Episode 9 - A Vessel to be Filled

The Narrator:
he is becoming more manic And here we are again dear listener, welcome back to Tales Beneath the Surface, I wonder what we’ll uncover this time around the merry-go-round we call life. I’ve been pondering these last few days, pondering and wondering and ruminating and cogitating and ambulating and contemplating over what has come before…what is still to come…I guess it’s the time of year! A New year, a new me and all that positive bollocks sigh I tell you the amount of resolutions I’ve made this year would fill a library! It’s going to be quite the job keeping track of all my various oaths, vows, obligations, pledges and contracts with strange cults… I jest. Still makes me wish I had a secretary with a little book to note it all down…I suppose there’s nothing stopping me expanding the team again, now that I’ve been left all alone, yes, some company would be fabulous. Of course I know I’ve got all of you but it’s hard not to feel lonely considering the delay between sending these out and receiving all your little notes in response, lovely though they all are. Things have been changing for me lately, beyond everything you’ve heard across the last few episodes. Yes, they really have, I’ve been…haunted, yes haunted, by deja vu. Wherever I go I’ve been there before, it’s all so uncomfortably familiar, and I know that just around the next corner someone’s waiting. They’re always there, just out of sight.

---

Ghosts of Soho

TOUR GUIDE:
Okay everyone, gather round, come closer. There are streets you can’t find no matter how hard you look. They shift in now and then as irregular as the night bus heading home in the freezing rain. We’ve all experienced that, right? Well, I’ve got a better knack than most at finding them. Too many misspent nights walking these cobbled streets trying to find something still open or a place that holds a bit of mystery, keeping it back and gifting out clumps to the lucky few who take the time to notice. If we’re lucky, and I checked the charts right, then we’ll see one today”

NARRATOR:
Malcolm heard all this standing on the corner of Old Compton and Frith Street smoking the first cigarette of the day.

MALCOLM:
internal Never heard a walking tour like that, the guide’s got chops, the team could learn a thing or two from him. Most interested I’ve been in ghosts since the ghost train back in Pitsea haha and what a time that was

NARRATOR:
He was a slouched man, shoulders rounded and angled forward, an “ice cream scoop hollow” cut out from his sunken chest with a paunch below, mounding by his waistline, dribbling out like chewing gum in the sun. His trousers were held up by a belt cutting into his hips’ hollow and 2 elastic braces carving train tracks over a set of fried egg tits. He was smoking vogues again, the narrow albino cylinder clamped between two jaundiced fingers, each topped with unevenly chewed nails. Smoke poured from his nostrils, the matched columns only broken by his hand returning the cigarette to his lips.

The crowd washed around him, tourists knotting in a riot of laughing and pointing and camera flashing setting the street in aspic ready to drool over back home. He barely noticed. His attention caught in the stuttering neon lights flashing around peep show curtains or highlighting the rubber coshes and face wraps displayed in every other window. He felt at home. A limpet clinging to the greasy underside of the of the city in the city. It felt organic, alive, even though there was nothing natural about the plastic pricks and pocket pussies strewn in every window display. Sure it had changed over the decade but for him, that’s what gave it the spark he treasured - anything staying still was dead, whether or not it still breathed. A flash brought him back, blinking.

MALCOLM:
internal Why take a picture of that? Of this street?! You’ll lose everything that makes it worth anything, everything that makes it live

NARRATOR:
He almost said it out loud but caught himself, shaking his head and smiling at the folly. He never understood the crowds taking pictures and carrying them away to revisit somewhere else, somewhere flattened, dry and dead.

MALCOLM:
internal Rivers yeah maybe, mountains definitely, makes sense to catch that, get the framing right and you’ve got something to marvel at when you’re back home surrounded by tarmac and concrete. But the city?! And this part of it?! I’ll never get it, the smell and the sound and the movement, the life’s the only thing….. well, for me at least. Each to their own laughs softly to himself

NARRATOR:
There was a rhythm to the street traffic. Through unfocused eyes it looked like the rise and fall of a ribcage as breath cycled in and out. The clumps of tourists breaking the flow were like coughing fits or hair catching at the back of your throat. He recognised it though, he could see the ebb and flow washing around him as he stood there, still. People at work rushing in and out of cafe’s with paper cups and bags in their hands. Others sat at tables with porcelain saucers and wafer thin mugs clinking with the stirring of metal spoons and occasional faces lit orange surrounded by the drawn down mouths of those who found the smell and smoke unpleasant.

