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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Survival / Success
- Subject: Pain / Problems / Adversity
- Published: 06/07/2012
One of the few good things about his cramped first floor flat was the view it offered, taking in as it did the entirety of the busy high street outside. Now though, as he stood by the window gazing out, Anderson was giving some serious, if hazy thought, to moving. The street below was absolutely packed with people, not many of whom appeared particularly well dressed at that. And why were they all staring up at him? Ridiculous.
With a sigh, Anderson turned away from the window and all but fell onto an aging sofa. From here, he surveyed the sun-drenched room and noticed a mug perched on the television. He’d no idea how long it had been there but was certain that if he were to take hold of it, perhaps in a dutiful effort to tidy up, the mug would stick to its surface like a seaside limpet.
Though having eschewed traditional domestic responsibility for the past three months, Anderson had drank rather a lot – but not so much that now was not a good time for another. And so it was, as he ascended and made for the adjoining kitchenette, that an uncharacteristic gleam from the room’s far end caught his eye. Here, a large shelving unit dominated, and as far as Anderson was aware there was nothing on it that had any business gleaming.
The alcoholic treat momentarily forgotten, Anderson turned to investigate as a puzzling ripple of excitement went through him. Was he really so bored that an unfamiliar sparkle from a dusty shelf now seemed the most exciting event of his week? The object’s glow intensified as he drew closer, but when he arrived at the unit somebody switched off the sun and his blazing quarry winked out.
Seconds passed before Anderson realised he’d blocked the light coming through the window behind him, and as he tilted sideways the object once again flared into brilliant life, its sheen so fierce that detail was all but impossible to discern.
Reaching forward, eyes slitted against the glare, Anderson gingerly took hold of the glowing enigma and felt its considerable weight. With one clammy finger he traced the name engraved with a flourish that ran the length of its barrel.
Ramon.
It was a golden pen with someone’s name etched upon its surface, a name that meant nothing to Anderson.
Are you sure about that?
He removed the pen’s lid to reveal a long, graceful nib. Clearly this was no ordinary fountain pen, and Anderson supposed he’d be hard pushed to find a handcrafted implement such as this at his local stationer.
Bemused, clutching the mysterious pen, he headed back to the kitchenette where he liberated a partly frozen bottle of vodka from the upper compartment of his worn refrigerator. From the cluttered sink he withdrew a soiled glass and into it he dumped the beautifully clear liquid before availing himself of two invigorating slugs.
Anderson was certain the pen was not his. Whose, then? Who was Ramon? Someone he’d met on one of his benders? Possible but unlikely; a solitary drinker, Anderson never spoke to fellow patrons of his numerous haunts, and even if he did he felt sure he’d remember the person generous enough to present him with such a treasure.
The vodka was good and he poured himself another, the seemingly unfamiliar name reverberating in his mind like a chant, Ramon, Ramon, Ramon Ra... And with repetition came a faint sense of enlightenment.
He did know someone by that name, didn’t he? In another life, perhaps.
“Can you hear me, Mr Anderson?”
Anderson spun. Did he actually hear that?
The words were clear but the voice distorted, as though coming from a bad PA system.
“Helloo? Mr Anderson?
“What the...? Who’s there?” Anderson shouted, spilling vodka as he looked about. (Amazingly, this criminal wastage went unnoticed).
Then, clearer now, a voice thick with exotic accent said, “Here Mr Anderson, look harder, I’m right here!”
Anderson thought he must be hallucinating. But then something shimmered to his left and he turned to see the form of a small, portly man flickering into view, like the image that emerged when he switched on the old black and white TV he’d watched as a boy.
“Hello Mr Anderson, it’s me, Ramon. At last you see me!” Then, pointing at the glass in Anderson’s hand the figure said, “Mind if I join you?”
The sun had sunk a little lower and the apartment now assumed an agreeable dimness, its murkier corners receding into shadow – just the way Anderson liked it.
The entity that went by the name of Ramon paced around the living room, stepping over carelessly discarded clutter and stopping occasionally to inspect some small detail buried within the hotchpotch of paraphernalia that littered Anderson’s home. “You really should clean more,” he sniffed, disapproval evident on his rotund face.
Anderson was back on the sofa, his legs now untrustworthy through a combination of vodka and fear; a cocktail he couldn’t recommend. “Forget that,” said Anderson in a faintly quivering voice, “I want to know...now...who you are and what you want... and how you got in!” But he sounded defeated.
