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TITLE (EDIT)
The Fringe Effect |
DESCRIPTION
Symbolic commentary on personal introspection.
[1,401 words] |
AUTHOR
K. F. |
ABOUT
THE AUTHOR
-
[March 2000] |
AUTHOR'S E-MAIL ADDRESS
oxygen.o2@worldnet.att.net |
The Fringe Effect
K. F.
Henrik was going home. The New Hampshire college where he was doing his graduate studies had dismissed him for “repeated failure to adhere to academic standards”. He would have disputed the charges if it had not been for his good friend who told him he had no hope of success. He tried not to think about it as he stood on the train. He pressed his forehead to the cold, mildly vibrating window. The winter was ending, but to Henrik, the weather never really changed.
He didn’t even lock his door. Living in one of the more reputable parts of town, he felt to anxiety about it. He had few possessions, none of which he prized in particular. He had always seen this flat from a utilitarian standpoint. It was where he worked, where he thought. It was the incubator in which his ideas gestated, to be born later into studies, papers and experiments at the college. The apartment was static, except for the bedroom. The bedroom was a sanctuary to humanity, for the rare times when he needed one and for a wink of sleep now and then, usually between three and six A.M. His bedroom was preserved with items from his life: childhood mementos, photographs of his brothers, crumpled letters from a once-known fiancé named Julia. It was the only room of Henrik’s not lacking in decorative touches: a flower pattern on the soft armchair, an elaborate lighting fixture in the center of the ceiling.
For what little sleep he allowed himself, Henrik always performed the process in his bedroom, But not tonight. Henrik sat in his small “study”, on the floor, analyzing the current dynamic of his life. He exercised his own unique form of self-analysis, an attempt to understand the reasons for his situation. He had a nasty tendency for the introspective, which made him somewhat of a social outcast, but bolstered his ego in times of distress. Henrik found sympathy in the grace of a mathematical proof, and felt logic his principal philosophy. But today, he was upset. Henrik was upset about his consciousness. He disliked the fickle nature of memory, especially at times like these. He didn’t remember undershooting “academic standards”, simply didn’t remember.
He meditated. He was determined to understand why everything was falling apart, why it was different. Recently, Henrik had sensed a certain falseness in his daily life, but it was inexplicable: almost unreal. His good friend had laughed when Henrik mentioned it, said he was likely in denial of some suppressed abuse, perhaps performed by aliens, who had removed his kidneys (the kidneys being the true centers of intelligence in the human body, not the brain). Henrik had not been amused. He was quite serious: something wasn’t right. But tonight he would figure it all out. In meditation, he tried to see himself objectively, to examine his perceptions and fix the errors, like properly focusing a camera lens.
However, the focusing, the whole effort, was futile. He ceased his meditation and fell asleep on the couch.
The following day, Henrik woke up much later than usual, with considerable effort. His eyelids did not want to open and allow entrance of another day’s infinite stream of images to a brain that was already so confused. He wished to remain static. The objectivity of yesterday’s perspective remained with him, as if he were still in his trance, still watching a sad film, shot with poor equipment. He hated these days, when nothing changed from the day before. They came very frequently now, nearly every day. Static. Film stuck in a loop, on a single frame. It wouldn’t be so bad, he thought, if the frame it were stuck on was not quite so meaningless. But in life, as in film, the insignificant moments far outnumber the profound.
He wanted to go outside, to walk and seek potential distractions. He went into his bedroom to pick up a coat, and was shocked to see the familiar room appearing somewhat narrower then before. He judged that he remembered it being at least two more feet in width. As he contemplated this impression, he sat for a few moments in the delicate armchair, which now seemed distinctly closer to the north wall. Henrik was troubled, bin in his continuing daze of self-analysis, could not justify the change. He closed his eyes for several minutes, convincing himself that when he opened them, all would be as it should. The bedroom would be as he thought it to be, and he would go for his walk outside, where the colors would be as bright and intense as they also ought.
When he reopened his eyes, he surged with immediate frustration. The room seemed to have shrunk even more, another foot at least. He left hurriedly, glancing back once to see his armchair, whose patter already seemed duller, and no indentation from his sitting in it.
Henrik walked several blocks though the town, stopping to drink coffee alone at a café. He became so upset that he finally forced himself to stop thinking about his situation, about his bedroom, and gazed into his coffee cup, trying to breathe calmly. Several minutes passed, and Henrik regained some ability for rational thought. He absorbed a few local sounds and identified their sources in his mind: the clutter of silverware in the café, the brakes hissing on a city bus, his own lungs savoring a long breath. He smelled his hot coffee, glad for a moment of calm, but it produced no sensation. He smelled again, a superior whiff, but still nothing. It had no scent. He could not experience it. He quickly tossed the remains of his drink in a garbage can and rounded the corner, his eyes aching red from tears.
In a frenzy, he nearly sprinted back to his apartment. He did not fully realize he was no longer dreaming. It felt the same. Crossing the freeway, a sign read itself to him, an ad for a telephone company: “Got a bad connection?”
At his apartment, he ran into the bedroom and threw open the door, cracking it. The room was scarcely wider than the width of his small bed. The chair had been pushed on top of it by the contractions. Henrik burst into hot tears and began feverishly throwing himself against the wall. Frantically, he removed all of the furniture from the room, creating cluttered stacks in the hall. Automatically, he pulled himself back outside.
The day allowed itself to pass, and Henrik ended up sitting in the darkness, his mental picture shaking, uncertain of itself.
He smoked a cigarette. It was late, and he wanted something comforting to hold on to, to bring into him. Somehow, he knew what was about to happen.
The first wave of the attack came slowly, and he was able to prepare himself for it. His brain gushed with brilliant white noise. Overflow. This wave was the slowest, overwhelming him in a fluid rush of unreality. As the waves increased in frequency, they decreased in duration, causing his knees to fail beneath him and he collapsed sideways on the dead pavement. Once he started to give up resistance, the pain died away and he allowed himself to pass in and out of consciousness. A flux of existence. The waves came more quickly, so fast the sensation was rather like flickering, with great intensity, like a fluorescent bulb which, knowing it’s on its way out, panics to sustain its previous luminosity.
His brain, knowing that Henrik’s perceived reality was only one option open to it, was giving up on existence.
Henrik ran inside with his eyes shut. He opened them only as he entered his bedroom. He had to turn sideways to enter, as the room was not too narrow to allow the full breadth of his torso. He squeezed in, holding his breath to fit. He opened his eyes once more, only for a second to see what little of the brilliant sunrise penetrated from the small remaining window. Six inches of the world. He could feel the pressure building on his chest, and embraced it.
Henrik allowed himself to be crushed.
Officials from the police department arrived several days later, in reaction to the neighbors complaints of a stench radiating from Henrik’s apartment. They found his body, in the childishly decorated bedroom, hanging from the decorative light fixture, dried blood about his mouth.
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"Hey there. You have potential with this one, but you need to check your grammer. Also try varying sentence structure-- you tend to begin sentences with "He" or other nouns. Try adding more action or something concrete, because it really lags. You tend to repeat yourself and it can get cumbersome." -- Carly.
"oh dear, there are some typos in there. apologies." -- K. F. .
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COPYRIGHT NOTICE
© 2000 K. F. |
STORYMANIA PUBLICATION DATE
March 2000 |
NUMBER OF TIMES TITLE VIEWED
2141
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