NARRATOR:
Malcolm’s eyes wandered around the street scene, sliding smoothly across the outfits, blurring them all into a smear of city life. Then something caught, demanding his attention like a stone in his shoe. On the opposite pavement stood a man. There wasn’t anything marking him out apart from a tired looking suit that would have been the height of fashion decades before. He had a normal looking face with mousy brown hair at that “in between” length, just kissing the tops of his ears, a length of velvet rope looped round one arm.

MALCOLM:
internal Do I know him? Nah, nah no way…what’s he doing? Just waiting…well free country, not my shop, not my pavement

NARRATOR:
No, there was nothing, but every time Malcolm looked away his eyes found themselves back on the man. It made no sense, he was just standing there. The neon light flickered again as a cocktail waiter walked past, sharp in a pressed white shirt, black apron and trousers. He was gone around the corner as soon as Malcolm saw him but hanging in the air was an imprint, a translucent shadow of the man, dragged out like a film reel, visible in the neon flicker. It disappeared with the last flash, scattering a silhouette of twinkling embers that rapidly dispersed. The man standing across from him caught some on his hand, tasted it and smiled as his eyes flashed rainbows and, with his business complete, abruptly stepped off the curb and away down the street. Malcolm stood there frozen, unable to credit what he’d seen. By the time he scrambled to catch up, the man had disappeared.

MALCOLM:
muttered He must have slipped into a shop..or a cab…or som
ething…just continuing with his day….what was that in the air though..that light…must’ve been a flashback…yeah…it’s got to be - I guess I did hit hard over the weekend weak laugh

NARRATOR:
Malcolm lit another cigarette, bic flame trembling, unable to shake the suspicion he’d seen something all too real. He took two long pulls on the walk back round to the shopfront’s flickering display. Nothing jumped out. It looked the same as it had every other smoke, fading into walls either side. He didn’t know what they sold or even what was written out in shaped light. Still nothing. As he leant forward to read the neon a woman walked past dragging his eyes along after. Her heels added to her height as she towered over the street, striding along with purpose. Then a flicker caught in the corner of his eye and he jumped back, shocked.

There were two traces hanging in front of him. Him and her. His own shadow falling back to where he crouched as hers slid past before both collapsed throwing sparks. Malcolm fell forward, both arms outstretched, fingers clutching at the glimmer in the air. The ground met his chin as it bounced off the pavement, the sudden snap of his teeth bursting blood from his lip and filling his mouth. Through teary eyes his hand glittered.

PASSERS-BY:
“Are you alright, that was quite a fall, why didn’t you catch yourself?”

NARRATOR:
Malcolm opened his mouth to reply and coughed scarlet across the tarmac.

PASSERS-BY:
“Jesus, you fucked yourself up good there mate, are you alright aside see if there’s an ambulance crew or copper nearby, hey big man help me get him up’

SASHA:
Blyat sigh Give me your hand

NARRATOR:
Hearing this Malcolm struggled to his feet, keeping his dusty hand clear from the floor and the hands suddenly outstretched and grasping him. He stood there buffeted by care and concern, words stumbling out as he tried to make his escape.

SASHA:
Let me see your face

MALCOLM:
No really I’m quite alright, really I am, just bit the inside of my cheek is all, you know how mouths can bleed

SASHA:
One. Look.

MALCOLM:
Fine, fine, happy now

NARRATOR:
He stammered as he rolled a tooth into the gap between his cheek and molar, gagging as he swallowed back a shot of blood.

SASHA:
Yes, wait, you should go home and cleanse your hands and face

MALCOLM:
Haaaha yeah sure aside weirdo

SASHA:
walking away Your funeral

PASSERS-BY:
“I did a St John’s course, should be able to tell if he’s concussed”

MALCOLM:
I’m fine, honestly, I live just around the corner, I can clean myself up

PASSERS-BY:
“You sure mate? You’re looking a little wobbly there”

MALCOLM:
It’s just the shock, bit of a surprise suddenly finding myself on the floor, haaha, really I’m fine, thank you so much for your concern.

