Infinite Rooms: a gripping psychological thriller that follows one man's descent into madness (17 page)

33

L
et me mark the end of this first act with a significance, perhaps synchronicity – the final clout from the hammer which will cause the last of the plaster to come from the first wall.

There, blow by blow, I’ve hacked away. I must stand back to admire it though not for too long. Time is hunched like a lewd and malicious demon, a task-master urging me forward with outrageous remarks muttered into my ear canal. I’ve no choice but to continue, here on the second wall.

The stink is unbearable. Can’t anyone else smell it?

‘As usual…’

‘I’m being stupid, I know,’ I finish for her.

‘Not that stupid,’ remarks Aaron. I’m irritated by his support of me. ‘It’s Syd the fish man, up there,’ and he indicates to the inside of the chalet door as though we can see through it down the length of the pier. ‘Dumps his waste bags at the side.’ The handsome smile from beneath his moustache is annoying.

‘Shouldn’t do that,’ says Bernadette. ‘It might spoil your bike.’

‘His as well. I’ve told him time and again not to lean it here. I’m thinking you’d fancy a bike ride.’ He’s suspiciously even-toned.

Bernadette making a weird ticking noise with her tongue.

You’ve been forced too close in the cramped quarters of the chalet. My skin is twisting in knots. ‘Let’s leave. We can go somewhere to eat.’ Let out hurriedly, trying not to show anxiety.

‘Not yet, Donald. Aaron’s going to read my palm again. He really is good. He’ll do yours, if you like.’

Where has the sharpness gone? Her cutting tone has been successfully cultured over the past three months but with this dire man here, it’s gone. Her voice has become a graceful timbre again, softly-spoken.

‘I don’t want my damned palm read.’

Aaron has taken hold of Bernadette’s hand and gently unfolding her fingers. She has her eyes wide and they shine like a minor presented with sweets; and she’s giving that particular smile which used to belong to me only.

‘Fair enough,’ she replies quietly as he intently examines the lines on her exposed palm.

I want to wrench her hand away despite knowing it would appear a fatuous act. I could walk out but this would leave them together. How have I managed to get this far into a situation which I didn’t want? I should be more firm. I should
have ordered. Seems to be the only way.

Aaron has brought his head up with its mop of black hair and says, in a positive and confident manner, ‘A strong love line.’

His smile again, honest and wide; any insinuation, evaporated. What impertinence — but I’ll not be pressured into retaliation, except the hammer pounding the chisel with contempt. Some might say I should raise my voice or fists, but this won’t be my way. The destruction of this man who would try to steal my wife will be surreptitious; he’ll be unaware of its progress. She can only ignore him and come to me with admiration and respect when she sees how reasonable I’ve become. Again I will be warmed with her love. He’ll be maimed with laughter, scalded with wit, finally destroyed with my goodnaturedness.

I’ll return a smile, add a chuckle even. Did I detect his face whitening a little? Perhaps not – however, eventually he’ll crumble before us, Bernadette no longer under his spell.

For the while I must be patient. My time will come. I’ll hide vengefulness, be composed, exude only a venomous serenity.

Hit the wall and the stones they come a-tumbling-down. My blouse and skirt are covered in dust. I’m sure the agency will understand once I’ve explained. They might be waiting outside on the pier.

A line of seagulls preening themselves, perched on the railings. Women have taken off their bonnets in common respect for
the important agency instructors. Now we’ve come out of the chalet onto the boards, the agents hide, satisfied to watch us from a distance.

How neat and tidy everyone is, and here I am in mucky clothes.

Strike the wall.

‘Pleased to meet you.’ Said to Lucy, even though I’m not. Immediately I sense an aspect of this girl which I dislike. Can’t quite understand what – she appears reasonable enough, dressed in a light frock with strawberries printed on it, white socks and sandals. She’s attractive as well, even with too much makeup and the clutter of imitation diamonds about her person.

‘Well,’ Lucy says and surprising me by taking my arm, ‘Where will we whistle off to? Anywhere exciting?’

‘We could go for a quick bite in the cafeteria. Then we really must make a move.’

Bernadette frowning. ‘Don’t be silly, Donald. Why did you say that?’

Why did you say that? Why did you say that?

I must grit my teeth to stop from speaking further. She’s liable to make me seem a fool. I’m already embarrassed: neck has become stiff and hot, and I’m feeling a mild blush in my cheeks as scrutiny has come to me.