“Take it easy, my friend,” said Ramon. “Besides, you know who I am, but I don’t think you want to admit it. Why is that? Are you ashamed?”
As Anderson tried hard to focus, to not freak out, he searched his troubled mind. And something clicked.
“As a matter of fact the name does resonate,” Anderson said, while simultaneously, and somewhat uneasily, burping vodka. “You were the.... cleaner...?”
“Right!” Said Ramon, grinning broadly.
“Spanish?”
“Colombian.”
“Oh,” said Anderson, “Colombian.”
Astonishingly, Anderson detected amongst his general discomfort a small flicker of gratitude. In three months he’d spoken to none but a collection of bar workers and anonymous shop assistants (mostly Off Licence assistants if he were to be honest) who hardly acknowledged his existence. He’d been wafting through his own life like a ghost, his presence barely registering with anyone but himself. As bizarre and weird as the situation plainly was, the truth remained that Anderson was thankful for the company.
“We are the forgotten, Mr Anderson,” Ramon said suddenly, “the great unnoticed.”
Fearful but oddly resigned, Anderson decided to go along with it. “We?”
“We’re many, we’re everywhere, but no one notices us.”
Anderson smiled boozily. “How come I notice you, then?”
Ramon put down the novelty ‘Star Wars’ figurine he’d been examining and smiled benignly back. “How old are you Mr Anderson? Thirty? Thirty five?”
“Forty,” said Anderson, cringing at the thought.
“Forty,” Ramon repeated, “and yet here you are wasting your life, going nowhere. And you, a lawyer. That’s a good career Mr Anderson, but right now you’re exactly like the rest of us, it’s how we all got here.”
Ramon gestured with his arms while he spoke, as if alluding to persons present but unseen.
Anderson was indeed a lawyer. Was. But his passion had dwindled long ago, about the same time as his self-esteem. And where others might have embraced the milestone with a renewed zest for living, turning forty had only added to Anderson’s increasing sense of general ineptitude.
Exiting his dark thoughts, Anderson emptied his glass in a gulp and studied this strange intruder. This... Ramon. He looked friendly enough, like an unthreatening beggar of the kind you see loitering around cash dispensers, but still his presence was unnerving. Just what the Hell was going on?
Ramon’s eyes, Anderson noticed, were pointed avariciously at the glass in his hand. At that he rose unsteadily from the sofa and returned to the sink where he re-filled his own glass before rinsing a second unwashed tumbler into which he poured a meagre dose. Cautiously passing it to Ramon he said, “I don’t understand any of this, so why don’t you tell me, quickly and succinctly, exactly what’s going on before I either start getting violent or surrender myself to the nearest psychiatrist.”
“Ok,” replied Ramon, “Remember when you worked at ‘Lawyers For All? In The Strand?”
“Er... Yes,” said Anderson cautiously.
“Well,” Ramon continued, “as you correctly stated earlier, I was one of the cleaners, actually part of a team that serviced the entire building in which your offices were located.”
“Ok,” said Anderson. “I think I do vaguely remember you, but I don’t believe we ever spoke.”
“Oh, we spoke for sure,” said Ramon. “Or rather, I spoke but you never really listened, and this is where it gets interesting!” A sly smile showed itself upon his thick lips.
It was true Anderson had a memory of the man, but it was at best a trace memory, a fragment so insignificant it was hardly there. He certainly had no recollection of ever conversing with a Columbian. “So let’s hear the interesting part,” he said.
“Well,” said Ramon, “How can I explain this...? Okay, have you ever stepped into a bar and stood waiting to be served only to find that you are completely ignored?” (‘Okay’ came out as ‘hokay’).
“I suppose,” said Anderson.
“Hokay!” Said Ramon. “But not just ignored, I mean completely unacknowledged, like you were invisible. The barman finishes serving the person next to you and then wanders away, despite you waving your money in his face. Or he turns to the customer next to you, who arrived after you and then, as you stare into his eyes, still waving your money, he finishes serving that second customer and moves to another. Or he wanders off to speak to his equally oblivious colleagues, anything but pay you the slightest attention.”
Ramon had mimed the scenario as he described it. “Have you ever experienced anything like that, Mr Anderson?”
Anderson didn’t have to think about this too much. For him the premise put forward was very familiar indeed. In fact it was one that occurred with increasing frequency as the weeks of not working accumulated. It didn’t necessarily mean anything though, did it?