PASSERS-BY:
“At least let me walk you back to your place, see you to the door, more for my peace of mind than anything, you mind taking his other arm”

NARRATOR:
Malcolm accepted the arm that was clamped around his, keeping his hand clear of the woman helping him across the road. It took a moment to reassure her that there weren’t too many stairs and no, she didn’t need to see him up and yes, he knew the emergency number and yes he would have it up and loaded on his phone, yes, yes look here it is just in case he collapsed and needed rescuing upstairs, yes his phone had audio recognition and it was on see? Thank you again, I can’t thank you enough, really thank you, if I see you again I’ll stand you a drink haaha

The door closed and Malcolm wasn’t even sure what he’d said to get the people on the street to let him go free. He rushed up the stairs, tripping over his feet while his eyes were fixed on the opalescent dust speckling one arm, his free hand clutching his keys then ramming them home, his shoulder knocking the door hard into the adjoining wall. Without feeling his feet, he was in his lounge, sat back in a deep armchair holding his arm up to the light. Its cover glistened like snail tracks, almost one with his skin, a soap bubble glaze trailing behind him all the way out the door. He brought it close and sniffed, nothing.

MALCOLM:
internal : Well, I’ve licked worse for less

NARRATOR:
Before the thought was over his tongue whipped out and slicked up a hand span of crust. It hit his tongue like battery acid, sharp petroleum fumes rolling down the back of his throat and out his nostrils layered over with creme de mure. The taste was incredible, a static shock paired with a bramble cocktail, forcing his eyes shut in teary disbelief. He gasped out a breath that scalded the back of his teeth, cauterising the new hole as it burst past his lips. The room was spinning out beyond the crack in his tear-dewed eyelashes pulsing out bands of oil-slick light. His lids peeled back, bathing his optic nerve with photons, blasting his awareness out of the back of his skull.

music break - Psychedelic?

NARRATOR:
Time passed and Malcolm realised who he was again. The room looked much the same - though round the edges a tickle of movement breathed, washing like ripples on a pond minutes after the stone was thrown. He looked down at his arm with disbelief. The tongue mark was there, a broad lap through the white dust. It looked inert now, or less than (what) it was. Another needle-quick taste confirmed it, just dust now, sitting claggily on his tongue.

Malcolm barely made it to the sink before his stomach flipped its contents into the metal bowl. He sucked water from the tap and spat out red tinged bile, the forgotten tooth pinging off the side and knocking down the hole.

MALCOLM:
What the fuck was that, I need to get some more

NARRATOR:
He went over to the window, looking down at the street and the flickering neon dancing letters across his blood coagulating on the pavement. People passed by, kiting around his puddle, leaving his view clear. He stared down, rolling the memory around, seeing if any sharp edges snagged and caught, stroking his chin and the rumpled gizzard beneath. His slender fingers pinching the skin trying to knead out an answer. Then the neon flicker caught his eye.

MALCOLM:
distracted Hunh look at that, I could swear the letters are changing, when did they change the neon? Didn’t think that was possible, wait, how are they doing that?

confused There’s a T and an H, we’ve got an ER , whassat, nothing flashing now, wait here we go H and I, H - I oh Hi! Hi There! Wait..more coming..M..A..L…C..O
surprised that’s me?!

NARRATOR:
He laughed delightedly with passing joy, but it curdled, gradually at first, then all at once. Thick clotted fear iced his spine then fell in broken clods splashing down into belly acid. The man was standing there again. But this time he looked back and their eyes locked in. His stare screwed Malcolm to the floor while one raised arm jerked back and forth in a wave.

He heard a voice in his head as the man’s lips moved, like someone was standing behind him whispering in his ear.

OTHER MAN:
Hi there mate, you and me, well, we need to have a little chat. Now, why don’t you come down here and we’ll go for a lovely little walk, I’m sure I can show you some things you’ve never even dreamt of

NARRATOR:
Malcolm’s feet stamped out a running tattoo down the stairs and out the door while his mind was still trapped staring out that window into the hungry eyes of this impossible man his body was about to meet.

music break

OTHER MAN:
It’s such a shame you saw me earlier, such a shame, though I’m sure we can work something out to the benefit of both of us, yes. Now, now, no need to look so forlorn, you took a taste you’ve already reaped the benefits! Ach sigh ok, okay, you’re feeling quite calm, quite calm indeed, yes, now, shall we take a stroll? I think so, you’re still looking a mess, I know just the place to get a restorative and a dishcloth, we can have you trim and proper before we meet the Accountant, she’s ever so important but goodness, I wouldn’t want to look scruffy in front of Her, oh no, ho ho, certainly not.