Lucy cries out, ‘Let’s go on the rides,’ and she’s pulling; I’m thrown off-balance and as my hand leaves a pocket, her fingers have quickly entwined with mine and she’s tugging me along
the pier towards the funfair. She’s surprisingly strong.

‘I don’t really want to go.’ How feebly I muttered that. All she does is pull me the more.

Bernadette calling over, ‘See you in twenty minutes.’ I turn around in time to see her linking with Aaron and strolling arm in arm back to the chalet.

I have to shout, ‘No, wait.’ It should serve a dual purpose, for not only do I want my wife back here, I also need this nimble girl to cease her continual pulling of my arm.

Old ladies licking ice creams, bunched together on those covered benches – handbags on laps – and fishermen in their deck-chairs, giving me disapproving stares.

But will nobody stop them? Certainly not those fishermen: one of them has climbed onto the railings and thrown himself off. ‘Knit one, plain one,’ an elderly citizen mutters as explanation, with clicking from her knitting needles.

I’ve managed to pull free from Lucy and I’ll march towards the chalet. Bernadette has gone inside. Thump the hammer. Feeling the blows in my chest. Aaron has stepped up to the chalet interior. My anxiety has me almost whimpering. Another four yards and I’ll be there. The slatted door has closed. I must get there before … before what?

Lucy has come up behind and put her arms around my waist. I must struggle to free myself from her but she’s tittering as though I’m playing a game.

‘Come on, you dappy man. They’ll be alright. Aaron likes to read palms.’

‘Well he might but he doesn’t have to do it in that crappy shed.’

‘But that’s what it’s for. Don’t worry, they won’t be long.’

I’ll shriek out as if I’ve discovered a secret formula, ‘I’ve remembered: he’s read her palm already; there’s no need for them to be in there.’

Smash the wall.

Can you see what’s happening here, doctor? See what you’re making me uncover?

As inevitable as the destination of the roller coaster, along with the excited squeals of its passengers. Once started there’s no stopping and it must roll on to the end.

My flesh is burning. I’m ill with worry. Lucy is giggling now. I understand the aspect of her I dislike. She appears shallow; I doubt she could be serious for more than a minute.

Clout the hammer, expose brickwork hiding guiltily beneath the plaster.

Please, don’t pull me away. I must open that door. My wife is inside; can’t you understand? Don’t you hear me screaming? I’m unable to put them into words, you would think me disturbed. Strangely, these screams from inside as I hit the chisel, they’re coming from the single seagull circling above, its cries beginning to resemble a siren.

Watch how it attacks the chalet. Believe me, I have no effect on its actions. Though I must be honest I’m urging it on as it spins in large arcs before flying at speed to the door — but then plunging back into the suffocating air at the last moment.
I can’t see anything else but the chalet suspended in sky as this gull attacks it in frenzied waves.

Possibly I’m partly responsible for the bird. Each hammer belt at the end of the chisel – every time a lump of chalky plaster joins the piles – this gull begins another descent to the chalet. And the chalet, I can’t rid it from view. I’ve encompassed it, fumbling over its boarded surface like an insect twitching antennae. This is becoming a nightmare. My nose is pressed onto the wood; I’m reeling.

Sent away from the sealed chalet entrance, wrapped in squealing elastic bands.

Hammer blow after hammer blow.

Before I’m ready, sent hurtling back towards the chalet, propelled at an unnatural rate. Slow down or I’ll slam into it; stopped abruptly, once more nose pressing hard up to the boards. Squeezing tears from between my burning eyelids. My cheeks are scratched.

Blow after blow.

I’ve been roughly pulled again, away from this structure. Must I spend the rest of my life thrown backwards and forwards with this loathsome nausea turning my whole body into squeaking sponge?

‘You’ll make me sulk in a minute,’ says Lucy, tightening her grip about my waist.

See the chalet, as flat as a painting, becoming as grey as plaster. The sky’s surface has been blemished by the chisel prising away parts of it.

‘To the funfair,’ the seagull demands as though it were a trained parrot; Lucy’s begun pulling again.

‘Lucy, no, we must … we must…’ but already I’m weary and resigned to go with her. I might as well be a puppet with its strings cut. Muscles inflamed and taut. Throat sore; legs have lost feeling from crouching down for too long; I’ve a harassing ache in my groin area.