“Sure,” he said, “but doesn’t that happen to everyone at some point?”
“Yes, of course it does,” Ramon replied. “But that’s only the beginning. Eventually such a person, a vulnerable person, might come to expect that kind of treatment, come to accept it and see it as normal. Not all, but some, and the ones who do... well... sometimes we fade. Not from reality but from perception, like we cease to matter. We’re still here, just not significant enough to notice. It happened to me, and now it's happening to you.
Silence.
This wasn’t making sense.
Are you sure, Anderson?
Yes, I’m sure. How is this making any sense at all?
Isn’t it actually making a whole lot of sense?
The damned inner voice.
Haven’t you passed through the last three months as if you weren’t here? Does anyone call you? Speak to you? How many bars have you sat in for hours, alone, with not a second glance from a living soul. In fact, think about it Anderson, as drunk as you were, didn’t you sometimes vacate those establishments without settling your substantial bar tabs? Weren’t you just allowed to leave as if you’d never arrived?
Anderson wasn’t one hundred percent certain, but he thought his inner voice could be right. (How he hated the inner voice!)
Ramon had turned his attention elsewhere, carefully scrutinising one of the many DVDs (The Vanishing) that occupied Anderson’s crowded, too-large-for-the-room, shelf unit.
Anderson’s mind began to enter free fall. Despite the alcohol, a cold and absurd sense of reality was starting to take hold. Perhaps he was experiencing shock? If so he had to collect himself, now was not the time to lose it. “How did you find me?” He managed to utter. “And what’s with the pen? Is all this really true?”
Ramon blew dust off the DVD and placed it back on the shelf.
“It’s all true, Mr Anderson. As to how I found you: pure chance, consider yourself lucky. My life as it is consists mainly of wandering, scavenging, sleeping where I can. Though I must say my lack of presence helps in that regard, I’m simply not registering on anyone’s radar so I pretty much go where I please.”
He wandered back to the kitchenette and topped up his small measure of vodka.
“A couple of days ago I found myself right outside your door as you arrived home. It was about three in the morning and you were stumbling about very comically. It’s unlikely you’d have remembered me, even if you could see me, but I remembered you. And even though you barely noticed me back at LFA, I never disliked you. Not that much. So, anyway, I recognised the signs, I’ve seen them many times. It was obvious you hadn’t been looking after yourself, you were alone and your clothes looked like they could operate under their own initiative, given half a chance. So I took the opportunity and slipped in behind you and I’ve been living here with you, in your flat, since then.”
Anderson stared, this was just too much. “And the pen?”
“Oh, I managed to hang on to that somehow. My father, who I was named after, gave it to me before he died. I’ve always treasured it, and apart from these rags...” Ramon indicated his dishevelled apparel. “...It’s the only possession I have. Anyway I tried, but as close as you are to your D-Day...”
“D-day?” Said Anderson.
“...Disappearance day, it’s what I call it,” Ramon answered. “As I was saying, as close as you were, are, to your own D-day, I still couldn’t get your attention. So I left the pen there, on that shelf, in the hope you’d see it and start to remember me.”
Ramon pointed to the place where Anderson had found the pen. “And you did. Eventually. It took you long enough, though.”
“Wait, what? You’re telling me you’ve been here for two days?” Anderson couldn’t believe it. How could that be possible? Though not tiny, his flat certainly wasn’t large and he thought he’d notice if there was someone else living in it. Then again, if what Ramon said was true...
Ramon strode over and sat with a considerable ‘whump’ beside Anderson on the sofa, sending a burst of dust into the atmosphere. “Like you, I was on the road to ruin. I was also on my own in a foreign country. No self worth, no friends, parents dead. I lived in a two-room apartment, and as my situation worsened, my vitality, what little charisma I possessed, ebbed out of me. Unlike you I had no one to help me, to warn me of what was happening and eventually a young couple moved in and took over. Without even realising I was there! Can you imagine that? When I left, the pen and the clothes I was wearing were all I took. Mainly because anything I wasn’t wearing, they threw out.”
As Ramon spoke, something had occurred to Anderson. “Hang on, if all this is as you claim...” He held up a finger to stop the flow of words he could see were about to erupt from the Columbian’s mouth. “...and no one sees you or is even aware of you, couldn’t you just live anywhere? Buckingham Palace, for instance. Doesn’t seem so bad to me.”
