A Tear in the Veil Read online

  There is machinery of varying shapes and sizes installed at irregular spots across it connected by cables and pipes and conduits. Some look mechanical and almost antique while others could be electronic.

  Felix feels a presence to his left and realizes there is something warm in his hand. He looks down.

  He comes to on a gurney in the back of an ambulance. His head is still pounding but his nausea is mostly gone. Paramedics are checking his vitals and gingerly examining his injuries.

  Audrey is sitting to his side explaining what happened but he can’t make out the words. She looks at Felix and gets emotional.

  The distortions start again, her face burning and collapsing inward and apart and just the sound of the shrill, pounding voice turns Felix’s stomach again. He dry heaves hard. The paramedic gently presses him back down onto the gurney and he loses consciousness again.

  There’s another hand in his. He looks up to see whose it is but it’s too blurry and dark. It’s a woman but the face has no definition. All he can make out is that her mouth is moving like she’s speaking but he can’t hear what she’s saying over the deafening howl of the dome chamber.

  Felix comes to again with a cute nurse pressing him down and a pretty doctor on top of him. Kinky, quips the distant part.

  The doctor has her foot wedged in Felix’s armpit. She aligns his arm and pulls up hard then down, wrenching it back into place with an audible, sickening pop.

  Ouch.

  He lets out a guttural moan and slips away again.

  She won’t stop speaking but he still can’t hear her.

  Something on the cold, dark rubber floor catches Felix’s eye and he looks down. Sitting at their feet is what has to be a cat. It’s almost totally dark in the chamber now but he can make out the shape. It must be bright white. Glowing, even.

  As his eyes adjust, he sees the cat’s eyes more clearly. They are entirely black and reflective, like obsidian. With no light left in the room, Felix can’t help wondering what they are reflecting off of.

  The cat cocks its head and examines Felix.

  Everything goes black.

  6

  Felix wakes up slowly in a recovery room bed. His left arm is in a padded, secured sling and his face and left eye ache. His ankle is wrapped but doesn’t hurt. They probably have him on painkillers.

  He looks around.

  A young woman in scrubs sits in a chair across from the foot of his bed. She’s reading a tabloid. “Tom Cruise has two penises and a mind control beam! There’s a unicorn boy trapped in a well! The Earth is actually hollow and space alien exiles live on the inside surface!”

  Bullshit.

  Audrey sits in a chair next to the bed reading a book. It’s her first printing German language copy of Züricher Novellen by Gottfried Keller. She must have re-read that five times since he’s known her. At least the Ursula novella in it. He’s not sure she even reads the others.

  He asked what it was about one time and she said a soldier and a farm girl. Felix asked why she liked it so much. She said it was hard to explain and got this misty eyed look. She said that the setting and style took her to another place.

  Audrey notices Felix is awake. She sets the book down on an end table.

  “Hey,” Audrey says then smiles, happy but cautious.

  “H-hey.” Felix’s voice is hoarse. His throat is dry. He rubs his throat with his right hand. Audrey pours him some water from a rectangular pitcher and hands him the cup. He drinks it all. She takes it back and refills it. He shakes his head and she sets it down.

  “They say you’ll be fine. Just need to relax and heal. How did you sleep?”

  “Alright. Had the worst dream. Well, weird at least. About like a big metal dome room.”

  Audrey blinks and furrows her brow. “Weird.”

  “My shoulder hurts, Audrey.”

  “Yeah… that’s to be expected, y’know? They said you shouldn’t wear that sling too long. Don’t want your tendons to atrophy or whatever.”

  Felix nods toward the attendant reading her tabloid. In a hushed tone he says, “Who’s that?”

  “She’s here to watch you.”

  “Watch me what?”

  Audrey scrunches her face a bit then seems to catch herself and actively relax it.

  “They’ve had someone watch you since they brought you to this room.”

  “Why?”

  “Why?!” The shimmering black starts as pinpoints in her pupils and pulses quickly outward, overtaking her eyes almost immediately.

