went back inside, put on my respirator, took up my supplies, and trudged down the rickety steps.

The steps were painted red, which paint had worn away in the middle of each from decades of tread. They creaked and bowed under my weight. My hands were full, and anyway there was no handrail, and I took each step with great care, making sure each foot was firmly planted before transferring my weight to it. In this way I descended gradually, until at last I stood on the bare packed-dirt floor.

The smell here was stronger, of course; I could detect it in spite of the respirator. My breaths inside the device were hot and damp; I had to draw them more deeply to pull the air through the filters. The cold crept up underneath the cuffs of my pants, and the furnace, a monolithic, mound-like protuberance in the ground, snaked its black tentacles all across the room. It appeared to me like a giant mushroom, some massive death cap, and as I stood regarding its great dark enormity it emitted a thunderous clank, and a hacking whoosh, like a sudden gust of wind. I could see the blue glow of the gas flame etched around the edges of the door, and I felt something turn over in my chest. Perspiration began to leak out of my pores, under my arms and in my crotch, and inside my boots my feet began to itch. I realized, belatedly, that I ought to have urinated before I came down here. But that would have to wait. I gritted my teeth and, supplies in hand, moved forward into the darkness.

The basement was laid out in a large square the size of the house, and had not been subdivided in any way. Enormously thick wooden beams supported the floor joists above, with the furnace in the center. The stairs had led me down to the south wall, and the light bulb was southwest of the furnace, illuminating the new circuit breaker box that Heph had installed. Foolishly, I had neglected to bring down a flashlight — but with my eyes adjusted, I could make out the north and east walls behind the furnace, and knew I would be able to see well enough to clear out the moldy trash.

My heart thudding, I took a few tentative steps north. I felt my entire body tighten, the skin squeezing the bones, as if it were trying to shrink me to nothing. My jaw, tightly clenched all this time, began to spasm, and I struggled to keep my teeth from knocking together. But I continued, taking one step and then another, my hands cold and trembling, my head pounding, my face swollen and irritated from the nylon straps of the respirator.

And then a familiar emotion took hold of me and my trembling subsided. Heat coursed through me. I gripped the lime bag and spray bottle tighter, crushing them in my grip, and vulgarities began to pour from my mouth.

It is a well-known truth that fear gives way to anger — we have seen it, for instance, in those diagnosed with a dangerous illness, or among citizens of an occupied state during a time of war. But in my case, the transformation was immediate. My irrational fear melted in the face of an equally irrational rage. I cursed the slovenly, careless people who had left things in my basement capable of growing mold; I cursed poor Heph for forcing me halfway down the stairs. I denounced the forest and its cruel rejection of me, its master, and I spat and seethed at the thought of my sister, the devious whore, for interfering in my life after ignoring me for so long. In short, the world was my enemy: it had driven me here, to this sanctuary, and, not having had enough, it had forced me into its bowels to clear away the miserable reek of its past. And so, fueled by hate, I made my way across the near-lightless space to the far northeast corner, where a jagged lump reshaped itself into a pile of cardboard boxes, each slumped, eaten away by fungus, and spilling books through its ruptured sides.

I gathered up as many of the books as I could carry, and then, my teeth tearing the insides of my cheeks, the taste of blood on my tongue, I roared up the stairs and out the back door, to fling their infernal rot into the brutal spring sun. I made many trips — a dozen, I’d say — growing angrier with each return, until at last I howled at the limp stinking cardboard that remained, bellowed as I scooped it up and hugged it to my chest and hauled it out into the light.

By the time I had opened the box of lime and begun dumping it on the floor, my anger had weakened, and with that task completed, my fear returned. I had time for a few spritzes of the antifungal spray before, wracked by terror, exhaustion, and spent emotion, I dragged myself at last up the creaking stairs to the bathroom. There, I tore off my mask and my clothes, spreading dust and scraps of clotted, putrid paper all over the floor, and stepped into a scalding hot bath, where I cleaned my wounds. I had gouged the back of one hand and an ankle during one of my desperate tears up and down the stairs; my face and scalp burned with scratches from who knew where, and my muscles ached from the tension at last released. From the bath I tumbled into bed, shivering beneath the blankets, and I slept until late afternoon. Then, at last, I dressed in clean clothes, tidied up the bathroom, and went out into the yard to transfer the ruined books to the trash pile.

There were several dozen of them, both hardcover and paperback, largely destroyed by the purple-black mold that had grown on them. The mold had permeated their pages, fusing them together into bulging, spongy blobs, and I carried them gingerly now, eager not to sully myself. Two of them, however, had largely escaped corruption, and after a moment’s consideration I set these aside. My constant renovation work had precluded the need for anything to read, but now that I had some leisure time, I could use a good book or two. The books seemed to be on the subject of human psychology — one of them was called The Malleable Mind; the other Shaping Behavior. I would not characterize my own cast of mind as intellectual, and these books did indeed appear to be quite dense and technical in nature. But I had never been one to resist a challenge, and of course there was nothing else to read, aside from the children’s book I had found in the sitting room. I brought these books back inside, and cleaned them up as best I could. Then I completed my work outdoors, washed my hands carefully, made myself a modest dinner, and, as the sun disappeared from view behind the hills to the west, turned in early to bed.

My plan had been to open one of the rescued psychology books at random, and read it until I fell asleep. And so I picked up The Malleable Mind and turned it over in my hands. Though largely undamaged, it was nevertheless redolent of the cellar, and my lips curled at the smell, and a small tremor of unease ran through me. But I was able to master myself, and I let the book fall open on my lap. The page began, presumption of inviolability must be negated. To this end, subtle adjustments were made to the subject’s comfort and autonomy by creating a physical dependence upon the experimenter. Specifically subject was requested to bring a bag lunch to the testing location, then told it would be placed in a nearby office, from where it was “inadvertently” lost. Experimenter then promised food would be provided, which promise was then “forgotten.” When subject requested promised food, the experimenter renewed his promise and then again forgot. Water meanwhile was provided for the subject that was slightly discolored and had a bitter flavor. When asked about the water, the experimenter pretended to take a sip and subsequently insisted that the water tasted fine, and that as for the color, it was always like that and nobody else ever complained.