Ramon offered a patronising smirk. “Exorcists, priests, psychic investigators, busybodies! They always turn up in the end and chase you out with their annoying bullshit. Spend enough time in someone else's house and they start to sense you. You eat their food, sleep on their furniture, watch their TV and forget to turn it off, whatever. Eventually they become aware of you, in a sort of abstract way, and come to think they’re suffering a supernatural infestation. Actually it explains a lot of life’s mysteries.”
Anderson nodded, that did seem plausible. And it did explain a lot. He looked up at a clock that hung crookedly, momentarily surprised it was still working (he had no memory of ever changing the batteries), and saw that over an hour had passed.
“So you’re here to warn me, is that it?”
“I suppose so,” said Ramon. “If it’s not too late. I’ve tried to help others without success, but you’re the first I’ve encountered who I thought really did have something to live for: a career, a beautiful girlfriend, a proper life!”
Some career, Anderson thought bitterly. He hated being a lawyer, one who clawed compensation from unsuspecting companies whose slow-witted employees thought they deserved recompense for slipping on a grape. Or a piece of wet paper (surprisingly common).
As to the girlfriend, there wasn’t much joy there either. Suze grew tired of the increasingly drunken, bored and dissatisfied Anderson and had high-tailed it out of the relationship some months ago. Looking for greener grass no doubt.
Almost exactly three months ago come to think of it.
Quieten down, damn inner voice!
He couldn’t really blame her. Dealing with him must have been a real chore. Out all night, grumpy and complaining most other times. He wasn’t at all surprised she’d left him.
Could he change?
Looking at Ramon now he felt he saw something of his own future; a literal nobody with nothing to look forward to. A permanently inebriated bit of flotsam drifting from place to place as no one cared.
Or worse, noticed.
The realisation of this jarred him and suddenly it was difficult to breathe. He cast his eyes downward and an errant tear dropped into the empty glass held loosely in one hand.
He could change.
You have to.
“Can I be saved, Ramon?”
Ramon, seated next to Anderson on the sofa, looked at him and smiled. This time without reproach.
“It’s up to you, Mr Anderson,” he said, draining the last of his drink. “Maybe. I never knew what was happening to me so I didn’t do anything, I allowed myself to fade. No one came to offer advice. As I said, I’ve tried to help others but they never listen, they’re too deep into their own despair. You remember Mr Abbot, the accountant?”
“Oh yes, Abbot, whatever happened to him? Don’t tell me...”
And then Anderson remembered.
Abbot had worked at LFA far longer than Anderson, he’d been there Lord knows how many years before Anderson arrived. Now that he thought of it, he couldn’t recall ever seeing Abbot speaking to anyone. Always at his desk, either working or eating a sorry-looking packed lunch, Abbot was a social outcast. And then one day he just wasn’t there and a new, more vivacious accountant had entered to replace him.
A feeling of guilt overwhelmed Anderson as he realised he’d hardly said a word to the man. Only now did it seem strange that Abbot’s departure hadn’t elicited a single comment, an iota of gossip, from anyone at all.
“Tell me what happened to Abbot?” Anderson said quietly.
Ramon, who had been studying Anderson carefully while he thought about Abbot, broke out another of his broad grins. “He’s still there!” He cried.
Of course, thought Anderson. He could imagine poor Abbot looking on as another, more charismatic accountant, took his place. By now he was probably feral, for it had been a year or more since Abbot’s D-day.
A feral accountant stealing food while forlornly roaming the offices of ‘Lawyers For All.’ You couldn’t make that up.
“Well,” Ramon announced. “I think my work here is done. Say, could I borrow a pair of your trousers?”
The sofa seemed to emit a sigh of relief as they both rose and Anderson walked to his musty bedroom to retrieve a pair of old tracksuit bottoms.
Back in the living room he handed them to Ramon. “Here, have these. They could probably do with a wash...”
“No worries,” said Ramon as he shed his extremely worn pants and roughly pulled on the leg wear. “These are great.”
Opening the front door, Anderson offered his hand to the Columbian who took it and shook vigorously.
“Thanks,” said Anderson, “I think you just changed my life.”
“Good luck,” Ramon said as he let go of Anderson’s hand and began shuffling down the outer hallway in the direction of the apartment building’s exit.
“Remember,” he called back. “What happens now is up to you. You still have a chance, so take it!”
