Rooted to the rug. Move!
I move. Stumble. Fight
to reach the door. Breathe.
Can’t. No oxygen. Vacuum.
Door. Almost there. Reach.
Something. Pulling. Tugging
me backward. Scream! Can’t.
No air. Need air. Hands. Clawing.
Hands? Can’t be. There’s no one here
but me. Knob. Reach. Turn the knob . . .
The Hands
Let go suddenly, and when the door
jerks open, I almost fall, face forward
against the far wall. “Goddamn it!”
A brew of emotions
simmers inside.
Fear.
Anger.
Curiosity.
Hands? (Claws.) No
way. My room is empty,
right? The words on my computer,
written by a dream. Right?
Spooked or not, I turn around,
suck in breath.
Two steps, I’m at my door.
I switch on the overhead
light. It floods
the room with stark
white and nothing
is amiss. No hands.
No red glow. No
words. Just a blank
black screen. I reach
for the power button, erupt
a cold sweat beneath the hair,
lifting on the back
of my neck.
The computer
is already off.
Mom Screams
From the kitchen,
Chloe! Damn it! Dinner!
“I’m coming!” I insist
loudly, but have to take
several deep breaths and
dig my fingers painfully
into the opposite biceps
so I can try to quit shaking.
Mom would want to know
what’s wrong, and what could
I tell her? That my Mac seems
to have a mind of its own?
Okay, none of that crap
happened. It all rolled straight
out of my burial-fueled
nightmares. I stuff it inside,
go to share Mom’s table
and make her happy,
though I’m not sure why.
She should feel as miserable
as I do. But no. She’s humming.
Singing some old eighties
crap under her breath.
When she hears my footsteps
scratching the floor,
she turns, grinning
like some demonic clown.
Hope you’re hungry.
I bought too much Chinese.
The sweet and sour is gag me
sweet, and the chow mein
noodles remind me of worms,
but I stuff them into my mouth,
try not to choke when they squiggle
down, and hope Mom’s post
bowling, carb craving appetite
keeps her swallowing
instead of talking. Right.
Like that’s going to happen.
Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah,
blah. What did you do today?
I could give her my usual,
“Nothing much,” but then
she’d feel the need to pry
information from me. I
shove another forkful
into my mouth, chew slowly
while I consider a lie.
Screw that. Too much
work. I shrug. “Went to
a funeral. Burial, actually.”
She cocks her head, curious.
You don’t say. Like, whose?
“Just this boy I know—knew.
And to save you the trouble
of asking, he committed
suicide. Hung himself
until dead.” Shock value.
All she says is, Oh. Then, after
some thought, Are you okay?
My shoulders jerk up and down
again. “Sure. I didn’t know him
all that well. Just weird. One
second he’s here. The next,
poof. Wonder where he went.”
If he took his own life, he went
to Hell. You should know that.
I’m sure that’s what her pastor
would say, but Cam pretty much
convinced me there’s no such
place as Hell, or Heaven, either.
“You really believe that, huh?”
Well, of course. Don’t you?
She stares like I’m a stranger.
“I don’t know. I just wish
I could be sure that there really
is something more.” I think
for a minute. “Hey, if I died,
where do you think I’d go?”
Zero hesitation. You’re a good
girl. Good girls go to Heaven.
Am I good? I suppose for
the most part I am. I don’t
cause a whole lot of trouble.
Treat my mom okay, go to
church with her on Sunday.
But sometimes I think dark
thoughts, and that was especially
true when I connected with Cam.
Does simply discussing suicide
lock you out of the Pearly Gates?
I wish the definitive afterworld
manual wasn’t written thousands
of years ago. Surely the rules
have changed by now. Or maybe,
like Cam said, all that garbage
was made up by men thirsty
for power. Mom offers two
fortune cookies, allows me to
choose first. As I unwrap mine,
she opens hers and reads,
You will receive good news
from a long distance.
“Hope it’s money,” I joke,
then immediately turn serious
when I crack open my cookie.
A broken promise leads
to an unexpected encounter.
Goose Bumps Erupt
“I’ve got a headache,”
I claim, and it’s the truth.
“I’d better go lie down.”
Take an ibuprofen right away.
You don’t want that to turn
into one of your nasty migraines.
