Loss of Separation by Conrad Williams

Author:Conrad Williams [Williams, Conrad]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Horror
Publisher: Solaris Books
Published: 2011-03-07T06:00:00+00:00

I did as I was told. There were no little adventures. No footsteps outside the bathroom window. No voices. No box on the doorstep, no shattered seagull spreading its wings, all the better to reveal its magisterial injuries. By the time I was in bed I couldn't work out how I'd got there. I seemed to be moving much more easily these days. Only the previous week I'd needed assistance to get in or out of the bath, and into or out of my clothes, but I was managing okay now. Perhaps it was because I was overdoing things. My muscles were getting a workout, being stretched and flexed so much that everything attached to them had no choice but to follow suit. There were the inevitable aches and pains, the cricked neck, the jarred back, but things were getting better. This rushing to be mobile again might mean that somewhere down the line there would be cataclysmic payback, but I couldn't take a retrograde step now. There was always the chance that I was a good healer, a fast healer, and that I was merely ahead of what the doctors predicted.

I closed my eyes and listened for the pain. It was all over me, dulled by analgesics, like concentric circles tattooed deep into my flesh. My skeleton shook and sat up, grinned down at me and said: 'If I had some eyelids I'd give you a wink, old friend.'

I opened my eyes and five hours had gone by. A tray next to the bed contained a plate with cold ham, cheese, a chicken leg, a bottle of water. There was a note. Eat this when you wake up. I'll be in my room if you need company. Rx

I managed to eat some of it. Your stomach shrinks when you're in a coma. Liquid feeds just don't keep your gut at the shape at which it's happiest. And it's got other things on its mind, like slowly consuming you, from the inside out. More IV juice? No thanks, I'll tuck into some of this slow-cooked belly of Paul.

The meal re-energised me to some degree, but now I really fancied a drink before I went to the reading room. I don't know why. I didn't want any nasty shocks and I thought the best way to combat them was to be slightly numb. The 22 pills a day I was popping just didn't seem to be enough. The synthetic morphine when mixed with a whisky and beer chaser would soften the edges of whatever horrors lurked in the back of the museum. Or maybe I was being paranoid and all I'd find would be a few twee letters home from sailors missing Mum.

I went to The Fluke, ordered my drinks and sat in the window seat. Ruth would have heard me moving about - unless she was asleep - and might be wondering why I hadn't gone to see her. I got the feeling she wanted to talk. I wasn't all that sure I wanted to any more.

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