Contours of Darkness by Marco Vassi

Author:Marco Vassi
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 1993-12-26T16:00:00+00:00

7

Sweet Satori Blues

The dream had the clarity often found in those who fall into a profound sleep after smoking marijuana. Conrad’s body rolled on the mat which lay on the floor of the van, shifting with the rhythms of the rubber tires slapping against the concrete highway. In the front seat sat Jerry, driving through the night, enjoying the hallucinations which time and again tricked him into a false perception of turns in the road, and pondering that, in the face of death, illusion and reality had absolutely the same weight. They were on their way to Nogales to buy dynamite.

In Conrad’s mind, a room appeared, and he viewed it with the ambivalence of one who knows he is dreaming and yet can do nothing but be a passive observer of the inner drama, watching it as one does a movie, with a blend of identification and detachment. It was a dark Victorian drawing room with eighteen-foot ceilings. All the angles were distorted as in a German Expressionist set. The walls were ochre, the woodwork mahogany. Thick drapes smothered all the windows, and the single massive door was locked and bolted. The furniture was ornate and overstuffed, deep armchairs, a pile rug, upholstered lamp shades. Only one light shone, from a lamp at the edge of the desk which dominated a whole corner. It had the quality of being underwater.

On the long couch lay a woman of about thirty, her slim form enveloped in voluminous skirts and accented above the waist by a starched bodice. Her left arm lay at her side while her right forearm was flung over her eyes. Conrad peered through the gloom and looked at her face. It was Cynthia’s, but transformed through the alchemy of subconscious distortion so that it kept changing aspects. Just behind her shoulder, one leg folded over the other at the knee, his hands in his lap, his lids lowered, his breathing calm, sat a bearded man of almost fifty. He wore a black suit and showed no signs of movement.

“It’s Freud,” Conrad said aloud. The man turned to him and held one finger to his lips so as to silence him.

The woman tossed restlessly, her clothing rustling silkily in the quiet air. There was a compelling suggestion of thigh sliding against thigh, of soft moist underthings, and secret places yearning for a hand to enter.

“I can’t,” she said aloud, “I don’t have anything to say. Nothing comes to my mind, nothing.” She lay still for a moment, only her heaving breasts showing her agitation; her cheeks were flushed. “Why don’t you speak?” she cried. “Why do you torture me like this?”

The man in the chair showed no reaction except for a slight twitch by his left eye. He looked down at the form in front of him and an expression of sadness darkened his face. “It is all so clear,” he sighed, “and yet she cannot see any of it.”

“It is all useless, senseless,” she said.

The man rolled his eyes toward heaven.

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