Anderson closed the door and went again to the living room window. As he looked out he saw it had started to rain. Pavement shone wetly in the glare of streetlamps as the unusually large crowd of dark figures headed off to unknown destinations. Oddly, he had no desire to drink more vodka. Instead, he thought, I’ll have a nice cup o’ tea. If I’ve got any, that is. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d drank tea and the idea of it made him smile.
Yep, this is a new beginning.
The damned inner voice. Only now it didn’t annoy him as much, so positive was its tone. He realised he was feeling an extraordinary sense of relief as he took a mighty breath and let it flow out in a glorious exhalation, noticing how a bloom of mist spread across the pane.
It was as he looked contentedly at the light filtering through the hazy glass that he finally became aware of the others and was all-at-once engulfed by horrifying clarity. For it was just as Ramon had said, they were many and they were everywhere; hundreds of invisible people as far as he could see, each consumed by their own personal nightmare and the awful knowledge that they no longer mattered. Back and forth below him the multitude filed, all staring up with expressionless, grimy faces. Each clothed in little more than rags.
And though they were many they went unseen by the regular populace who even now walked among them, umbrellas unfurled, oblivious, as if caught en masse in a peculiar form of determined indifference.
You've been seeing them for days.
Another unpleasant cocktail consisting of two parts black dread and one part cold panic swept him up. “No, no, no, no, no…” he went on repeating.
From his front door came the rattle of a turning key, followed by voices. The door opened and a woman’s head appeared, peeping in, looking directly at Anderson.
“It’s ok, he’s left a lot of junk behind but he’s gone,” the woman said. “Come in and take a look around, but watch you don’t trip.”
The woman entered, shaking a wet umbrella, while a young couple followed, heads swiveling to take in the apartment.
“Nice view,” the youthful man said, staring at the white-faced Anderson.
And then he looked away.
We Fade(Paul O'Brien)
One of the few good things about his cramped first floor flat was the view it offered, taking in as it did the entirety of the busy high street outside. Now though, as he stood by the window gazing out, Anderson was giving some serious, if hazy thought, to moving. The street below was absolutely packed with people, not many of whom appeared particularly well dressed at that. And why were they all staring up at him? Ridiculous.
With a sigh, Anderson turned away from the window and all but fell onto an aging sofa. From here, he surveyed the sun-drenched room and noticed a mug perched on the television. He’d no idea how long it had been there but was certain that if he were to take hold of it, perhaps in a dutiful effort to tidy up, the mug would stick to its surface like a seaside limpet.
Though having eschewed traditional domestic responsibility for the past three months, Anderson had drank rather a lot – but not so much that now was not a good time for another. And so it was, as he ascended and made for the adjoining kitchenette, that an uncharacteristic gleam from the room’s far end caught his eye. Here, a large shelving unit dominated, and as far as Anderson was aware there was nothing on it that had any business gleaming.
The alcoholic treat momentarily forgotten, Anderson turned to investigate as a puzzling ripple of excitement went through him. Was he really so bored that an unfamiliar sparkle from a dusty shelf now seemed the most exciting event of his week? The object’s glow intensified as he drew closer, but when he arrived at the unit somebody switched off the sun and his blazing quarry winked out.
Seconds passed before Anderson realised he’d blocked the light coming through the window behind him, and as he tilted sideways the object once again flared into brilliant life, its sheen so fierce that detail was all but impossible to discern.
Reaching forward, eyes slitted against the glare, Anderson gingerly took hold of the glowing enigma and felt its considerable weight. With one clammy finger he traced the name engraved with a flourish that ran the length of its barrel.
Ramon.
It was a golden pen with someone’s name etched upon its surface, a name that meant nothing to Anderson.
Are you sure about that?
He removed the pen’s lid to reveal a long, graceful nib. Clearly this was no ordinary fountain pen, and Anderson supposed he’d be hard pushed to find a handcrafted implement such as this at his local stationer.
Bemused, clutching the mysterious pen, he headed back to the kitchenette where he liberated a partly frozen bottle of vodka from the upper compartment of his worn refrigerator. From the cluttered sink he withdrew a soiled glass and into it he dumped the beautifully clear liquid before availing himself of two invigorating slugs.
Anderson was certain the pen was not his. Whose, then? Who was Ramon? Someone he’d met on one of his benders? Possible but unlikely; a solitary drinker, Anderson never spoke to fellow patrons of his numerous haunts, and even if he did he felt sure he’d remember the person generous enough to present him with such a treasure.
