To the Brink of Madness
Was it possible for a single dream to send you spiraling into madness?
There it was, a ring lost decades ago. If not for the dream I was in, I would not have remembered or even thought about the silver ring with the abalone inset. Yet, there it sat, nestled amongst the dust and cobwebs that adorned the windowsill. That was the way of dreams, to resurrect stuff from the past and return them to you. I placed the ring on my pinky finger and looked around the grimy attic. I had frequented this place in my dreams before, but this visit carried a different tone — one not altogether pleasant.
Was this a nightmare?
All articles in the room were familiar, long since forgotten, until the moment my eyes fell upon them. The ring was one such item, as was the small gold watch with the black velvet strap. The watch sat atop a chest of drawers attached to the wall by cobwebs. The cobwebs were new — an addition since my last visit.
At first glance, each possession appeared as when I last saw it. However, the preliminary observations did not hold up against closer inspection. A closer look revealed the shadowy and unwholesome stain that rested upon each surface, upon the room as a whole. The result cast the room and its contents into a deep melancholy — and something else — something less savory. The overall picture remained and was no less mine, but it was diminished, flattened somehow.
Too many shadows shifted in my peripheral vision for this to be a dream. Too many cold drafts smelled of decay and rot. Footfall padded to my left, but when I looked, all was still. Elsewhere in the gloom, something emitted a low and menacing growl.
Any ideas of this being a dream left me. Any notion this visit was similar to those that came before, vanished. It occurred to me that a disagreeable note had sounded from the first chime of the doorbell.
I peered out the dormer window, past the cobwebs and decades of grime, to see my car parked in the drive where I had left it. The relief at the familiar sight was short-lived, for as I looked out the window, the attic dwellers and their whispered movements were at my back.
A distant memory, watery at the edges, suggested the house was a lop-sided affair with chipped white paint and in need of love. The shingles on the roof and covering the exterior curled in solidarity. My fingers knew the exact texture of those curled shingles, the ridged concave shape and the sharp edges of the chipped paint. No memory presented itself and thus clarified how those sensations were so vivid. Yet, they were, and with those vivid recollections came a wave of unease.
The attic smelled as one would expect a long-abandoned room to smell, musty with a sour note. Stacked in a chaotic mess, boxes, trunks, chests and bureaus held the belongings and memories such as the ring and watch. This arrangement was not a neatly appointed cubby organized in chronological precision but rather a mess of the misplaced, the dismissed, and discarded.
If organized, perhaps the items would have portrayed the dreamer in a beautiful painting — photorealism at its best. This mess, however, was chaos sans the appeal of a Jackson Pollock.
Where this was my nightmare and my stuff, I was a visitor and an unwelcome one at that.
Two doors stood at the back of the room.
Avoid those, a dream voice hissed.
Under one door, a strip of dull red light had crept onto the floor. Don’t look. I stood transfixed nonetheless and stared at the spilled light. At times the flooring immediately in front of the door was carpeted, yet, other times, it was tile. Then it would slowly morph into linoleum. Over, and over it changed, carpet, linoleum, hardwood, tile in a mesmerizing rhythm. Each surface reflected the strip of red light in a unique but equally disturbing fashion. It was only light — virtually harmless. Yet, I knew it represented something vastly more horrifying than mere illumination could suggest. Each style of flooring I recognized was from a time in my life I would just as soon forget.
The room held my rage, and it was significant and well-fed.
The other door cast no similar illumination around its frame. Instead, only darkness, to a disquieting degree, issued from beneath. This darkness heralded a foreshadowing that something active, a terrible thing made up of flesh and bone, sought escape through the narrow gap. Darkness, defined as a lack of illumination, would seem passive to me. Yet this darkness, unlike any I had witnessed before it, harbored an air of dread that threatened to suffocate and was, by no description, passive. Frigid air seeped from beneath the door.
This room held my fear.
Each one fed off the other. Without seeking access through either entryway, I knew the symbiotic nature of the two would lead to a single chamber.
The saving grace that could rid this attic of the stench of madness oozing from beneath the two doors was unknown to me. Fear kept my feet rooted to the floor in the patch of weak light that filtered in through the grime of the small attic window.
Feeble as the light was, it offered a frail boundary that the manifestation of the two doors could not pass, but for how long?
There I remained. Maybe in one of the boxes, chests or bureaus, I could find something that would help, a flashlight perhaps, or belongings I could MacGyver into a weapon of sorts — even though I did not know against what foe I would brandish such a weapon.