  “SO YOU DON’T TRY TO FUCKING OFF YOURSELF AGAIN, FELIX!”

  The warping, glitching, translucent cutout mess pours out of her eyes until it twists and burns like striking a huge wood match or road flare of impossible blue-black flame and light.

  Felix draws back in the bed. A twinge of sharp pain in his head makes him cringe. He feels nauseated but not as bad as before.

  The young woman looks up from her tabloid. He expects her to shriek and run out of the room. She doesn’t seem to notice it at all. She actually looks at him like he’s crazy then her expression changes to one of compassion or pity or something when she looks at Audrey.

  Oh yeah, she’s the one stuck with me!

  Felix can’t believe this. He looks back at Audrey.

  She cries quietly into her hands. The effects of the distortions are lessened with her eyes covered but it’s still cutting through her head and hands and the glow pours out from between her fingers like she’s covering a big flashlight with them. Through a prism cutout, he can see one of her black eyes through her translucent finger bones and eyelid.

  Audrey lifts her head and locks eyes with Felix. The iridescent black of those eyes piercing into his own sends that deep chill through him again. They’re like shark eyes. Empty. Cold. You wouldn’t think they could see anything but they see just fine. He’s horrified but can’t look away.

  “WHAT DID I DO? WHY WOULD… HOW COULD YOU DO THAT? THAT’S ALL I NEED.”

  The windows and long light bulbs in the ceiling panel vibrate hard with each syllable but Felix can’t think of anything but those eyes.

  Why can’t that stupid girl see or hear this?

  Wait…

  Maybe I’m going crazy like my dad. Is this in my head?

  “Audrey, I didn’t–”

  There’s a strong but gentle knocking outside the door of the open room. Audrey snaps her attention to the door.

  An attractive middle-aged man enters wearing an expensive, tailored suit and carrying a medical chart. Actually, other than not young and not old, Felix can’t easily peg down his general age. He has a shock of grey hair coiffed just enough to look casual yet professional and some wrinkles around his pale blue eyes which make him look distinguished more than anything else.

  Somewhere between forty something and a very fit seventy?

  When Audrey sees this man, the distortions change from one indescribable color to another and retreat back into her eyes. He pauses upon seeing her. He nods at her and she returns it.

  Is that recognition or familiarity? They must have met for a consult while I was under. Audrey likes mature, charismatic types. I’m not really much of either. Another thing she seemed to be okay with. Dance and etiquette lessons it is then.

  The man speaks smoothly and pleasantly with a German or maybe Swiss accent.

  “Hello, Felix. I am Doctor Fleischmann. I am a psychiatrist and psychotherapist.”

  Felix says nothing.

  Audrey stands and extends her hand and Fleischmann gently shakes it. A little too gently for Felix’s liking and he thinks he sees the doctor subtly caress her hand as she takes it out of his. For just a moment, Fleischmann looks at Audrey like she wouldn’t see his face for three hours.

  Like he’d just work on that sherbet push pop until he couldn’t feel his jaw then go all Kama Sutra on her sweet ass.

  I’m right fucking here!

  That’s obviously my job. What a slimy prick. Or am I just bei
ng sensitive? Projecting? Maybe he’s just like that. Europeans can be that way, right?

  Audrey sits back down. Felix just hopes she doesn’t slide off the chair and hit her head or something.

  Doctor Fleischmann extends his hand to Felix and smiles ever so pleasantly. Felix weakly raises his hand and the good doctor shakes it firmly. A little too firmly this time. He feels his metacarpals grind together just a bit before the doctor releases his hand.

  “Do you mind if I sit, Felix?”

  Felix shakes his head. Doctor Fleischmann pulls up a chair and flips the thin metal cover of the chart he’s holding over to the back.

  “Now, just to check a few things. Your full name?”

  “Felix Andreas Brewer.”

  “Your address?”

  “Six forty-two Greenwich Street.”

  “Mmhmm. Your date of birth?”

  “January seventh, nineteen eighty-five.”

  “And what year is it currently?”

