Something Wicked SF and Horror Magazine #4, page 13
"Thanks,” he murmured.
She seated herself down opposite him at the table but the distance was not enough to conceal the cacophony of male cologne from him. Nor the blushing scratch mark beneath her jawbone. Rain chattered gently to itself outside, sliding idly down the dirt-frosted kitchen window. Silently he ate what he could of the bread. His mother hadn't brought home any food for about a week. He'd just have to wait until supper and hope that his mother came back before then.
Bread eaten; Vanessa got up; exposed a few more pieces of lace and started to leave, stumbling over the chipped concrete in the passage.
"Bye love!"
"Goodbye Vanessa."
Kay licked the last few crumbs off his fingers and went over to put out the smouldering cigarette properly.
Back in his room Kay made his bed; gently folding the scarred blanket back into its place. He put away his pyjama top in his wooden chest and took out a scratchy red woollen jersey, which he pulled down over his head. He fetched the front-door keys that his mother had left for him and made his way out of the apartment.
The keys jumped and jangled inside his worn pocket as he made his way down the reeking stairwell. He strode on down the corridors, past babies crying, through air thick with unsettled arguments. The walls had shed their paint and wore now a dress of graffiti. Profound statements of self-worthlessness and calf love stitched and patterned themselves into the hallways. Down to the basement he went and over to the darkest corner. Silently a trapdoor was flipped open and Kay slid into its secret chambers.
A match bit into the darkness, hissing and spitting to life. Two old candles were lit and his small corner of the underworld was soaked in amber light. Kay made his way over to the other side and lit another three candles. Together they made visible a small, square room layered in dust and broken cobwebs. Initially it had been a private storeroom but years of neglect had turned it into Kay's room. He was the only one who knew where it was and who ever came down into it. Pieces of paper littered the walls. On each page was a picture of furious orange swirls and streaks. Some of them flicked upward towards the tattered edge of the page while others did crazy dances round and round themselves. The candles stood in pools of old wax on elfin tables. A small area on the floor had been crudely swept to form a tight circle. Inside the circle lay a few pieces of battered paper, orange, yellow and red crayons and an old book.
Kay sat down on the edge of the circle with one knee under his chin. He pulled towards him the heavy book and opened it to a page entitled Banishment. He couldn't read, but he loved the way the letters curved and dipped into patterns on the page. Carefully, using one of the crayons, he copied out the words.
* * * *
"O deathly darkness come once more,"
His crayon glided over the shapes and dots.
"To let this spirit roam no more."
He swapped around his legs and continued to write.
"As sure as dust is dust to death,
Then let this last be its last breath."
* * * *
A week had gone by before another Monday lazed on towards dusk. Kay's mother still had not come back and hunger pains were digging through his thin flesh. He wandered through the lonely rooms aimlessly, brushing his skeletal fingers along the mummified chairs. They'd been there too long and now stood with their guts falling out across the floor. He dragged his feet over to the gaping window and realised that it was quickly becoming night. He'd run out of matches and so the candles in his bedroom stood unlit. The refinery workers would be leaving soon and then she would dance again.
Dust and debris swirled around his ankles as he hurried down the stairs. The ground outside was slippery with oil and the rain had put a metallic dampener on everything. He walked in rhythm with the highway towards the fraying edges of the city. A trail of brittle and empty bones led the way to an opening in the fence of the refinery. Through the fence and towards the tower. As a pilgrim he walked on through the sticky darkness. In the far-off distance Kay heard the worker-filled train depart from the station and he hurried his footsteps. Eventually he reached the calloused wall of the tower and slid his hands across it until they could feel the rusty iron ladder beneath them. Up he climbed. Each rung lamented quietly under his hollow weight as with each step the stench of burnt gas saturated his translucent skin. Not so far above him the clouds lay thick and heavy across the sky. The ladder ended more quickly than Kay had expected and he found himself standing on a wide rim enclosing a huge circle of nefarious blackness. A slow shiver trickled through him. He lifted his head and gazed around with desolate eyes. The city lay with its legs spread beneath him in its unnatural, orange-lit glory. It welcomed every person and their advances into its secret cavities, charging them only their life. The sun had set and was dragging with it its flailing strands of light as his anticipation burned fiercely in the destitute atmosphere. The last second tore by and all at once Kay could hear a moan echoing up from the belly of the refinery. She was coming. He could feel scorching heat welling up below him. Kay closed his eyes with long sought-after relief. Up she flew, spinning, twisting and roaring. Up she flew to catch him in her arms as he fell.