NARRATOR:
Malcolm couldn’t speak. The man’s words rolled over him, cascading into his ears like the slurry sluiced out from a dam’s popped spillway. They ballooned in his skull, filling it up, crawling out of his nostrils and tangling in the hair then bubbling from his mouth when he opened it to breathe. He felt like he was choking. Nothing was getting in. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t…

OTHER MAN:
Oh dear, come on now, it’s not that bad just breathe

Gasp

OTHER MAN:
Ahhh, there you are, much better. You always hear that the lungs take care of themselves but, in my experience, it can be one of the first things you forget to do.

NARRATOR:
The man reached out and placed his hand on Malcolm’s arm then drew him in close. All he felt was pressure, evenly spread across his sleeve, then a whisper tickling past his lobes.

OTHER MAN:
Best I keep you close for what comes next, we’ve a crooked turn to take, don’t want a misstep and end up in between ho ho ho, no that wouldn’t do at all

NARRATOR:
They barrelled along the street, carving through walking couples without splitting their held hands or mussing the hair on their heads. Malcolm was swept along, kept at the man’s shoulder by the hand on his forearm. He supposed they might look like lovers walking arm in arm before panic rose again. They were aiming at the corner of a building, where the edge pointed at the curb skirting the crossroads, one of hundreds in this part of town. It looked sharper the faster they drove towards it, each brick a serrated edge joined with mortar, saw blades and sandpaper climbing into the sky. Malcolm watched as the brick drove towards his eye, time slowing down as every jagged point grew and grew and grew.

Then they were through.

OTHER MAN:
You wouldn’t believe how lucky you are to have me here, guiding you along, that junction leads to more than one alley and most of those you’d never wish to walk

NARRATOR:
The street was skewed. They rolled down it, Malcolm dragged along by the grip on his arm, shifting across the planes of cobblestones with no regard for gravity. His mind was reeling from what he saw, even the buildings loomed, staggered and multiplied with menace let alone the people brushing past either side of them. Figures flickered in and out splaying fans of asura limbs, fixing him with every pair of stares. He couldn’t make sense of it. Smiling faces and dancing arms surrounded him. There was a thread that ran between each person’s outfit, they were variations on a theme, but he couldn’t grasp it. The connection kept twisting away from him. It throbbed in the hollow behind his nose cartilage, pressuring his sinuses to leaping crystal clear pain. As he felt his head begin to crack apart he heard the sound of a door close and sweet relief rolled in.

OTHER MAN:
And here we are, yes, it can be a little…..overwhelming the first time, you’ll get used to it, we all do, eventually

MALCOLM:
Uhm…must be sleeping…or still in my flat…that powder must’ve knocked me sideways…yeah I’m probably still there dribbling on the floor…hahaaha….oh god let this not be real”

NARRATOR:
The other man looked at him with baffled sympathy dredged up from a life half forgotten, left behind curled up and smouldering, the last half drag of an abandoned cigarette picked up and lit, his words coughed out glazed with tar.

OTHER MAN:
Oh there, there, ducky, you’ll be alright, if this was a dream why haven’t you got a bill or an arse full of feathers? No, this is real, and you’re to meet your new employer so try to hold it together

MALCOLM:
I’ve…I’ve got work thank you, do well fo—

OTHER MAN:
interrupting That was before, it’s no use now, none at all. Though I think you’ll find the terms of employment quite amenable

NARRATOR:
Before Malcolm could drag a sharp edged retort from behind his broken teeth they reached another door. A bell rang as they approached even though they walked across bare marble and neither man had seen a bell pull. In sloped gold lettering the word “Accountant” leaned sloppily across the frosted glass window boxed in by the door.

OTHER MAN:
Here we are, now, game faces on please, you’re about to meet your mistress

fx grandfather clock

NARRATOR:
The door swung open on mute hinges and the room rolled away in front of them. The walls were shadowed suggestions, marking out a theoretical boundary of the space somewhere out of sight. A narrow carpet rolled across the dark wooden floor, knitted escher patterns drawing the eye in never-ending spirals each of which added a foot to the carpet’s width. Malcolm took a step, forced by the other man’s hold on him, and fell into the room. His foot was suspended, falling over the boundary for an eternity, his stomach weightless. With a muffled tap it met the floor and he was swept along to the desk, the sudden motion stamped across his body. There was a woman wedged into a large wingback chair, her shoulders rising to the edge of either wing before swooping down to the desktop, one hand tracking the other’s progress across the tight set lines of a double-entry ledger. It took up the desk’s surface, stretched edge to edge, the middle marked with a red leather tongue, the two splayed open pages filled with tight black scratchings.