Please, Bernadette, you must come out of there. If you must hide, hide in the wardrobe, in the cocoon. You’ve been inside for ten minutes.

‘Here, Donald—’

Where are you hiding? Show yourself. You’re close. Over there, by the amusement hall or in the doorway of the cafeteria? Be seen. Maybe you’ve gone down to the beach, sitting by the sea sifting sand, collecting shells. Or you might be under this pier, swinging your legs as you sit on one of those huge, mollusc-covered struts.

‘Over here.’

Still can’t see where. The rest have walked on ahead. They’re too fast. At least stop for a short while. Remember how weary I am. The weight of the hammer has doubled. I can barely lift it more than a foot. Can’t bring it hard down onto the end of the chisel, just let it fall. Look at this blister on my thumb: have you ever seen one quite so large? If I were to pierce it with a pin, the pus would spurt out.

‘Here, here I am.’

Stop playing games. Let me catch up. Wait where you are.
I must rest for a few blinks. You can’t be far away, your silvery voice is close. It floats down these cobbled lanes and thin streets, past the antique shops and cafés and arcades.

Even now, in the car – what used to be my car – you can be heard clearly. Aaron turning the wheel and the vehicle lurching out onto the country road.

‘Here.’

I know, but where? I’ve turned around and there, sitting at the back, is Aaron with Lucy. Look forward and Aaron’s handling the wheel to move the car off the road onto gravel, and then grass. ‘What’s this?’

‘You must know, surely. Bernadette showed us where you used to come for a picnic sometimes.’

‘I know it damn well is. Bernadette, how could you? This was our secret.’

Someone chuckling. Not laughter though, it’s become too high. Now the twittering of a bird high up in the branches.

Why do you have to be like this? Show yourself. I believe you might be hiding on purpose.

‘Here – here…’

These infernal trees. Made of stagnant tinsel. They must be covering you. Still I can’t see where you are.

Strike the chisel.

34

‘
C
aught up then. Here.’ Lucy handing me a sandwich.

Slump to the ground; take it from her. Bitten into it but tastes of sand.

I could do with a drink, I’m parched.

‘Here we are.’ Bernadette offering, holding out a glass of lager.

I’ve found you. I’ll reach out. How my hand shakes, bruised and battered from the hammer blows missing, grime covering me. Everyone else appears so fresh. Really grateful for this liquid. An appetizing froth on the top; the glass feels cool. Gulp it quickly – pour it into the back of my throat with relish…

I might as well be drinking dust.

Lucy, gazing about. ‘Isn’t it perfectly lovely.’

Aaron will answer. ‘Certainly is. Not many poppies this year.‘

I’ve caught that fond expression appearing on Bernadette’s face. He’s reaching out. I’m ready to stand up, prepared to defend her.

He’s taking a piece of grass from her hair. I should stuff a mouthful of grass down his gullet.

Lucy still giggling. The sea breathes with a rasp.

Bang goes the hammer.

Swollen eyelids, aching numbness; I’m hiding within this flesh which is painful and at the same time without feeling. Can’t explain. I’ll have to move lumps of plaster from under my aching back, they’re digging into me. Yet my back has no sensation of touch.

There’s only a gentle covenant of sounds which I can barely perceive, enough to be aware of another existence other than this insulated interior.

How easily I’m able to merge and intertwine realities as easily as balls of string. Here, laying down – in the glade with the burden of sunlight still sapping, washing me away – I can imagine I’m in a darkened room with the lower half of two brick walls, plaster littering the floor, and a disfigured doctor leaking sarcasm from behind.

Have to continue. What’s been started must be finished. Almost was lulled into sleep. Must force eyes open, have to find my real Bernadette.

Of course, I’m still here in the woods. Brush away the fly from my cuff. Lucy lying there, outstretched, sucking on a piece of straw, one of her hands waving listlessly.

Bernadette seems to have pulled herself closer to Aaron. I can notice details like this. He’s taken off his striped jacket and laid it between us. What does he believe this action
symbolizes? They are sitting there, each with the same posture, a mirror of each other, simply looking. Both with lost facial expressions. But eyes can’t be disguised. They show a little of one’s quintessence. Breathing hard through my nose to attract her attention but still her whole concentration concerns this other man. I have stop myself from lurching forward to pull her to me; to pull her away from him. I detect a slight raising of his left eyebrow. How can I stop them? They’re the two halves of one. If only I was able to sever those solid poles of steel connecting them. No, not solid — joined hollow pipes, allowing their locked sights no distraction as they encompass each other, attempt to melt their minds for an illegal spiritual lovemaking.