* * * *
At a young age Caitlin Leigh was hauled down from the rooftop during one of her attempts to get her fairy wings to work. Now19, she still has not managed to get a secure grip on reality.
She's studying English and Psychology at UCT and has yet to learn not to play with fire.
This is Caitlin's first story for Something Wicked.
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THE DESTINATION by Malcolm Cumming
illustrated by Kobus Faber
* * * *
* * * *
My name is not important. None really are. You will soon come to terms with the validity of the notion that all names lead to one, and from that name alone you may reach God. Nevertheless, to avoid confusion, I shall tell you my name. It is Trevor Mitchell. In my tale, as with all things in life, the choice of what to believe is yours, and I have no doubt many would label me a liar, even with the evidence I am able to offer. It was for this reason that until now this anecdote has gone untold. It is true that in this respect I am a coward, and am disinclined to the mockery of other cowards. Some time ago, several months now, an incident occurred which I somehow had the misfortune, or fortune, to be a part of, and which, to this day, perturbs my own powers of belief.
I live in a little known part of the world, a small suburb in Cape Town, South Africa. The suburb is named Observatory, a nod toward the astronomical observatory that the area quietly boasts. This star-gazing centre is present more strongly as the suburb's title than as a presence of its own. Most people, even those that reside here, have not even seen the building—it rests obscurely on the far side of the river where few have any reason to venture, and the significance of the suburb's title is blurred in the affectionate vernacularism ‘Obz.'
It is a quaint suburb, not quaint in the way of a charming old English village, but more in the manner of the tang of a New Orleans. It is unusual, distinct, colourful in every way. The suburb is gently illumed by the magic lamp of free-thinking, and through that oleaginous light filters the innocuous anti-authoritarianism characteristic to all the various pockets of comradeship found here. Apothecaries advertise their wares on small hand-painted signs outside their houses, Immigrants, legal and illegal, babble away in all the European tongues of West Africa and all the Bantu sounds of East Africa in their search for a better life, Rastafarians peddle their wares, students find an affordable (and suitably bohemian) haven, artists of all mediums and occupations eke out livings and careers, and in the centre of it all restaurateurs provide the heart that pulses in the nights, and ticks evenly during the day, but never hurries.
The house I stay in is on the North Westerly side, tucked away from the busier byways. At this time I am the only resident. Of my two previous house fellows the one graduated and shipped off, and the other just shipped off, once his parents concluded that his graduation would not be merely tardy, but non-existent, and so drew him home on a leash of financial dependency. I'm expecting new tenants, friends of mine, in a few weeks, once the university term begins, but in the meantime I am enjoying my solitude. I have time to read, and to write, and to indulge in other idle pastimes. The only thing that disturbs this peace is the nag of my memory, which wants me to consolidate an opinion of the incident I wish to tell you about. The proof of its happening is right before my eyes: two pieces of paper. The much larger piece of paper, a letter, I shall get to shortly. The other, a mere snippet, is an obituary:
* * * *
Omar Abrahams
Beloved friend and colleague, passionate astronomer and cosmologist, accomplished academic; a man whose hearty enthusiasm for life was surpassed only by his inspired practical jokes. Died at home: 8 October 2005.
