I started the morning with a feeling in my stomach, mostly likely from the partly cloudy day when I was used to bright sunshine. It was a slightly excited feeling full of memories and hopes but nothing clear. I had nothing going on that day, nothing to be excited or anxious for specifically. I had my morning coffee with this feeling, read, and tried my best to eat. It didn’t leave me. I went to the only grocery store in town that I could stand anymore. There was a sharp focus on every person and object. All the employees and customers seemed to be lost in their own world. I walked through the aisles in almost slow motion, gazing at everything in perfect detail. I heard shouting in the back room. It was unsettling.
I went back home and as soon as I walked inside I couldn’t stand to be there. I drove to a diner down the street where an acquaintance of mine worked. This diner was very white on the inside, with tiny square windows which made it appear quite dark. It was nice to know someone who worked at a diner. It made me much less self conscious about going in alone. I sat at the bar and nodded hello to him. He wore an old dirty white apron while looking exhausted and cheerful like he usually did.
“Does today feel strange to you?” I asked.
He looked out one of the windows to his left for a moment.
“How so?”
“I don’t know, feels like an odd day to me.”
He continued to gaze out the window.
“It’s cloudy.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s not usually cloudy.”
“No it isn’t.”
“Anything else?”
“It just feels off.”
He turned to smile at me with nothing left to say. and I just looked at him. I thought through the last few days for any clue as to what was bringing about this change in feeling and agitation. I heard screaming from the kitchen similar to what I had heard in the back room at the store. This bothered me. I had intended to go to the diner as a place of relief, but it was making everything worse. Every sip of coffee heightened my anxiety. The walls and floors were so white that I could see every bit of dirt and grime. I looked to my acquaintance. He seemed preoccupied and didn’t seem to notice the altercation in the back.
“What’s going on back there?” I asked.
“Where?”
“The kitchen. I heard shouting, and fighting I think.”
“I didn’t hear anything.”
“Maybe you should go back there.”
“If there’s a problem I’ll hear it.”
“I’m telling you I heard something.”
He looked at me with concern and I left shortly after with barely a goodbye, feeling slightly offended. I couldn’t decide where to head next. Going home wasn’t an option this time. I’d gone from feeling apprehensive about it to absolutely terrified. I decided to drive to my parents’ house. They weren’t the most sympathetic parents, but I could think of nowhere else to go.
I walked up to their door and heard the shouting again. Inside there were two separate voices from the kitchen or a room near the back of the house. For a moment I also thought I heard crying from a bedroom upstairs. My parents lived alone so I didn’t know who else could be there. There were no unfamiliar cars in the driveway. I felt helpless and got back into my car.
I had very little money saved but I decided to go to a cheap motel. The lobby was small and the front desk was surrounded by glass. Hardly a lobby at all. There was cheap wood paneling on the walls and forest green carpet. The guy at the desk was a small bald man. While he was searching for availability on the computer he stopped and turned to me.
“Does today feel strange to you?”
I looked around in confusion and turned back to him.
“I don’t know, how so?”
He took a sip of his coffee and made a sound like he’d burnt his mouth.
“Hard to explain. Just woke up sort of anxious and felt there was something in the air.”
I really didn’t enjoy hearing this from him. My uneasiness came back stronger than before and I felt the need to leave immediately. I told him that I thought I left my wallet in the car or at the diner. He stared at me as I rushed out, I pretended to search under the front seat and around the interior of my car and drove off.
It was getting late and I didn’t feel comfortable going anywhere. I decided to sleep in my car. I was thankful to be living in the desert but it still gets quite cold after dark. I went to Kmart to get some cheap blankets and a pillow. The children’s blankets were the least expensive.
I didn’t sleep well. It was colder than expected and I had to repeatedly turn on the engine for heat. I parked and slept outside of an old gas station which I later found to be a horrible idea. I heard people lurking a few times and probably imagined noises that weren’t being made. A cop woke me up right as the sun was rising and told me that I had to leave. It was the father of a girl from my high school. She was beautiful but also very mean spirited. Many times I fantasized about sleeping with her and dating, along with the ways she might treat me. Her father being a policeman added to these fantasies. I apologized and drove to a coffee shop on the edge of town that I knew would be open. I got out of the car and my clothes were stained red and blue from the dye of the cheap Kmart blankets. My neck was stiff and I felt even more anxious than the morning of the previous day. I ordered a drip to save money and asked for milk after they charged me as a precaution. When I went to use the restroom, I walked by a bulletin board with an ad that was very striking. It was on dark purple paper with a devilish outline of a face, and under the face it read:
HEARING THINGS? SENSING SOMETHING THAT HAS YET TO COME?