I get them sometimes, usually
induced by stress. “Will do.”
But there’s something better
than ibuprofen stashed
in my underwear drawer.
I return to my room, where
Valium, Percocet, and Wild
Turkey lay in wait. I saved
them up for over a month,
sneaking Mom’s painkillers
here and there to augment
my personal collection—
some bought at school, some
traded for, some prescribed
by my personal therapist, Paula.
Okay, I have a few issues,
including anxiety and panic
attacks, as well as intermittent
insomnia. I do want to sleep
tonight, so I pop a single Valium,
plus a Percocet, wash them down
with a small glass of whiskey.
I don’t want to get sick, just
messed up enough to tumble
straight down into a darkness
dreams dare not invade.
It doesn’t take long. I’m sinking . . .
I Hear
The door knob turn, lift my eyelids
as far as they’ll go, try to discern
who has crossed the threshold and
owns the footsteps creaking the floor.
I see nothing. I try to sit up, but have sunk
so low into my bed that it holds me
in place. “Who’s there?” It’s a lame
attempt to exhale words. They lodg
e
in my throat, a huge wad of fear-flavored
gum. Closer. Whoever it is has almost
reached my side. Still, I can’t see him.
I’ve no clue how I know the intruder
is male, but I sense he has something
unsavory in mind as he moves into place,
and now the mattress depresses beside
me. He wants me. Wants to touch
my nakedness, sleep-warm beneath
the covers. “N-n-no.” It’s a soundless
stutter, and the invisible he is weighting
me, pushing down on my body. I know
what he wants and try to scream, “Help,”
but all that escapes is a breathy hiss.
He buzzes in my ear, Don’t fight.
It won’t hurt. Imagine the rush
when our energies collide. You broke
your promise, but I’m patient, and
since you wouldn’t come with me,
I decided to visit you. Just relax.
Cam. No, impossible. But the sheet
lifts, the pressure shifts, an icy hot
wave splashes against my skin, and
still I’m deep-mired in quicksand.
Our joining has no single entry
point. It’s like every pore opens
up, inviting the tiny electric pricks
that sizzle, close to pain, and tingle,
arousing the private places no one
but I have touched. Though it only
lasts a moment or two (who could
take more?), the apex is spectacular.
And with it, the weight disappears.
I’m alone in my bed, the force field
has disintegrated, and I can move
again. Breathe again. Talk again.
“Cam? Was that you? Where are you?
Please tell me where you’ve gone.”
I lie still for a moment, hoping to hear
his voice, but the answer does not
come as a whisper. It’s a single word,
lettered red, on the screen of my computer.
Correction. My powered-down computer:
Paradise.
I Slap Myself
Into the present.
Sit up to watch Paradise
fade into the ether.
Letter by letter.
I take deep breaths
to counter the anxious
tremors. It was a dream.
Not.
It was a hallucination
care of last night’s
self-indulgence.
Not.
It was a product
of my overactive
subconscious brain.
Maybe.
As my heart rate slows
from wind sprint to crawl,
a phrase surfaces.
Sleep paralysis.
According to Paula,
it’s when you wake up
while your brain’s caught.
Mid-REM sleep.
Mid-dream. So you’re half
here, half wherever, and
your nightmare visitor
isn’t real at all.
The Experience
Isn’t completely foreign.
Something similar happened
not very long after Daddy drowned,
trying to save a toddler from a car
overturned in a swollen stream.
When I heard the door open,
I thought it was he, come to say
goodbye. That time, though,
I viewed the scene as if looking
up through water, and there was
no voiced communication,
nor low voltage electricity.
Still, some unidentified weight
did land heavily on top of me,
crushing every emotion but terror.
When I confessed this to Paula,
she gave me the lowdown on
sleep paralysis. “But it seemed
so real,” I argued, half disbelieving
her and half relieved it probably
wasn’t Daddy’s ghost after all.
Of course it seemed real. Many
people think they’re being attacked
by an evil spirit. But surely your dad
wouldn’t want to scare you like that?
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
“Sometimes he was really mean.
Sometimes I thought he liked
to be mean, like it helped him
forget the bad stuff at work.”
Paula nodded. A cop sees a lot
of terrible things. Makes sense
he might take it out on his family.