RIP
* * * *
It is this day that chases me. Omar Abrahams was a friend of mine. I may only be a young student who knows little of the world beyond my own, but Omar Abrahams and I struck a sort of rapport in spite of our difference in age, (though I never knew his exact age).
* * * *
On the morning of the day he died I returned home from early lectures at the nearby University of Cape Town. Travis, my then house mate, before his parents drew on the purse strings funding his eternal holiday, was at home as he usually was during the mornings. He was lying on the couch in front of the television when I walked into the living room. He told me that “that freaky old guy called” asking me to stop in at his house as soon as I could.
'Maybe he's finally going to come out the closet to you man,’ Travis had added with sly malice.
I had about two and a half hours to spare before I was due back on campus, so I left immediately. The call itself did not leave me with any unease. Omar had a bizarre dislike of cellphones, commenting that we'd soon wish they were never invented, and only ever communicated over landline telephones. He had also called to invite me over to his house on several occasions without notice, as if on a whim, as if he had just rediscovered my existence and wished to be a friend once more. He had not always been so capricious, but had become increasingly absorbed in his work in the preceding months, and so I put his inattentiveness down to other engagements. He never gave me reason to believe that he was uncaring.
Omar lived almost on the opposite side of Observatory to me, on the North Easterly side, down by the hockey stadium. For him, it was conveniently close to the Observatory building. If I walked it would take me only about fifteen minutes to get to him. So I left my car on the pavement outside where it was parked, and set out on foot. It was a bright summer's day with the oppressive heat that Cape Town can cook up in the sunny season. I walked to and then along Lower Main Road, past Cool Runnings, the irie, self proclaimed ‘Rastaraunt', and turned into station road. Along the way I remember thinking how faded everything looked. At night the colours seem so much more vibrant, but under the stare of sunlight they were exposed as a muted, dusty, and tired sophism.
I was still thinking about night's flattering potencies when I walked past the sign-less signpost of Nuttall road, just before the station bridge. I looked down that side road, cramped with parked cars, and saw a little way down the façade of the quirky bar and restaurant ‘A Touch of Madness'. It was there that I had met Omar, about a year ago. I'd been back from my holidays for about a week. I'd spent most of it up the east coast with my family, who had returned to Johannesburg, and I was revelling in my emancipation. Although I had enjoyed the holiday it was good to be back in Cape Town, amongst my kith and back to a life of my own.
* * * *
* * * *
A Touch Of Madness was hosting one of its sporadic poetry evenings, and I had gone along accompanied by Travis. I'd arrived feeling a little nervous. I had never read any of my poems to an audience, any audience at all, and I was worried that I would be revealed as an incompetent or a fraud. As the evening matured I sat a little easier, soothed somewhat by my comparisons of my own rhymes with the rhymes of others, but when my turn came I realised I had not achieved calm. I stood and walked to the microphone, inhaling the heady voodoo airs of wood and wine and candle wax. I glanced over the lines that I held between agitated fingers, and was about to start when I noticed a man staring at me. This may seem a strange thing for someone who was at the time standing as a focal point to remark, but while others sipped their drinks and bantered privately with their companions, this one man had his eyes intently on me. He looked like he had seen a ghost. It unnerved me greatly, but when I looked back at him he looked no different from the others who waited, encouraging me to speak with their settling silence. At the time I wondered if I had imagined the man's startled expression. To save myself from mounting embarrassment I composed myself and read aloud my poems.
They were received without fanfare or jeers, and as I returned to my seat I was dispatched with the same polite applause the others before me had received.
'Nice one,’ remarked Travis, ‘You want to get another drink?'
The reason Travis did not like Omar was that he hated to feel like he was being shown up as a fool. As I was returning from the bar with two glasses of red wine I noticed the old man regarding me again, but his eyes had softened considerably. I sat down, and said to Travis: ‘See that old guy sitting at the back there? He keeps on staring at me.'
'Maybe he's queer,’ volunteered Travis.
