Jonathan Carroll - Voice of our Shadow

She got up and left without another word.

I sat in the chair for the rest of the afternoon. I looked at the floor and out the window. How dare she! What hideous thing had I done to her to deserve those words? I'd simply been honest, and she'd returned the favor by cutting me in half with a dull razor blade. What if I had been totally honest with her? Told her I truly loved someone else but was going to stay with her because it was my duty rather than my desire. That was the first, scorched-ego part of the afternoon's thoughts. The part where I very much wanted to punch her in the nose for having the nerve to tell me. .

The truth? Had I been searching for that truth ever since the death of my brother, or running away from it as hard as I could? I picked up the paper with the Connell quote and read and reread it.

The sun crossed the sky, and the shadows through the Venetian blinds followed it. I would allow her one thing — I had taken advantage of Ross's death, sure, but wasn't that what a writer was supposed to do? Cash in on his life's experience and try to make some sense of it on paper? How could she fault me for that? Would she have condemned me if the story hadn't happened in the right place at the right time? What if it had been an exercise for a creative-writing class in college and nothing more? Would that have been okay in her eyes?

She was jealous. Yes, that was it! All my fluke money and success from "Wooden Pajamas," being able to pull her away from Paul and then hinting I didn't want her after the danger had passed. She was a loser and I was a winner and. . Hard as I tried for a couple of minutes, I couldn't dress her in that outfit either. She wasn't the jealous type and certainly wouldn't wither up and blow away if I walked out of her life. There was a toughness in her that could weather all kinds of storms, and I wasn't egotistical enough to think my departure would bring the curtain down on her life. Pain and guilt, yes, but no final curtain.

Part Two in the revelations on a winter afternoon of one Joseph Lennox, writer and parasite.

When it grew dark outside, I walked without thinking into the kitchen and opened a can of soup. I have no memory from that point on, until I realized I'd just washed my dinner dishes. I zombied back to my thinking chair and sat down for the next installment.

Had my life, lucky as it was, run on automatic pilot from the day I'd pushed Ross until now? Was that possible? Could a person function in that kind of vacuum for so long without knowing it? It wasn't true. Look at all the work I'd done! All the places I'd visited, all the. . the. .

A light winked on in an apartment on the other side of the courtyard, and I knew what she'd said was right. Not exactly, because I knew it wasn't magic I was trying to suck from other people, but rather a delight in life I knew I'd never have.

A delight in life. That was what Ross and Paul Tate had in common, as did India and Karen. If magic was the thing, India had sold herself short by not taking her own into account. I did want what she and those other people had — the ability to live at ten out of ten on life's scale for as long as they possibly could. Me? I'd always chosen three or four, because I was afraid of the consequences of higher numbers.

Ross stuck his nose right in life's face and challenged it to constant duels. Paul and India jumped into it blindly, not ever worrying about what would happen to them, because no matter what, the results would be interesting. Karen went out and bought you cowboy boots because she loved you. She was awed by the light coming through a glass of red wine and cried at old movies because one should cry then.

A delight in life. I put my head in my hands and wept. I couldn't stop. I had done so many things wrong; judged distances and temperatures and hearts (including my own!) incorrectly from Day One, and now I knew why. I wept, and it didn't even feel good, because I knew I'd never have the delight they did; it tore me apart.

What could I do? I had to talk to India. I had to tell her all of this. I also wanted to tell her about Ross and what I had done to him. She was a good psychiatrist (a little off the mark, but not much, considering the things she didn't know!). Even if she thought I was using her again, I wanted her thoughts on what I should do, now that the cat was out of the bag; now that I had the rest of my life to live.

As I rubbed my nose on my sleeve, I started laughing. I remembered a ridiculous poster I'd seen in a head shop years before, which even then struck me as particularly trite and offensive: Today is the first day of the rest of your life. You could say that again.

"India? It's Joe. Can I come over and talk?"

"Are you sure you want to?"

"Very sure."

"Okay. Should I put on my boxing gloves?"

"No, just be there."

I took a shower and chose my clothes carefully. I wanted to look good, because I wanted it all to be good. I even put on a tie I'd been afraid to wear for a year because it had cost so much. When I was ready, I stood in the doorway and gave a quick look around the apartment. Everything was neat and tidy, in place. Maybe when I returned my life would be in place, too. I had a chance, a fighting chance, to set things right, and I was grateful.

I would have walked, but was so excited by all I had to say to her that I took a cab. As with the soup I'd eaten earlier, I was so preoccupied that I didn't realize we'd moved until the taxi pulled up at her door; the driver had to ask twice for eighty schillings. I got out the key she'd given me and let myself into the building. A smell of cold stone and dust was waiting, but I had no time for it and took the stairs to her apartment two at a time.

"Two-at-a-time. Two-at-a-time." I said it to match the cadence of my feet on the steps. Unconsciously I counted how many there were. I'd never done that before. Thirty-six. Twelve, then a landing; twelve, then a landing. .

"Twelve-then-a-landing!" I was out of breath, but so hyper by the time I got to her floor I was afraid I'd break her door down.

She preferred that I use my key to the apartment because every time I rang the bell she was either in the bathroom or taking a souffle out of the oven. Inevitably, as soon as she opened the door and greeted me, the next moment she was off, flying down the hall — back to whatever she'd been tending when I buzzed. I let myself in and was surprised to see that all the lights were out.

"India?" I went into the living room, which was only dark shapes lit by the night-gray light from the windows. She wasn't there.

"India?" Nothing in the kitchen. Or the hall.

Puzzled both by the darkness and by the silence, I wondered if something had happened while I was coming over. It wasn't like her to do this. What was wrong?

I was about to turn on the lights when I remembered the bedroom.

"India?" The light from the street fell in stripes over the bed. From the doorway I could see her lying there, with her back toward me. She had no top on, and her naked skin was like soft, bright clay.

"Hey, what's up?" I stepped halfway into the room and stopped. She didn't move. "India?"

"Play with Little Boy, Joey."

It came from behind me. A familiar, beloved voice that sent a vicious, twisting chill down my spine. I was afraid to turn, but I had to. He was there. Little Boy. He was behind me. He was there.

I turned; Paul Tate stood leaning in the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest, the tips of white gloves showing behind his armpits. His top hat was cocked to one side. A dancer in the night.

I began to crouch like a child. There was nowhere to go. Lower. If I got lower, he wouldn't see me. I could hide.

"Play with Little Boy, Joey!" He took off his hat and, in a slow dream, peeled Paul Tate's face down and off his own: a smirking Bobby Hanley. "April Fool, scumbag."