Everything happened at once after that television interview, which was two days after my seventy-seventh birthday. As I always have before broadcasts, I felt a certain level of unease as I drank with the other guests in the green room. I could hear one of them speaking to me, I even articulated back to him whatever thoughts came to mind that seemed relevant to the topic at hand. However, it was hard to keep my mind focused on whatever this actor, or singer, was saying – at this point I could not even tell what wine I was drinking, red or white, merlot or pinot grigio; maybe it was champagne.
This lack of certainty struck me as strange. Even in my darkest days, clambering for my Dictaphone to record every drunken thought or lyric, I still was able to justify every drop of whatever I drank by alluding to the fact that I had great taste – I always knew what I was drinking or what I wanted to drink back then. Even so, I didn’t think on it for very long, as I was not able to. Luckily, I was whisked away from this vapid, and presumably juvenile, famous person, as the arm of a producer wrapped around mine and guided me to the wings of the stage.
I was in the studio of the Joseph Fenton show, which I had been a guest on only once before. Joseph’s show was fairly new as far as talk shows go, but there’s something about the tone of his voice that I admire, and at least he actually seems to read my books before he has me on. That shows a level of respect that I expect, amongst all the dingy Hollywood films he probably has to watch, he still has time to read everything that I churn out. I used my cane to guide me to the chair opposite Joseph, as the audience clapped and cheered, still aware that I am alive, still aware that I am writing. Joseph began by breaking the ice, pandering, telling me he thought the book was fantastic,
“So horror’s a bit of a departure for you, isn’t it?” he said.
“Yes,” I replied, “I had previously dabbled with the genre from time to time, but after years of playing it safe, with all the romances and historical dramas, I felt that a fresh audience needed something new from me.”
“Well,” he said, throwing the audience in with him, “we always appreciate your books, sir, and we always appreciate any artist trying something new!”
I chuckled, retorting, “‘art’ is a relative term.”
At this point in my life, I have produced a book once every two years since 1975, my first being when I was around thirty-seven, relatively old for a first-time author. I was by no means some kind of young prodigy, not like some of my contemporaries. But I had a dream, and for what I could not see in the world, I could at least feel and record what I felt. I had studied English and History at College a long time ago, and for a long time I had felt that the past could only be neglected, unless it were visualised and adapted by writers. Surprisingly, my first historical drama did extremely well, even amongst the new generation of LSD-soaked, Hunter Thompson College readers, and I was greeted with accolades, crowned as some kind of saviour. Since then, I have produced numerous books, all without being gripped by writers’ block.
“What, then, inspired you to get into horror?” Joseph asked.
“Well, it was never something I just ‘got into’, I have always admired horror fiction,” I replied, and the audience chortled.
“Most of the memories I have of my parents are auditory: muffled and frantic fragments of screaming”
I never knew what my father or my mother looked like. I heard once, somewhere, that the first person you grow attached to is the first person you see when you’re expelled from the womb, usually your mother. Unfortunately, that was not something I received the benefit of. Most of the memories I have of my parents are auditory: muffled and frantic fragments of screaming. The breaking of bottles on tables, chairs, windows, and sometimes faces. The latter sound terrified me the most, it sounded like nothing but something at the same time. The initial impact was like a record being scratched on a Gramophone. Afterwards, when the skin broke, it sounded like a man stepping on grapes in Europe somewhere. At least I could never see what was happening. Sometimes these noises wake me up in my dreams, even now, and I can’t even stare at the white walls in this care home for comfort.
“But horror is a hard genre to master,” Joseph quipped.
“Yes,” I agreed, “but I hope that with my years of experience I can have a crack at it.”
“So you’re expecting a little bit of blind luck then?” Joseph chuckled.
I was a little bit taken aback by his comment and I grimaced as a means of articulating my disapproval. I could hear that the audience had noticed my grimace, and sharply the upper inflection in their laughter lowered to a soft murmur.
Joseph continued with his questions, “we only ever see you when you come out on TV to promote a new book, do you use Twitter at all?”
“No I don’t,” I replied.
“But even Margaret Atwood uses Twitter!” he gasped, “all the authors of your generation keep in contact with their fans!”
I thought for a while, feeling several crystals of sweat trail down my forehead, and replied, “I once owned a computer, for a while, about a decade ago. I wanted to learn how to type on it, but I could never get the hang of it. Nowadays, I still stick to recording my voice on my Dictaphone, and then it is typed up by someone I hire later.”
“Dracula was always my favourite. He terrified and enchanted me.”
