Lights in the Night

Sitting in the recliner Trevor regarded Sergei’s face, as it slid off his skull and onto the floor. Cocking his head like a dog that heard a strange sound. He still comprehended Sergei’s voice, but it came from his face on the floor, “Just relax and enjoy the trip. Should be over in a few hours.”

A few hours!? That did not sound comforting to Trevor at all. Beholding the room, he chewed the colors as they lept off the atoms flying around his head. Trying to hold his breath, thinking, I don’t want to breathe in the atoms they are much too humongous, humongous is such a funny sounding word, Giggling to himself.

Darting his head side to side, in a vain attempt to keep the atoms out of his mouth. Then noticing, his body worked fine, but his feet acted like they did not want to comply with the command to move. Risking a glance down at his Tony Lamas, it appeared his boots were melted into the stone floor. Feeling like his lungs were about to burst, he resigned himself to not care and gasped for breath. The atoms rushing into his body.

Music started, forgetting about the huge atoms now inside his lungs, he inspected the arm of the recliner. There he witnessed an inch-tall Doors cover band, they did a miniature version of ‘People are Strange’. Leaning closer, he was busy enjoying the miniscule band playing, when he felt fondled by a hand reaching inside his chest from behind.

Silence surrounded him pulling his attention from his chest massage, he was alone in the room. Sergei and Crystal both left him. Strange, he really wasn’t alone, he had the Doors cover band to keep him company. Also, he had all the atoms inside him. Feeling them moving around inside him, they were huge. He imagined the O2 atoms bouncing around his lungs and passing into his blood stream. Envisaging them tearing him asunder. They might paint the walls with his insides.

Anxiety almost took over but he envisioned that hand again. With the softest touch caressing his heart. Focusing on the stick pin Crystal had given him, it glowed. It changed from the brilliant blue to a glowing gold, had he seen that color somewhere before? Not remembering where he was. Was that the color he had seen in the picture? He needed to think, he must remember.

The inch-tall Jim Morison impersonator was becoming angry, Trevor was not paying attention to the song. Annoyed, he started to smash his tiny guitar against Trevor’s right hand. This irritated Trevor so he took his left hand and flattened the tiny cover band. Jim Morrison didn’t play guitar anyway. Scrutinizing his hand, he visualized the splatted remains of the tiny band, their instruments sticking out of his palm. Strange it sounded like chocolate and smelled of yellow.

Still, the hand on his heart.

Grasped by the chair, the floor pulled on his boots. Slipping his feet out of the boots, with a pop, he raised his feet and crammed them under his butt. The floor started to turn to liquid. Not lava, but liquid rock. Mesmerized as it started to drip through the cracks in the floor. The cracks got wider as the stone melted away.

There was nothing under the floor. The void black as sackcloth. Spellbound as the light was dragged into the abyss, his chair remained anchored. But more and more of the room slipped into the blackness that was enveloping the room from the floor up. Fighting the tug of darkness pulling at his soul, the hand in his chest gripped his heart and soul tightly. He perceived if not for that grip, his soul would tumble head first with his body following after.

The gravitational pull of the black began to subside. Relieved from the constant pull on his soul and body he chanced a peek around the room. To his surprise, there was no room. It was gone, save his chair.

He gazed down and the chair was what held him. The chair, melded into his body, like a large Trevor chair. What he thought was a hand holding his heart was the tuck of the buttons stitching him in a diamond pattern.

Finding himself at one with the chair made him panic. The black of space was backlit with a soft glow. He perceived planets in the distance. The constrictions on his chest from the tuck and roll buttons was making it harder to breathe. Hard as he tried, he could not break free of the recliner. Straining, he began to feel his heart beating harder.

The O2 atoms were racing through his body now. In the distance, he perceived a golden light whizzing towards him at incredible speed. Just before hitting, it stopped. It was Grace’s Disembodied head. Hat and all. The wide brim of the hat created beautiful rings about her head, spinning like Saturn.

Grace stopped spinning to speak, “What would Douglas Adams say at a time like this?”

Trevor yelled, “Never forget your towel?!?” like a man in a straight-jacket, Trevor tried even harder to break free of the chair.

“No! You blithering idiot!” Grace’s disembodied head shook from side to side.

“Don’t Panic! It is on the cover for cryin out-loud!” she continued her orbit spinning off in the direction behind Trevor. Spewing Mandarin as she left. Trevor was sure it was about him, and not appropriate.

He began a mantra, of ‘Don’t Panic’. Thinking, what was the worst that can happen?

Floating weightless he had no sense of down. Music started again a simple tune. Not sure where it came from, but he could just make out a light walking his way. Strange he should see the light walking, even though there were no legs. Later he would swear it was walking, like a human but a gold color light. The light stood before him. Golden pulsating warmth, and it tasted green.

“What do you want?” Trevor asked but the only reply was the song, where had he heard it before?

“Why am I here?” Trevor asked louder.

Shouting, “Why are you here?”

The light began to take a shape, first oval, like a face. The beams of light flowed to compose hair. Shifting into the form of a woman’s face. A face Trevor recognized, having seen most nights since he was thirteen, in his nightmares. It was the face of his Mother.

Screaming now, “Why did you leave?”

Softer, “Why did you leave?”

Changing tone, “It’s not my fault!”

He repeated it over and over, “It’s not my fault.” Trevor started to cry.

Feeling the chair safely holding him, he surrendered himself to the chair. The softness of the old leather engulfing him. Rocking him as he broke down, tears flowing in a tea induced hallucination. He envisioned the golden voice cooing to him, “Don’t panic.” That tune from that damned song played on.

He is one with the chair. The chair his universe. The stars are above and below. His tears cathodic, the disembodied golden voice repeating in his head, “Don’t panic.”

Trevor repeating, “It is not my fault”.

The stars began to fade. Trevor cried himself to sleep.