  Felix studies the doctor’s face then says, “Two thousand eleven.”

  “Great. Thank you. Now, do you understand why I’m here, Felix?”

  Quit saying my name, is what Felix thinks.

  What he says is, “I guess because I… I jumped out of Audrey’s car.”

  Felix looks at Audrey. The pinpoints are back and pulsing in her pupils but she’s trying to stay calm.

  “Audrey’s quickly moving car?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And why did you do that?” Doctor Fleischmann asks, still pleasant and with that incredible calmness that screams “I am so objective right now.”

  The shimmering black is slowly growing in Audrey’s eyes but still only pulsing gently.

  She must be meditating. She does that sometimes to gather herself.

  Doctor Fleischmann studies Felix’s face.

  “Audrey? It was Audrey, correct? Could you please step out for a bit?”

  “If you think that would help.”

  “Yes, I believe so. Thank you so much.”

  Audrey gently squeezes Felix’s left hand, careful not to move his slung arm. Still holding Felix’s hand, she turns and gives the doctor a look Felix can’t really decipher.

  Cautious? Protective?

  The doctor nods and blinks slowly and deliberately, seeming to respond to the non-verbal question or statement. Satisfied, she stands, takes her book, and leaves the room.

  Doctor Fleischmann turns toward the young woman reading her tabloid.

  “You may leave as well.”

  She keeps reading. He loses his air of soothing tranquility for a moment when he notices she isn’t paying attention to him.

  “Excuse me!” the doctor exclaims with the disdain of a king scolding a commoner. The young woman looks up, visibly startled.

  “Yes. Please leave.”

  She looks too confused and embarrassed to be angry as she gets up and hurries out into the hallway.

  Doctor Fleischmann turns back to Felix, cool and calm once again. “Better? Now, why did you jump out of Audrey’s car? She seems to be quite pleasant.”

  Felix isn’t thrilled with how much emphasis the doctor not-so-subtly places on the ‘quite’ but he lets it slide. He leans over and tries to make sure Audrey isn’t near the door.

  “You didn’t see that? Her face?” Felix asks cautiously.

  “Her face? Was there something wrong with it?” The doctor is subtly but closely observing Felix’s reactions now.

  “You would have noticed.”

  “Something strange?”

  “You could say that.”

  “So, you jumped out of Audrey’s car because something about her face troubled you that much?”

  Felix knows where this is going but he figures it was settled before the doctor walked in anyway.

  My asphalt bodysurfing experiment was pretty out there.

  Might as well be honest.

  “Yes. But I didn’t try to kill myself, if that makes any difference. I was just confused and… scared.”

  “Scared. Of Audrey? Her face frightened you enough to make you throw yourself out of her car?”

  How many ways is he going to rephrase the same basic question? Must be a trick of the trade.

  “Yes.”

  Doctor Fleischmann studies Felix’s eyes to be sure, then writes a few things on the medical chart and flips it closed.

  “Alright, Felix. I feel that we have a great deal more talking to do on this subject. I will have you transferred to my facility for a few days so that we may do that and so that you can get some more rest. How does that sound?”

  “Is it up to me?”

  “Is your health and well-being important to you?” the doctor asks pleasantly and smiles at Felix.

  “I guess that sounds great then.”

  “Wonderful. I’ll have your transfer arranged.”

  7

  Felix watches the view out through the tinted rear windows of an ambulance. There’s a dirty, one-eyed Jack in the Box antenna ball on a car behind them that sometimes gets close enough to the ambulance to smile at him. Mostly at stop signs and lights. Then they start going and it tries to keep up and catch them again.

  His shoulder aches a bit.

  Hopefully they’ll give me some more painkillers at the facility.

  He looks over at the EMT who’s in back with him. The EMT notices and smiles at him, comforting. Felix looks back out the rear windows.

  The doctor explained that he has to be transferred in an ambulance for legal reasons but it seems like overkill to Felix; especially now that he’s strapped securely on a gurney.