I instantly knew that they were referring to what I was going through, and the same sensations that I got from the motel man came rushing back to me, except this time I felt I needed to give this my attention. I ripped off a tab with the phone number and sat down to drink the rest of my coffee. It had gotten cold and tasted bitter but I continued to drink. The coffee shop was strange. The walls were red and it had horrible local art posted all over the walls with outrageous prices listed below. The barista woman said as little as possible and looked quite angry. Her coworker had a mischievous goatee and one of those red and white bandanas. The bright sunlight coming in gave the whole place a strange and conflicting atmosphere. I went up to the guy while he was steaming milk.
“Hey, do you know who put up that poster over there? The purple one.”
He looked over slowly.
“No idea.”
I asked if the refills were free. He told me they were but that I’d have to wait for a new pot. I left without waiting and found a payphone in the shopping center. It was probably too early to be calling but I dialed the number anyway. A man breathed into the phone.
“Yes.”
“Hi, I’m calling about the poster?”
There were a few seconds of silence.
“Tell me what you’ve been experiencing.”
I wasn’t comfortable telling him anything about myself but I did anyway.
“Well I don’t know, I woke up yesterday and felt different, felt something strange in the air. I’ve heard disturbing arguments and shouting behind several closed doors. And maybe some crying. I don’t want to go home and I haven’t felt that I can talk to anyone.”
He asked me if I was ready to write something down. After asking for a moment I ran over to my car and back while the phone dangled. He gave me an address. He told me not to be afraid, in fact he said please don’t be afraid, and to show up that night around 10pm. I asked him to tell me more because I didn’t feel comfortable meeting strangers anywhere that late at night, but he wouldn’t say anything else. He hung up and I reflected. I was supposed to go to work that day but knew that I wouldn’t. I was on the verge of panic. His voice didn’t set me on edge as I thought it might, but the thought of this strange house brought on a different kind of anxiety compared to what I’d felt so far.
I planned to investigate the address the man on the phone had given sometime before sunset, after forcing myself to check on my parents once again. I was shaking and on the verge of tears when I got to their neighborhood. I parked and stared at the front of the house. It looked much more menacing than I had ever recalled it looking before. I knew I would hear what I’d heard before, maybe something worse. I accepted this fact, took a deep breath and thought about how this house had been nothing but normal for me in the past. A house they bought after I’d grown up but that I’d spent a decent amount of time in. My parents let me stay whenever I was in between jobs and lost in life. I’d stay until the awkward tension forced me out, then I would end up there a few months to a year later and the cycle repeated itself indefinitely. I’d been depressed in that house, scared, optimistic during the holidays. I even had a few girls over, girls that didn’t seem like they’d judge me for living with my parents. Who knows whether they did or not. I didn’t care.
I walked up to the house when I couldn’t take it anymore. This time I heard buzzing like a TV that’s been left on after the VCR has shut off and the volume left up too high. After a few seconds of that I heard some slamming and then screaming and shouting. I couldn’t tell if it sounded like my parents. I don’t think I’d ever heard them in a violent altercation. I felt that I needed to go in so I forced myself to go inside. It was locked and I used my key. I entered the living room and everything looked as I’d remembered it. The TV hadn’t been left on. I listened and the noise sounded just as far away as it had at the door. I followed it to my parents bedroom and opened the door. Once again I found no one, and heard it coming from the kitchen and found nothing there either. This all started to make me panic. Finally I heard violent pounding and screaming in the guest bedroom where I would stay while living there. I broke out in a sweat and felt a special kind of fear. It was a childlike fear and tears started to slowly flow from my eyes. I went to the door and the sound was the loudest I’d heard since walking up to the house. I had nowhere near the strength to open that last door. I ran out, got in my car and drove, still crying.
I stopped at Kmart again to get some food and calm down before heading to the address given to me by the man on the phone. I was still shaking and I didn’t know what I was doing considering going to this place. I reflected on the man’s voice. I supposed it didn’t sound very threatening, if at all. When he asked what I was going through there may have even been the slightest hint of compassion, like a therapist that’s all science and strategy. I decided to head to the house in the afternoon even though I’d basically made up my mind to go at night. I was still terrified to go home and completely lost as to what to do next, so this felt like the only logical option.