Malcolm and his steward stood on the other side of the desk, waiting. The accountant continued working without any indication she knew they were there. A clock, housed in a humpback bridge of wood, cut away the seconds, flensing the wait to the ever present now. Malcolm could feel the mass of time cut away with each ticked marker. It held every potential for that moment within it, then fell crashingly off, cascading in whispered rockfall. Every movement of the hand crashed louder through his head. It was shaking his teeth loose in their sockets and unravelling his joints’ stitched-in ligaments from their ossified beds. Malcolm was shattered apart, his ash pilings coned on the carpet. With a liquid slap the book covers slammed together, drowning out the cut down passage of seconds. Malcolm swelled back into himself, suddenly aware of his vision returning and the after echo of a pop in his ears.

ACCOUNTANT:
You’re back early, the last drop was a fraction ago, your next isn’t due for some time, why are you here?”

OTHER MAN:
An… opportunity I suppose, that and a debt needs recording

ACCOUNTANT:
Get to it then

OTHER MAN:
This one, here, noticed. He noticed and took action

ACCOUNTANT:
He did, did he?

OTHER MAN:
See the track mark splattered on his skin, it glistens beneath his sleeve

ACCOUNTANT:
So it does, he noticed..and he tasted, well, well, when was the last inductee… it matters not, the debt is right and must be paid. You sir…

MALCOLM:
M…Me?

ACCOUNTANT:
How did it taste?

MALCOLM:
I need it again, it carved through me, my head is splitting apart

ACCOUNTANT:
And that just from the dregs, do you think he’ll be able to imbibe a full dose?

NARRATOR:
She said as she placed a small glass vial glimmering with impossible prismatic light on top of the closed book.

MALCOLM:
Is that…is that…Help me…please….

ACCOUNTANT:
In good time, you’ve incurred a debt and an obligation to my man standing next to you, in a way you could consider it an invitation you’ve accepted, whether or not the letter was addressed to you

MALCOLM:
An obligation? What do you mean?

ACCOUNTANT:
You took action, you stole a taste and, well, now you’re here, that’s enough, there’s a cost to everything after all.

MALCOLM:
I don’t understand…my head…

ACCOUNTANT:
You owe him and he owes another who owes another who owes…well you get the idea. We stretch out, an unbroken chain of bondage and responsibility linking us together all written down on the pages of this book, the book. It is this that lets us slip between the pages of reality, dancing in the gaps between its written words and laws, you just need to sign right here

NARRATOR:
A pen sprouted from Malcolm’s white knuckled fist, it took both his hands to hold it as he looked down at the suddenly opened book. There was a box where there hadn’t been one before, ringed around with a curlicued border that stepped up off the page.

ACCOUNTANT:
Just there, you see? You’re welcome to read the contract, oh, I guess not

NARRATOR:
Malcolm squinted through weeping eyes as his hand dipped the nib into the inky lake and drew down towards the page. He felt the weight of his entire life pressing down upon him, as his hand scratched out a ragged X. A surge of strength rolled over him and he swiped the vial from the table pouring the liquid hungrily down his throat. He fell to the floor and screamed. The two others looked on, Malcolm’s writhing body reflected in their cold silver eyes.

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The Narrator:
I can’t be certain but I’m sure I’ve heard one of those voices before… .well doesn’t matter that much now, there’s barely a whisper, it’s so…fleeting, yes that’s the word, fleeting, they just passed through, a short word and nothing more. I wonder what he knew though, seemed he had an idea what our lead would face….odd.

Well, onto brighter things dear listener. I’ve always wondered if there’s a hidden room with a book much like that. An invisible hand scribing out all the ills of the world, noting down each and every misstep and false start like a joyless Santa stockpiling his coal. I try not to dwell on it but there it is, my deepest fear, a trifle really. There’s a version of you that lives on in the memory of anyone you meet, it carries on, a thin hollow slice, cut away from you, fully independent. You can’t control that after all, as much as you may wish it were different. What’s a book full of guilty sins compared to the simulacra running around in everyone else’s head?! Well it brings me cold comfort.

Goodness, listen to me dear listener, I’ve taken a bit of a morbid turn, wool gathering in all the wrong places hahaa. I wonder how I look in your minds…would I recognise myself if I met your construct on the street? I wonder, I really do, would you recognise me? We’ve never met but you know me now, I’ve shared so much, too much. There must be quite the likeness painted there, sitting behind your eyes. Well, I can only live in hope because, after all, reality writes itself.