  Of course, he’s the only one who knows he isn’t a danger to himself. Not the way they think at least. In the same situation, most people in that car would do the same, right? Maybe not.

  If I’m crazy, how did it come on so suddenly?

  The top half of the antenna ball pops up repeatedly, trying desperately to catch them and beam at Felix like an ecstatic Cyclops.

  This person tailgates like a bitch but at least it gives me some company.

  Felix remembers a chapter he read in Psychology class in high school about schizophrenia. That’s what his grandparents said his dad must have had, so he paid attention. In the chapter, it basically said that schizophrenia is partly hereditary but usually needs triggers to blossom. Until then, it hadn’t occurred to him that it could negatively affect his life again in a different way.

  Delightful revelation, that.

  The only trigger it listed that ever worried him was the drug use stuff because he’d already done his share by junior year when he read that. Psychedelics were his favorite and the book said those seemed to work just fine as triggers. Just fine. That was a while ago, though. For acid, definitely a while. He still ‘shrooms once in a while with Audrey, H, and K, but only a few grams usually. Kid stuff. And it’s been over a year since they’ve done that.

  Maybe it was a flashback? Like little molecules of acid in my spine detached somehow and just wrecked me? But I never saw anything like that even when I was on multiple whole doses. And this was so real.

  Probably just crazy then.

  Felix imagines Fleischmann’s facility as a scary, dilapidated horror palace filled with dungeons and deranged, drooling psychopaths. He just hopes the huge, no-neck orderlies and evil nurses don’t torture the patients at night.

  How far away is this place?

  He can tell they’re heading south from the time of day and the angle of the shadows on the antenna ball when it’s visible.

  Thank you, drawing classes. Not to mention we never crossed a bridge. We’d have to be on the coast highway at this point.

  “Excuse me,” Felix says to the EMT in the back with him.

  The EMT looks up from a chart. His ID badge reads “Tim.”

  “What’s up, man?” asks Tim.

  “Where is this facility?”

  “We had to look that up ourselves, actually. It’s pretty specialized, I guess. You a de
pressed superhero or spy or something?”

  Felix chuckles softly and says, “Nope.”

  “It’s in Linda Mar below Pacifica. In the south part near some pretty dense woods. Should be scenic.”

  “Can’t wait,” Felix says.

  “Everybody could use a little vacation now and then, you know? Just take it easy, man.” “Yeah, I will.”

  I’m glad we had this little talk, Tim.

  The EMTs roll the gurney out of the ambulance and the legs slide down and lock in place. The driver closes the rear doors and Tim hooks a metal crutch on the side of the gurney and steers Felix toward the main facility. The driver checks some charts as he follows.

  The facility is two-levels high and half a city block wide at this end. The outer surface of the building is made up of seamless mirrored paneling. Simple. Stylish. Elegant even. A vertical array of satellite dishes juts from the roof. They have more antennas per dish than Felix remembers seeing before and they are a distinct ovoid shape.

  Must be for internet and lots of TVs for the patients? Pretty high-tech for a mental hospital.

  Past the large, squat building Felix sees the woods the EMT mentioned. He could see trees lining the road they drove up out of the ambulance windows and the parking lot is lined with woods but they do get much denser just south of the facility.

  The EMTs wheel Felix onto the sidewalk and toward a set of automatic mirrored doors. Backlit white letters installed flush in the mirrored wall near the doors read “FLEISCHMANN MEDICAL CENTER”. Felix looks away after reading it due to his reflection being pretty much inescapable this close to the building.

  The doors slide open smoothly, disappearing into the door frame on each side. That way, the left door never covers the FMC letters. Slick.

  Tim rolls Felix into the facility lobby and eases to a stop near a large, tasteful reception desk. The whole lobby is tasteful. Minimal and clean. Expensive leather chairs line dark coffee tables in waiting areas which flank both sides of the entry walkway.

  The driver approaches the desk and speaks with a lovely young redhead. She eyes Felix warmly as she gives the EMT directions. The driver walks back to Felix and Tim and points to their right.