Chuck Palahniuk - Doomed

The naturalist in me—the supernaturalist; call me the Charles Darwin of the afterlife—I take careful regard of what occurs. The heap of junkie-filled laundry begins to shine. Something as faint as a memory shimmers on the surface of the body. A glow as insubstantial as a thought begins to rise from the fallen figure. Please note, Gentle Tweeter, that memories and thoughts are the stuff of ghosts. For souls are nothing if not pure consciousness. This spirals up to shape the translucent form I first saw in the foyer of the Rhinelander penthouse. The wasted, wrinkled body remains on the floor, but above it stands a shimmering double. It looks at me and smiles, rapt. “Little dead girl.”

Sitting on the bed, I say, “My name is Madison Spencer.” I nod toward the photo of me and my mother unfurled on the floor.

The figure, I’ll venture, is Mr. Crescent City’s spirit. Anecdotal evidence suggests that ketamine users can depart their physical selves. The consciousness of the intoxicated person detaches. The soul leaves the sedated body and is free to travel, according to the not-exact testimony of numerous drugged-out Special K abusers.

The spirit glances from me to the photo and back to me. He drops to his ghost knees and touches his forehead to the carpet at my feet, his hairy braid flopping against my Bass Weejuns. His voice muffled by the carpet, he says, “Little dead girl… it’s you !”

Out of pure meanness I put a ghost foot forward and step on his vile pigtail.

A foul sputtering noise rends the air.

A second trumpeting blast follows.

The prostrate underling, he’s breaking wind. “Oh, great Madison Spencer,” he whispers. “Hear my prayer.” He lets loose a fresh—fresh?—round of flatulence. “Hurry and accept my tribute and praise, okay? I need to make this quick, because I only have a couple minutes before I go back in my body, but I need to tell you about my holy mission….”

And the vile monster, he lets another rip.

Gentle Tweeter,

The pigtailed phantom of Mr. Crescent City kowtows on the floor at my feet, clearly demented. His face pressed to the carpet, the ghost softly mutters the words, “Piss. Shit. Shit. Fuck. Pussy. Tits. Fucker…” A mantra of expletives. He’s whispering, “Motherfucker. Butthole. Crap. Crap. Crap…” It’s Tourette’s syndrome suffered in an attitude of prayer. In time with his obscene utterances he lifts his open hands, stretching his fingers toward me, beseeching. Nearby lies the inert heap of his earthly body, starfished flat atop a sparkling sea of shattered glass.

From my position, sitting on the bed, I extend one chubby ghost leg and push the toe of a Bass Weejun against his supplicating head. Not kicking him in the skull, not exactly, I just push. I ask, “What’s your problem?”

In response, Mr. Crescent City, his rude ghost, passes gas. A real honker, a real Canadian goose call. Tranced out, he’s muttering, “Please accept the reverent song of my stale bunghole, dear Madison. Accept the humble praise of my ‘Hail, Maddy….’”

Hail, Maddy? Gentle Tweeter, these words form an instant blockage within my brain. Somehow, my name has come to be synonymous with making a stinky?

I say, “Let me confirm something: You’re saying my mom hired you?”

“Accept my butt prayer,” he says, “Sacred angel Millicent Spencer, I petition for your divine guidance.”

I say, “You are disgusting.” I say, “And for your information my name is ‘Madison,’ you pestilent worm.”

“Forgive me, little pissed-off angel girl.”

Me, an angel. As if. I ask, “How much is my mom paying you?” I stand and step closer, asking, “What did my parents tell you?” After all the Gaia agitprop my parents have spouted in Vanity Fair , my former-pagan, former-Buddhist, former-atheist mom and dad, I can’t imagine what faith they espouse now. I snap my fingers to get his attention.

“Camille, great Camille,” the kowtowing ghost says, “mother of the little messiah who will guide all mankind to paradise…” He belches. “Hear my prayers.”

I lift one ghost foot and plant it on the back of his glowing phantom neck. “Let me get this straight. So you toot a fat rail of K and drop into a K-hole. Your soul leaves your body for, let me guess, an hour?” Through my clenched teeth, I warn, “If you break wind again, I’ll rip that mangy pigtail right off your scalp.”

“Thirty, maybe forty minutes,” he says, still facedown. One of his outstretched hands tilts side to side, a gesture of hedging. “I found Marilyn Monroe this way. I found Elvis,” says the spirit, tapping his breastbone, a note of pride in his voice. “I’m the best.”

I say, “That’s a lot of ketamine.”

“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck,” he says.

“Stop that!” I say.

“But it’s how I pay tribute,” he whines.

“To me?”

“We don’t have much time,” he says. “I pilgrimaged here on behalf of your old lady. My sacred duty is, I’m supposed to deliver you safely to the Pantages.”

A theater?

“It’s a big ship.”

“Do you mean the Pangaea Crusader ?” I ask.

He says, “What did I say? Whatever it is, you’re supposed to follow me back there.” The translucent figure pinned under my foot begins to fade.

“After your spirit goes back into your disgusting…” I gesture toward the pile of flesh and rags. “So I’m supposed to follow you?”

“Yeah,” he says. “I guess.” His brain-damaged attention is wandering. Already, his phantom self is vanishing the way it did in the penthouse. His soul is returning to his drug-ravaged body.

To hold him another minute I’m practically standing on his ghost neck. I’m shouting, “Tell me! I command you, you filthy cockroach!” That’s me. That’s just how I am: imperious. I demand, “What is my devious mother up to?”

Cutting cheese. The belching. The path to redemption is swearing .

I have a terrible premonition.

“You, glorious Angel Madison, you died and your flesh was buried, yet you spoke to your mother from beyond the grave….” He’s fading, Mr. Crescent City, seeping back to life. “You dictated the path for righteous followers to attain paradise. By farting in crowded elevators… by pissing in swimming pools… by going ‘fuck’…”

Gentle Tweeter, my ghost self goes cold with dread.

“Since they were visited by your holy spirit,” he says, “your parents have preached your teachings to millions all over the world. To follow in your steps zillions of your disciples are praying ‘Hail, Maddys’ as I do….” He adds, muttering, “Fuck. Crap. Asshole…” He says, “The Supreme Mother Camille is our fervent harlot….”

“Zealot,” I correct him.

But it’s too late. Mr. Crescent City is no longer under my shoe. Across the hotel room his scarecrow’s body begins to stir.

Gentle Tweeter,

Passing gas. Belching. Picking your nose and flicking the boogers. Leaving your used chewing gum on park benches. These are the prayers of a new major world religion, and it’s all my fault. My goal was just to reunite my little family, albeit in Hell. I told my parents to double-park and say the F-bomb and discard cigarette butts on the ground because I knew those acts would surely send them to Hell. And because they couldn’t keep their mouths shut, now they’ve doomed a thousand million souls to eternal misery.