God willing, I would awaken in my bed, safe and sound.
My insides trembled when I thought of awakening in my bed. I would, of course, but not safe and sound. I was certain of one thing, this nightmare had a purpose. Failure to comprehend the intended message once the final curtain fell would render me helpless against the takeaways.
This rage and fear were the manacles on my wrists. Their combined forces slumped in the darkness and waited to take me in their grasp. Snarling at my heels, they were, and now that I was here, this was perhaps the only opportunity I might have to fight back. Yet how? No answers were forthcoming.
To stand passive was not an option. I gulped and stepped into the shadows.
In one darkened corner, shapes shifted. Something freed itself from the darkness and paused as though aware of my presence. The form of a man wearing a derby hat and a long coat moved with shocking speed. His intended destination appeared to be the door I associated with rage.
I wanted to scream but fought it down with sheer will.
Although its movements were jerky and disjointed, it was lightning fast, and in an instant, it threw the door wide and permitted dirty red tendrils of mottled light into the attic.
The scream stuck in my throat, and my heart hammered behind my ribs. My ears roared with my rising blood pressure.
Without taking a step, I moved toward the room. No straining or twisting stopped the involuntary approach. A final push from unseen hands thrust me across the threshold and into the red room, where I landed hard on my knees.
Pain shot into my hips, and the thought flashed through my mind that I could recall no past dreams where the pain was so electric. The stench of rot threatened to choke me, and I gagged. My eyes brimmed with tears as I searched in the dim light in hopes of a window to crack. No window presented itself nor doorways, for that matter.
My search revealed the interior was not as I had feared but much worse.
Bathed in the mottled red light was my companion worthy of any nightmare. Fear and anger had taken form and were coiled together in a sickening dance. Conjoined twins, they were, with one body and two heads. One face was contorted in terror, its mouth wide in an endless howl.
The other head, a hairless mask of rage, grinned with yellowed fangs. The skin over the skull was raw and blistered, a mass of wet pustules that oozed and bubbled. The head hung at an odd angle on a long sinewy neck that slithered and wound around the head of fear. Its lascivious coated tongue tormented, licked, and prodded its twin. Opening its mouth wide, it sunk its fangs into the flesh of the screaming face of terror. It bit and chewed and tore even as the chunks reappeared so the attacks could begin anew.
Together the two abominations, partially joined and unable to extricate themselves, entwined and untwined, coiled and uncoiled as two lovers engaged in an obscene coupling. The glistening shape threw off the sour stench of fear and filth that filled the room, and when droplets hit my face, my stomach bucked, and my mouth soured.
Helpless, I could not draw my eyes away from the tongue as it darted and probed in its grotesque quest for the last shred of sanity left in the twin.
The endless shriek of terror that came from the jaws of fear scorched the edges of my sanity. The rage twin hissed, sending spittle flying. Fear and anger — anger and fear — forever linked.
On hands and knees, I crawled as far away from the beast as the space would allow and rose on unsteady legs. The same stench hung on my skin as the hideous vision before me, and it combined with the strong scent of urine in an Eau de toilette suitable for nightmares. It was then I realized somewhere along the line, my bladder had let go.
For a moment, the tongue froze, its foray across the face of fear momentarily forgotten when its black eyes found me. Motionless for a moment in the red gloom, it glared.
With that, I closed my eyes and prayed to wake up. How meaningful that anger’s weapon should be a blackened, wagging tongue. More fitting was that it fed on fear. Look away and focus, I thought.
If in a mere nightmare, logic would suggest I had only to awake to rid myself of the vision. Perhaps if I concentrated on happy events and times from my life? With nothing else at my disposal, and as my wits dangled by a thread, I forced my eyes shut and attempted to focus my mind.
Retaliation was swift.
The first crash sounded from the far end of the room when the reptilian tail of the beast hammered the far wall. My eyes flew open. Debris flew, and bits of moldered plaster and insulation rained down on me. More plaster cracked and fell away in chunks heaving forth a thick cloud of dust that filled my nose and stung my eyes. The war thus waged — the battle, on.
My attempt to pull my thoughts away from the creature seemed to have angered it. As results were results, I took it as a sign of encouragement that my host responded with such rage. It indicated I had some say in how this played out.
Just get out of the room — go to your happy place, my inner voice whispered. With no weapon at hand aside from a vicious tossing of buttons torn from my blouse, I had but one choice. In this attic, alone and unarmed, my options were limited. There was nothing at all to fear but fear itself.