I mentioned that I never felt a tinge of writers’ block in my forty-year career. Well, unfortunately this is a lie. Yes, I didn’t previously experience writers’ block, but writing my horror novel was a slow process. Initially, I wanted to echo the nineteenth century monster fiction I had been reading in braille since I was a young boy. I can remember, after the arguing and weeping, that I would stay up late, feeling each of these monster books, no torch light to guide me late into the night. I would roll my fingertips over each pattern slowly, and they would hang for what seemed like hours over the monsters. Dracula was always my favourite. He terrified and enchanted me. Sometimes when I fell asleep, he would come to me, and I could feel his hands touching my chest and shoulders. The blood he drank smelt intoxicating in my nose, as he would whisper into my ear, drunkenly lulling me to sleep forever.
I was trying to capture what it felt like, to be seduced by the terror of those monsters all those years ago. It’s not always that easy, however. I spent many nights, bundled over my desk. The Dictaphone would click on, and I would start speaking. I always begin, but more so in this tale, by describing the characters to myself. What was most important in this writing process was realising the face of my monster. I wanted something new, a terror you could see, yet not see. Something that sneaked up on you, maybe even made friends with you, but you could never trust – something with a human face, like Dracula. Every time I spoke into my Dictaphone, I felt once again like I was rubbing over that word from my books.
‘Dracula’.
He whispered in my ears again with that booze-soaked, but humble, breath. I could feel the jagged contours of his face, as I sculpted my monster in my mind’s eye again and again, adding detail after detail. Something about vampires always fascinated me. The way Stoker framed that Count made me shudder with terror and excitement every time. So much finesse in his impeccable taste and speech, yet so much brutality with the way in which he stole babies away from villagers, to feed to his vampiric ladies. I did not want to write a vampire story, but I couldn’t get the man-beast out of my head.
“Ah, so you do write with a Dictaphone, do you?” Joseph responded.
“Erm, yes I do,” I replied, coughing slightly, “unfortunately I tried to write conventionally, but I always feel a bit more comfortable with my Dictaphone – it allows for a bit more stream – of – consciousness I guess”.
The audience shrieked with laughter, and Joseph goaded them on, saying, “Well, I guess that’s convenient, as I’ve brought something to show you…”
There was a drum roll from the house band, and I could sense the audience pivoting on the edges of their seats as Joseph reached into his jacket pocket. A low humming sound emanated from the stunned audience, and my head began to pulse, my temples feeling like they had been shrunk.
“Here we have it!” Joseph shouted, as he produced a Dictaphone from his pocket.
I was beginning to salivate, and I could feel sweat running down my back and between my legs, gripping to my musky cotton clothes.
“Does this make you feel more comfortable?” Joseph asked.
“I could see whatever I had made sometimes, breathing in front of me. Late at night I could hear it rambling below”
My father committed suicide when I was fourteen. I stopped reading horror novels after that, and became more focused on history – what was real, what had happened. When my wife died, three years ago now, I could only work on the next book. I wanted every thought, everything horrible, to go away, to get lost in my speech. I described every human feature I could only picture. Taking a human head, I transformed it, giving it wide features, a huge jaw line, dark hairy eyebrows, and yellow teeth that glistened in the darkness of my mind’s eye. I could see whatever I had made sometimes, breathing in front at me. Late at night, while I was upstairs writing, I could hear it rambling below. I imagined what my kitchen looked like, imagined it walking around, leaving an intoxicating stench in its trail. Fear would always strike me in the middle of the night, as I wondered whether the creature I had created could smell me lying in bed upstairs. Would it come up? Would I feel its breath whistling through my hair?
I had to do something to stop it. All I could do was record my voice, take what I had made and do everything in my capacity to silence it. Make it a remnant of the past. Bar it from crawling up my stairs on those many long nights, when I wondered whether I would even wake up. I don’t know what the world around me looks like, but back when I started the book, I wished that I could visualize every waking moment. Even if I was just stuck at my desk, fashioning my tale, I felt like I was fighting some remnant of the past – some vision that kept me stuck in my scary books when I was young. Slowly, my creature began to evaporate into the air, with every word I spoke. I started to drink heavily again, but I felt like I needed that, to get me through this struggle, and to give me enough power and rage to destroy the festering mess that had entered into my life. Maybe it hadn’t even entered recently, maybe it had been buried somewhere for a long time, just watching me, waiting for me to move. I could stop him now; I was strong enough.
“How in hell did you get that?” I spluttered, nearly spewing the green room wine all over the stage.
