6
"In those moments, I scream—soundlessly, so no one will come and witness the clawing, weeping, open-mouthed thing wearing my face. It's not me. Me is someone else, buried beneath the black. It's hard to remember that person over the screaming pleas for the end, though. Who am I? Could someone please call me by name? Maybe that's what I need to live again."
Professor Davis came to me through the darkness. Light didn't come off him, but I could see winter bald trees breaking through the roof of the little one room apartment my mother and I had. I wanted to talk, but my teeth felt loose in my mouth, and I had caught sight of spiders spinning webs between the trunk of the trees and the walls of the apartment. It only made sense. Mom and I had been away for a long time.
But the weirdest thing about Professor Davis here was his expressions. It was as though another had stolen his face and placed it over their own muscles and bone.
"Don't be alone," he said. I saw another spider spread out on a hammock of thread beneath the coffee table. So dark. And as big as my hand.
I didn't like this place. I didn't have arachnophobia or anything, but I still hated spiders. The sight of them all caving into my home like that, along with the overgrown, giant, leafless trees, burned me with a desire to flee, to breath fresh air, to see the sky.
But there was no sky above me.
Professor Davis knelt down in front of me, so close that he blocked the majority of my view. He took my jaw in his hand, gently.
"Listen, Mai. It's dangerous. You can't be alone."
"I'm not," I managed to push out through my heavy loose jaws. After all, he was still there.
"You have been for a long time."
I wrinkled my nose at him. "Oh, come on, I gotta roommate."
The trees started to crackle. Spiders fled from the base of the trunks, shooting across the carpet, zooming closer to me.
I flinched back, fighting to find the strength in my legs to get up. But no sooner had I stood and turned did the abyss my back had been pressing against opened up before me, framed by railings with balls carved into the bottoms. It seemed to open wider, and at the same time, the railing shorter. I couldn't get my hands to unclamp from the wood.
Something scratchy wrapped about my throat.
"Don't be alone."
The professor's voice sounded farther away now, almost like an echo. But just as soon as I thought I could manage to recoil from the railing, an unknown force, like the floor had gained a mind of its own, swooped me over and down, down, down—
I woke up with a jerk. It took me a moment to comprehend my pink shaded, lacey surroundings and the faint morning sunlight making lines and hearts on the walls.
I ran both hands down my face. I hated those kinds of dreams. The falling ones. You know, when you just JERK because your body decided to have a brake check while you were almost asleep because that makes sense and doesn't mean your brain damaged at all. Frick…
After some more face rubbing and digging out sleepy sand from the corners of my eyes, I pawed over to the bedside table for the poem—
To find nothing. Just the lamp and an old school clock.
Frowning, I leaned over my bed to see if it fell off, then under the table, under the bed, behind both, and even under my pillow.
"Huh," I tapped my finger against the side of my elbow. "Weird."
Well, it wasn't all that important anyways. Just some random batshit crazy poem. Probably not even worth mentioning, though I did want to find out who had written it and why they thought my pillow was the best place to put it. Definitely wasn't a love poem, and as far as I know, at least Ayako and Takigawa knew of my distaste for poetry. I liked my expression straight forward and to the point, thank you very much.
Downstairs, Ayako stood at the huge industrial stove, flipping pancakes. At the table, Lin and the professor, already immaculate and ready for the day, ate their pancakes. Even from the doorway I could smell their aftershave and I started to regret just heading down here in a large t-shirt and the jeans I worse yesterday. I could have at least brushed my hair.
"Hey, girlfriend," Ayako gave me a friendly smile. "Pancakes?"
"Oo, yes. Three please. Dang, they look fluffy."
Her smile widened. "Just a little secret technique on my part."
They were so fluffy, they were practically subway sandwich material, or better yet, actual cake.
I proceeded to ice dem cakes with syrup when Takigawa hobbled in, fresh from the bed just like me. He squinted at everyone, and sniffed.
"Pancakes?" he croaked.
"Good job, you know your shapes," Ayako handed him a plate piled with them.
He didn't say anything to that slap, only ambled over like the half-dead morning thing he was.
"Can I have some? Please?"
Ayako couldn't say anything to that. Soon, Takigawa sat next to me drowning his pancakes in syrup too.
"When you're finished, Mai, we have temperatures to record and tapes to go over. I'm going to need an analysis from you by noon."
"Freaking Mother—I just got up! Let me take a bath first at least."
"Baths take forever. Who are you trying to impress?"
"Are you seriously discouraging me from bathing?"
"No. We just have a limited time to go over a lot of information. I wouldn't be so pressed if I didn't have students to worry about teaching in the first place, I could just do it all myself."
"You know I'm not your only student."
Professor Davis looked at Takigawa and Ayako, the later which had just sat down with her own serving of pancakes. Then he snorted.
"I brought them to keep my word. They both showed signs of latent psychic power and interest, but I don't want my first set of graduates into the world to make an embarrassment of me."
"You care that much what the world thinks?"
"In this business, reputation is a big part of what separates the hobbyists and the professionals. Not all people believe in ghosts or psychics."
I sighed around a mouthful of pancakes. "It's all about you. You know what, prof? You're kind of a narcissist."
A chill silence.
"Finish your pancakes and get ready for work." He finally said, all aloof, all cool, all dumping ice upon my head.
"Fine, fine, but if I stink it's your fault."
"Don't worry. I won't be breathing through your armpits."
Takigawa snorted and choked at the same time. He plugged his nose, coughed, made some weird noises, than sat there dazed.
"Never got pancake up my nose before," he said, flashing me a grin.
Ayako just looked at him like a grownup 8 year old boy had taken Takigawa's place, and it was a smelly one.