Focus.
I gulped and squeezed my eyes shut.
Should I awaken now, I will be doomed. This room would hold me and cast me into a real-world life of madness.
Nonsense, I reasoned. This was only a nightmare, a memory salad concocted from bits and bobs of the day, nothing more. It bore no more substance than dreams of my past.
Fear was the skeleton key — the master — it fits all the locks. Anger was only a secondary emotion and followed fear like the cart follows the horse. This, of course, made sense. I must focus my attention away from the trickery of my mind and toward pleasant matters.
Doubling down on my efforts, I continued conjuring images of summers on the lake as a child. Another thunderous slap of the tail and something whipped across my face. A bright sting resonated across my right cheek that brought tears to my eyes. Such pain was more substantial than mere imagination could account for. However, what followed was something far worse. A fetid tongue tickled on my lips. It flicked and probed in a lewd and insistent hunt for penetration.
A scream of pure terror broke from my chest.
The screams continued for several moments before I realized I was awake — in my bed. I struggled to sit up against the sodden sheets that tangled around my body.
The sun, not fully up, cast the room in a twilight glow.
Awake or not, the thought I had been having followed me into the sanctuary of my awakened state. Fear was the skeleton key — the master — it fits all the locks. Anger was only a secondary emotion and followed fear like the cart follows the horse.
I would do well to remember it.
The day was overcast and cool. Still plagued by the mood of the nightmare, I pulled myself from my bed and retrieved my bathrobe that hung on the closet door.
Shrugging into the plush red fibers, I stepped into the ensuite and considered the dream — two doors, side by side; one led to my walk-in closet and the other to my ensuite bath.
“That was the room in the dream — not an attic at all,” I said into the bathroom. See, I reasoned. It was nothing.
But then that was a lie. To deny it would be my undoing.
I washed my hands and loaded my toothbrush with toothpaste. It was just my bedroom, the one where I routinely selected the clothing I would wear that day, the other where I painted on the face I presented to the world.
Fear and anger; anger and fear.
I brushed it off and continued my morning ritual.
I chuckled, but it sounded hollow and forced to my ears. The tremor in my hand told the truth. This one was hard to shake off. That much was a given, I concluded.
Little bits and bobs of your day tossed together in a fractured memory salad. Bizarre, sure, but hardly worth getting in a snit about. You will be right as rain after coffee.
My hand working the toothbrush froze with a look in the mirror.
I leaned away from the sink and looked back toward the pristine white sheets of my bed. A streak of blood marred my pillowcase. It, no doubt, came from the narrow cut on my cheek — fresh and still oozing a small amount of blood. My hand trembled, and I dropped the toothbrush in the sink.
As I washed the cut and applied an antibacterial cream, I revisited my best moments — my favorite lifetime memories.
This was ridiculous — I was being ridiculous. I was in more danger of deadly tooth decay than the attack of nightmare demons as I brushed my teeth. Far too much energy this was, all over a silly nightmare — albeit a vivid one. The scratch was, of course, self-inflicted.
But how? the persistent inner voice asked.
Not important, I reasoned. What was important? Well, for starters, the fact that my mind insinuated that scratch into my dream.
Of course. Of course. My two minds were in agreement.
Yet, my hands trembled as I pulled the blood-stained pillowcase free and set it to soak in the bathroom. They continued as I completed my morning routine and headed for the front door.
With hands still shaking, I opened the car door and got behind the wheel. When I finally inserted the key in the car ignition somewhere around the third attempt, something on the passenger seat caught my eye. A small, sterling silver ring with an abalone inset glinted in the light.
I stared a moment before I picked it up and put it on my pinky finger.
Was it possible one bad dream could send you spiraling into madness?
I had but one weapon. Seriously, I needed to get a grip. The ring was there yesterday, and I must have forgotten about it. That is why it was in the dream.
I put the car in reverse and placed my hand on the back of the passenger seat to back down the driveway.
The vision in the back seat froze me in place. In that moment of staring that seemed to stretch on into oblivion, a high keening issued from my constricted throat. In the same clothing worn yesterday, my form was in the backseat, the steady rise and fall of my chest visible under my jacket. My left hand, or hers, was tucked under my, or her, head in peaceful slumber. The small silver ring with the abalone inset was visible on her left pinky finger.
Was it possible for one bad dream to send you spiraling into madness? What now?
Fear was the skeleton key — the master — it fits all the locks. There was, according to FDR, nothing to fear but fear itself.
Focus.
I backed down the driveway.