“As I’m sure our audience would agree, what doesn’t matter is how we got it, but what’s in it”, replied Joseph, gesticulating like a child in a toyshop.
“My Hand fixed tightly on my cane, and I began to gulp water, unsure of what to do”
He continued, “On these tapes we have the original notes, the original thoughts of our author here! You have a fine way of articulating your deepest secrets, you really do. An astounding way of taking your innermost demons, and transforming them into a monster we can all enjoy, don’t you?”
My hand fixed tightly to the top of my cane, and I began to gulp water, unsure of what to do, unsure of where I was. I searched for every logical, yet highly illogical explanation as to what was happening. Maybe I had entered, unwittingly, some kind of roast, or maybe Joseph’s producers had snuck into my house, taken my stuff – my Dictaphone. I just did not want them to listen. They could not hear what was on that tape. They could not understand any of it. It is my process; it is how I write. Writing is a process of capturing the personal and making it accessible. This was not accessible, the endless reels of cassettes recorded into the night. People can only understand the words on the page – this audience could not begin to see the world how I don’t see it. Why would Joseph, a respectable host, torture me this way?
“Do you have any grandchildren old man?” he asked
“No no no, I don’t,” I gasped, “we didn’t…”
“Who’s ‘we’?” he retorted, “do you mean your dead-cunt wife?”
I could hear the audience laughing hysterically now, their laughter interrupted by loud banging noises – whether these came from the house band or the fists of the audience members punching the studio walls I did not know. I felt naked now – as naked as I had felt when I peed myself biweekly at elementary school. I couldn’t say anything now; I could only listen. Joseph kept goading the audience’s cries,
“Oops! I said a naughty word! Well I guess you know what that means guys?” he exclaimed as the band roared. I could hear jazz chords swirling around the baying audience. The saxophonist pitched his note higher than the joyful cries of the women and children above me, while the double bass grumbled like an ulcer in the belly of this studio. The men shouted the loudest, like bear baiters, watching, as Joseph seemed to strip every ounce of skin from my body. I sat there stunned, struggling to say anything above this gleeful cacophony.
“Yes yes yes ladies and gentlemen. You know what that means,” he contently announced.
“What time is it Joseph?” I asked, vulnerably, “You’re really confusing me. What is it you want to know about my wife? Why insult her? No, we didn’t have grandchildren, we didn’t have children period.”
Joseph was calm, “And why not? Why wouldn’t you have children? We could have had them on the show, they would have had so much fun!”
The audience continued to laugh, more quietly now. I could hear a low humming, and a soft fumbling around, as the stagehands brought something out. I was brought out by two stagehands to the centre of the stage, and made to feel three objects lying on a table in front of me. I could hear Joseph giggling, as I rolled my hands over what felt like three sacks. They all wriggled underneath my hands, yearning to get away from my touch.
“And now, the weapon…” Joseph exclaimed, as I was handed what felt like a large barbed knife.
“The object of this game is simple, sir, either we listen to the tapes on your Dictaphone, or we go for the much more interesting option, as I’m sure our audience would agree! In each of these sacks is something living. We have, a rabbit, a little dog, or a human baby.”
I grimaced, I gagged, and I couldn’t breath. I could barely muster words, but I managed one thing,
“We didn’t have children… I didn’t want that… I couldn’t show a child how messed up I was, how messed up I had been treated as a child. That’s why.”
“It’s okay. Its okay,” Joseph repeated, “you can see now and we know that you know what to do”.
Raising the knife above my head, I saw the faces of the audience melt into a bloody pulp in front of me
Suddenly I was there, all of me. I looked up and could see them all, and Joseph. It felt so sweet to breath in the air. To breath in not what I imagined, but what I could see. Each face in the crowd stared at me wide-eyed, with glee and hopefulness. Women and children bayed in the audience, throwing their arms in the air – sweat drenched every person there, and blood seemed to seep like foam from their mouths. I looked down at the table, felt the textures on each sack. They felt like the hairy arms of a man, of my creature, of my own. Raising the knife above my head, I saw the faces of the audience melt into a bloody pulp in front of me.
They told me when I woke up that I had collapsed on live television; I was having cold sweats. I had to force out of them the other stuff: the ranting and raving. Apparently, Joseph had asked me about my parents and I had gone insane, punching walls, threatening stagehands. I was safe now, apparently, between the four white walls of my new room in this place. Every night they feed me with drugs to take away the pain and to help me sleep. I get time off to walk the grounds, and I can interact with the other residents, talking about youth, and everything that once mattered. I love seeing their faces, and I love breathing in the green of the gardens.
I can see, I can finally see.