But I’m betting he was a good man
at heart and that he loved you a lot.
She Convinced Me
It was all in my head—
a byproduct of my twelve-
year-old psyche trying
to process my father’s death.
I haven’t had another episode
since. Not until this morning,
that is. Yes, they were akin.
But the differences were notable.
I pull myself out from under
the covers, into morning cool.
Mom will come knocking
soon, insisting I go to services.
Funny, because she was not
a believer until after Daddy died.
It didn’t take sleep paralysis
to send her looking for answers.
Too bad she found them where
she did, because her so-called
church seems more like a den
of thieves to me. It’s cultish—
all about hellfire, brimstone,
and speaking in tongues, as if
anyone could actually decipher
exactly what such babble means.
But it brings Mom comfort,
so who am I to tell her I think
Pastor Smyth is full of crap
and living large off the generous
gifts of his faithful followers?
Regardless, I exit my bed,
reach into my closet for a skirt
(women in this congregation
do not wear pants), head
for the shower. I pause at
the mirror, startled by what’s
reflected there. Head to toe,
my skin is red, as if sunburned.
It wasn’t that way last night.
and know they must be related.
Now, as I stand here staring,
a series of small bruises
shaped like fingerprints
appear all over my body,
most concentrated on
my inner thighs, breasts,
and circling my neck.
I blink disbelief. Once.
Twice. They’ve disappeared.
I hear Mom in the hallway,
lock the door, hide behind
the shower curtain, adjust
the water temp to cool.
By the time I finish and
towel dry, my skin has
faded from red to pink.
I cover it all anyway, with
a demure baby blue blouse
and floral patterned skirt
that stretches to my ankles.
Plus I keep my makeup
barely there, nothing
dramatic to disturb Pastor
Smyth or draw his attention.
Nope. Please, just let me
sit in the back, tuning out,
trying not to think about
what yesterday might mean.
Somehow I Manage
To mostly do exactly that.
Good thing. Pastor Smyth
is wordy today. A few key
phrases do not escape
my attention, however:
darkness wrestles light
key to the kingdom
doorway to everlasting life.
My own thoughts turn
to Cam, of course, but also
to Erica and Daddy, all three
moldering in the ground.
Did any of them discover
the doorway, let alone the key
to some Disneyland in the sky?
The question has barely coalesced
inside my head when I notice
the vibration of my cell, which
is sleeping in my bag. I reach
for it with a trembling hand,
extract it stealthily so no one—
especially not Mom—notices.
I move it carefully into my lap
and words swim out of the dark
screen. Paradise is better
than Disneyland. No tickets
required, and no key, either.
Your friend’s here. Your daddy, too.
I close my eyes. (Why did I
look, anyway?) When I reopen
them, the text has faded away,
away and the screen is black
again. Black, because I turned
off my phone before services,
like I always do. “Please leave
me alone,” I beg silently,
just as Pastor Smyth winds up
the benediction and everyone
rises for the coffee hour. My heart
races, but Mom doesn’t notice
that either as she goes to talk
to Daddy’s old patrol car partner,
Mark. She stands very close—
maybe too close for church—and
as always when I see them
together, a hot shot of anger zaps
my nerves. Yes, it’s been five
years since Daddy died. Plenty
of time for Mom to hook up
with another guy. But why Mark?
That feels totally wrong, and it’s
becoming ever more obvious
that they’ve bonded, both here
and well beyond church, which
is probably where it started.
Mark, in fact, was the one who
convinced Mom that this peculiar
brand of born-again believing
is her entry code to the Pearly
Gates. Arm in arm, they approach
Pastor Smyth, who grins broadly
at their news. Now all three turn to
stare at me. Whatever they’re selling,
I damn sure don’t want any.
As If I Have a Choice
Mom kisses Mark softly
on the cheek and as she starts
in my direction, my phone
vibrates. Like an idiot moth,
drawn to a smoking lantern,
I peek at the text. Snake oil.
My ghost has a sense of humor.
Wait. My. Ghost. I just thought
that. Does that make him real?
I suspect my cell holds an answer
to the unvoiced question, but I
don’t try to look because Mom
is standing in front of me. Mark
is coming over to watch the game,
and he’s bringing pizza for dinner.
Hope you don’t mind. We’ve got