Over the mountain, watching the watcher…

Must say something to break them apart. ‘Looked at Bernadette’s palm again, did you?’ Swiftly blurted out; tried to accentuate the sarcasm there. Aaron inevitably smiling and nodding. ‘A good future has she got? Could you see?’ Had to ask to promote a response.

As if time has slowed, he’s reaching with a hovering, indecisive hand, to the furred green stem of a dandelion clock.

‘Bernadette, must have got your money’s worth. In the chalet, I mean. You were there for so long.’

She’s poking out the tip of her tongue and it’s travelling slowly along her top lip. At the same time, Aaron is holding out the dandelion clock to me with his arm fully extended; bringing the fluffed head to his blank canvas of a face and
exhaling through rounded lips, the sound exaggerated, as if made from blowing across the top of a bottle. The lace ball has exploded, white seeds drifting towards where I lay.

How I could scream to perverted memory of Bernadette, ‘Stop torturing, giving me this world of pain!’ Can’t you see how I yearn for the real you, every ounce of myself ? There you sit, two feet away, and still we might as well be a thousand miles apart.

See me holding hands up, bloody and blistered. And I’m going to reach out, and at the instance of making contact with your unblemished face, all else will vanish to leave only the two of us, immutable, together for an endlessness of continuation.

What cruelness is this – my hands travelling through you, making you as vague and unreachable as a hallucination, and there behind, I’ve felt a wall, cold and solid?

‘Aaron has such a clever gift.’ Sickly admiration. ‘You also have glorious healing hands, don’t you?’

Do you think I missed that action? Subtle movement of Aaron’s index finger towards Lucy, that secret message which Bernadette has obviously interpreted – she nodding back, not as subtly.

I’m going to let out a long breath as though relaxed then close eyes again, an expression of satisfaction about my lips. You’ll think I’m unaware of any deviousness though I’m attentive and listening.

A male voice: ‘Lucy, are you awake?’

A few bars of birdsong from the woods; the sea a mile away casting onto shingle; my own breathing, husky and unmodulated.

A moment of true silence, before Bernadette breaks it. ‘Lucy, wake up.’

‘Give her a nudge.’

‘Lucy. Lucy.’

A light moan followed by a sniff. ‘What’s happening? I was miles away then.’ I can hear her sitting up.

‘What about going for your walk? You said you wanted wild flowers. You ought to go and collect them, now. We’ll be making a move soon. What’s the time anyway?’

‘A quarter to six.’

‘If it’s that late, I won’t bother.’

A tut. ‘Yes you will. You particularly wanted flowers, you said. You were most insistent about it. You might want help as well, remember?’

Another pause; Lucy’s answering. ‘Oh, of course, yeah, right, but he’s asleep.’

My leg kicked. Now Bernadette tapping me. ‘Donald, Lucy wants to pick some flowers.’

I must give the impression of struggling from sleep. I’ll even pretend a yawn. ‘Pardon?’

‘I said Lucy wants to pick flowers — help her. We haven’t got long. We’ve decided to leave the meal in town and go straight to The Neptune. Get yourself moving.’

‘What makes you think I want to pick bloody flowers?’

Lucy has got up, brushing bits from her frock. It’s become grass-stained and creased. ‘Ready.’

Aaron sitting there looking smug, drinking from a paper cup.

‘To help Lucy. It’ll be quicker. Don’t be a spoilsport.’ She can’t stop herself from glancing at Aaron, I’ve noticed.

‘I’m sorry but definitely not. Lucy, you might as well sit down again or else pick flowers on your own. I’m not going to pick any. Anyway I don’t respond to orders, even yours. Who do you think I am?’

Nobody’s answered. Bernadette giving a mean look and as her fingers nip at blades of grass, she’s blowing air through her nose. How obvious this is, the devious plot so my wife can be alone with this heinous man.

But I can analyse myself and be aware of a peculiar talent for self-deception. Bernadette is only being difficult. I’ve probably upset her without realizing. This is her way of retaliating.

There’s more, I know, the abandoned filmic hiding just around the corner. Can’t quite see this despicable manufactured truth yet I’m beginning to understand there’s no way of avoiding it.