There are some houses in the desert that have the atmosphere of Halloween throughout the entire year. I got this from the house when I pulled up. It was very average. One story, brown and forest green with cactus sprinkled throughout the front yard and the side of the house. There was a tall wooden side gate and there seemed to be a good sized backyard. While I was studying the house an agitated looking woman came outside looking at me and sat down in a chair by the front door. We continued to stare at each other after she sat. She lit a cigarette and the intensity of her eyes grew and trapped my gaze. I didn’t feel it wise to immediately drive away, and I don’t think I could have if I’d wanted to. The minutes of uncertainty that passed were awful. We continued to stare at one another. I didn’t want to be the first to look away, but once she smiled I caved. I could hardly believe it when she smiled. It was somehow slightly horrifying and comforting at the same time. I looked forward and drove off. The sensations I was feeling made no sense to me. I now felt terrified of aspects of my normal life yet drawn into what would have frightened me before. Even after this unpleasant and bewildering encounter with the woman I knew I would be back that night.
***
Several parked cars littered the neighborhood. It looked as if there was a party going on yet it was completely silent. I left my car near a park down the street and saw others walking toward the house. Nobody walked together, I took notice right away that it was individuals only. When I got up to the front door, the door was open but the screen door was shut. There was a note on it that read: Welcome. Head straight down the hall and down to the basement on the right. Basements are rare where I’m from so it was strange to read that word. The living room was only lit by dull bulbs and candles. The windows were open and there was a slight breeze running through the living room. There was a mixture of Native American and cowboy art on all of the walls, as well as some framed crochet. Like many that I grew up in, there was the sense of the elderly and a 60’s vibe to this house. At this point I felt very numb as I went down the basement steps. People of all kinds sat in the overcrowded basement. I’d expected there to be mostly goth, punk, and hippie types but this was not the case. There were women covered in tattoos as well as men and women who looked like they were likely retail cashiers or grocery workers. Before I sat down I spotted the motel man and I knew that he saw me. It didn’t upset me to see him; I realized that what had bothered me before had something to do only with myself. The basement was completely full of chairs but some chose to stand against mud colored walls or sit on the floor. I couldn’t get over the amount of people in addition to the variety of the crowd. Some people spoke to each other quietly but it still seemed as if everyone had come on their own. How strange that no close friends or relatives were able to discuss what they were going through and find this place together. I wondered how much advertisement they’d done other than the poster I’d seen. Still, I knew that the effect of the advertisements had done relatively nothing to entice them into coming, it was the feelings that we all shared. I wondered if everyone else hadn’t been home in days like me. I still had on my clothes that were stained from the cheap blankets I’d slept with, and I’m sure my smell was at least somewhat unpleasant. I took in all kinds of body odor as I’d entered the room so I certainly didn’t feel self conscious. Upon further inspection most everyone looked as if their clothes weren’t clean and that they hadn’t had a good night’s rest in the recent past. There were a few people standing near the wall that we were all facing that seemed to know the deal better than the rest of us, but I wasn’t sure. I waited for what felt like about ten minutes scanning the crowd, when we all heard the door to the basement shut and someone walk down the steps. A basically crew cut young man in his mid 30’s appeared wearing a very clean and freshly ironed short sleeve white button up shirt, buttoned to the top. He had an air of seriousness comparable to what I imagined a head accountant in an office would have. He was dark skinned with jet black hair and glasses. It looked to me like he was possibly a descendant of Native Americans and/or Latin Americans. He looked over the crowd and sweat. His eyes had kindness in them but his mouth was stern. This face nowhere near resembled who I pictured calling me.
“Hello everyone.”
He cracked a very rigid smile. There was no doubt that this was the voice I had heard over the phone that morning, however it had a much more calming effect in person. Perhaps it had to do with my affinity for the Native American accent and my assumptions of his descent, but still I was unsure and second guessing my every thought.
“We all know why we’re here. That’s very simple. I’ll be honest…I don’t pretend to know the answers and I don’t have any intention of convincing you of anything or leading anyone in any way.”
He paused and we all continued to stare at him. It didn’t seem like he was used to public speaking; he seemed to be struggling, but handling it in the best way he knew how. He coughed and continued.