The man seemed to take our attention as an invitation. He smiled back at us and came over to our table.
'Good evening gentlemen,’ he said, leaning over the table and speaking in hushed tones so as not to disturb the poetess that had replaced me at the microphone. ‘I apologize if I alarmed you just now,’ he said to me, ‘I thought I remembered you from somewhere.'
I saw Travis roll his eyes at that.
'May I have a seat?’ the man continued.
'Sure,’ I said, and introduced Travis and myself.
'Yes, as I thought,’ said the old man, smiling wolfishly, ‘My name is Omar Abrahams.'
Omar Abrahams was a small man, a coloured whose mixed descent hinted at Malaysian ancestry. He had a neatly clipped, ash-white goatee, close cropped hair of the same colour, and dark, expansive eyes, almost black and near to infinite. His clothes were casually formal. He wore trousers and a collared shirt that covered a small belly. We sat in silence, waiting for the poetess to finish.
'Your poetry shows a lot of promise,’ he said to me once she was done, ‘I'm sure if you stick at it, it will develop nicely.'
'So what is it that you do Mr Abrahams?’ Travis asked, leaning back and lighting a cigarette.
'Well, mostly I work at the observatory, the one down the road. But I also lecture a few modules at the university. You two are students there?'
'Yes,’ I answered, ‘we are. I'm studying literature, and Travis is doing economics. So you're an astronomer then?'
The little old man nodded solemnly.
'I'm supposed to be a cancer, but I don't know if I really believe in that stuff,’ said Travis.
Omar chuckled.
'Most astronomers would agree with you Travis,’ he said, ‘We are in the business of science. We leave clairvoyance up to the astrologers.'
I knew this had annoyed Travis, but he did a good enough job of hiding it for long enough that he would not be blatant in excusing himself. He spent the few minutes finishing his cigarette, barely partaking in the conversation, until he went off to go and speak to the poetess.
I had never met an astronomer before, and so stayed for quite a while at that little table with Omar. When I confessed to him that I had “never been good with the stars", his smile merely got a little broader, his eyes twinkled merrily, and he replied, “Yes, but you will get better,” and he offered to teach me some of what he knew. When I asked him why he had chosen such a vocation he replied, “Sometimes I think it chose me,” and then went on to explain that no matter where he went his eyes had always been drawn to the celestial unknown. ‘Since I was a child I've been curious about up there’ he said, pointing with his index finger. We talked about my poetry, and about his fascination with the cosmos. When I got home that night, before I walked through the door, I looked up at the dark skies and did not take that deepened dome for granted. I may have been a bit tipsy from the wine, but I was certain the happy awe I felt had something to do with a beginning rather than wine warmth and an insouciance at the tautology of an impending hangover.
That awe has never completely left me. I still struggle to comprehend how the serenity of the night sky can be the titanic swirl of an unfathomable sum of bodies and forces that it is. But I look up and am stilled.
* * * *
By the time I had reached the apex of the bridge I was beginning to feel a light sweat blooming on my forearms and neck. There was hardly a breath of air, and so I had to be content with my own movements to fan myself. From the top of the bridge you can make out the guarded gate and roof of the observatory building. The rest is obscured by trees.
That historic building was one of the places where Omar cultivated my awe. Many nights we had sat there until the birds announced daybreak, watching the sky through outmoded telescopes, or thumbing through collections of the earliest photography of the heavens, or watching computer simulations of supernal dynamics. There was a lot of silence on those long, adventurous nights, but also a lot of Omar's soft, patient voice, unfurling the universe for me.
We spent evenings in fields and on hilltops, looking up at the constellations, and making up our own. We spent time at his small home, neat on the outside, neat on the inside, except for his study, which was always a flurry of papers. I brought my poetry and other writing for him to read, and we would speak of great writers and their works. Although our favourite subjects were always astronomy and literature I found Omar to be inexhaustible in the range of subjects of which he always seemed to have intimate knowledge.