“I’ve simply had some visions…dreams…I’m not sure, but I feel compelled to tell anyone that wants to listen. In these visions, storybook pictures and different forms of animation are presented to me of a messiah type person and her group of followers. She was very clearly a woman but somehow a shadow of a woman, as if she were blended with the sun or the moon watching over everything. In the story there are many children that love her. I recognize myself as one of these children, and I recognize each and every one of you as well. It’s very strange…there are so many people here and I don’t believe I’ve actually ever laid eyes on any of you, but I recognized everyone here immediately. Even those of you that called, I knew your voices. Now, in these visions, there really isn’t anything happening. I can feel that we’ve accomplished something and bonded in some way, memories are there in my mind ready to be accessed, however the only thing that you are doing is smiling. That’s all, and it’s clear that we’re all at peace.”
He paused briefly to look us over once again.
“There were no direct instructions given to me if that’s what any of you are thinking. It was more of a sense of duty gifted to me, as well as the ability to feel what you have all been feeling recently. I know what you’re going through and I know that you cannot go back to the lives you had before. I’m not trying to tell you what to do, however to me it feels certain that you can’t escape what you’ve been experiencing, other than to remain with this group, and to build a new life; to build a community with those you see around you, as those from the old world disappear and disintegrate. You will find that along with your other new sensations, that there will be a lack of distress over this.”
He was right. We all sat there quietly and peacefully. Initially it seemed strange that there were no questions, but upon reflection it wasn’t so strange. Former sensations were leaving me, separate and hovering somewhere close by, preparing to leave. I felt a certain calmness that anyone that wasn’t here with us would be fine. This was a collective consciousness that we were living in now, and I found that any questions, fears, or confusion I had previously were completely melting away as I looked into this man’s face. He became more beautiful by the second. A man I wanted to care for and support, to help him realize his potential. In addition to him, I looked around me and felt this way about everyone in the room. Usually in a setting like this I would feel very self conscious. Look around and see what others were like and try to get a feel for the room, or I would try to find any and all attractive women and try to make eyes with them, picture a date, sex, or any kind of relationship, but this was not the case. I had the same love for the old man with dirt on his shirt next to me as any attractive woman in the crowd. We all seemed to fall into this meditative calm. I doubt that anyone was hearing what he was saying anymore. The need for answers wasn’t sought and it seemed that we all had a positive sense of the future. After a few minutes the man just stopped speaking.
We made a fire and tents in the backyard as well as sleeping arrangements inside, then spent the next morning together eating, laughing, and discussing anything other than what we had been through recently. We then peacefully assigned roles for our new family with no conflict whatsoever. We soon had our engineers and carpenters, caretakers, cooks, and artists. Over time, the outsiders in our neighborhood moved out. Whether it was because of us or not I’m not quite sure. We slowly overtook their houses and the entire cul de sac. How wealth was acquired I had absolutely no curiosity about. I took care of the maintenance in our community which was delightful for me, as I was able to interact with everyone and experience a new type of love that I had never felt.
As the days went by living in this new community I thought about if she’d appear. I imagined it more and more consistently but without anxiety. Just once, for a moment, on a random afternoon sitting with my legs in the green water of the backyard pool, as the sun was setting, my mind went back to its old ways and everything felt off. I looked around at this new environment as my old self and saw madness and felt pity. Just as quickly I came out of this, and realized that these were the fears and lies that had – since the beginning – poisoned my brain up until recently, only to be released once again. I was ready to experience something powerful when she arrived, while still able to feel uncertainty and risk of disappointment. Although I was a believer, I felt that what I knew was coming was somehow too good to be true.
***
I realized that my uncertainties were misguided as soon as it happened. The apprehension leading up to what I felt and saw in her presence all felt to be a part of what must happen. I don’t know how to describe it other than that my feelings came in orgasmic waves, or maybe it was the sensation of what I felt in those last days of terror and uncertainty rushing out of me once and for all. My new friend hadn’t been wrong, I did feel like a child in a painting or some sort of illustration, sitting with other happy children surrounding the one in which we all loved.
***
Let all who read this appreciate where you come from and how the life you live came to be. I’m sure that many stories have been told from this time, but I believe that each and every individual holds fresh, and insightful information that’s worth considering. Perhaps the cycle of life has continued past the point of bliss and you live the way that I once did. In that case this story should be all the more meaningful to you.
*****
Jack Uppling is a writer and music teacher currently living in Phoenix, AZ. He graduated from The Motion Picture Institute of Michigan, and shortly after spent several years recording and performing original music in the Midwest and Seattle. His writing has recently appeared in Blood+Honey and Club Plum.