The vodka was good and he poured himself another, the seemingly unfamiliar name reverberating in his mind like a chant, Ramon, Ramon, Ramon Ra... And with repetition came a faint sense of enlightenment.
He did know someone by that name, didn’t he? In another life, perhaps.
“Can you hear me, Mr Anderson?”
Anderson spun. Did he actually hear that?
The words were clear but the voice distorted, as though coming from a bad PA system.
“Helloo? Mr Anderson?
“What the...? Who’s there?” Anderson shouted, spilling vodka as he looked about. (Amazingly, this criminal wastage went unnoticed).
Then, clearer now, a voice thick with exotic accent said, “Here Mr Anderson, look harder, I’m right here!”
Anderson thought he must be hallucinating. But then something shimmered to his left and he turned to see the form of a small, portly man flickering into view, like the image that emerged when he switched on the old black and white TV he’d watched as a boy.
“Hello Mr Anderson, it’s me, Ramon. At last you see me!” Then, pointing at the glass in Anderson’s hand the figure said, “Mind if I join you?”
The sun had sunk a little lower and the apartment now assumed an agreeable dimness, its murkier corners receding into shadow – just the way Anderson liked it.
The entity that went by the name of Ramon paced around the living room, stepping over carelessly discarded clutter and stopping occasionally to inspect some small detail buried within the hotchpotch of paraphernalia that littered Anderson’s home. “You really should clean more,” he sniffed, disapproval evident on his rotund face.
Anderson was back on the sofa, his legs now untrustworthy through a combination of vodka and fear; a cocktail he couldn’t recommend. “Forget that,” said Anderson in a faintly quivering voice, “I want to know...now...who you are and what you want... and how you got in!” But he sounded defeated.
“Take it easy, my friend,” said Ramon. “Besides, you know who I am, but I don’t think you want to admit it. Why is that? Are you ashamed?”
As Anderson tried hard to focus, to not freak out, he searched his troubled mind. And something clicked.
“As a matter of fact the name does resonate,” Anderson said, while simultaneously, and somewhat uneasily, burping vodka. “You were the.... cleaner...?”
“Right!” Said Ramon, grinning broadly.
“Spanish?”
“Colombian.”
“Oh,” said Anderson, “Colombian.”
Astonishingly, Anderson detected amongst his general discomfort a small flicker of gratitude. In three months he’d spoken to none but a collection of bar workers and anonymous shop assistants (mostly Off Licence assistants if he were to be honest) who hardly acknowledged his existence. He’d been wafting through his own life like a ghost, his presence barely registering with anyone but himself. As bizarre and weird as the situation plainly was, the truth remained that Anderson was thankful for the company.
“We are the forgotten, Mr Anderson,” Ramon said suddenly, “the great unnoticed.”
Fearful but oddly resigned, Anderson decided to go along with it. “We?”
“We’re many, we’re everywhere, but no one notices us.”
Anderson smiled boozily. “How come I notice you, then?”
Ramon put down the novelty ‘Star Wars’ figurine he’d been examining and smiled benignly back. “How old are you Mr Anderson? Thirty? Thirty five?”
“Forty,” said Anderson, cringing at the thought.
“Forty,” Ramon repeated, “and yet here you are wasting your life, going nowhere. And you, a lawyer. That’s a good career Mr Anderson, but right now you’re exactly like the rest of us, it’s how we all got here.”
Ramon gestured with his arms while he spoke, as if alluding to persons present but unseen.
Anderson was indeed a lawyer. Was. But his passion had dwindled long ago, about the same time as his self-esteem. And where others might have embraced the milestone with a renewed zest for living, turning forty had only added to Anderson’s increasing sense of general ineptitude.
Exiting his dark thoughts, Anderson emptied his glass in a gulp and studied this strange intruder. This... Ramon. He looked friendly enough, like an unthreatening beggar of the kind you see loitering around cash dispensers, but still his presence was unnerving. Just what the Hell was going on?
Ramon’s eyes, Anderson noticed, were pointed avariciously at the glass in his hand. At that he rose unsteadily from the sofa and returned to the sink where he re-filled his own glass before rinsing a second unwashed tumbler into which he poured a meagre dose. Cautiously passing it to Ramon he said, “I don’t understand any of this, so why don’t you tell me, quickly and succinctly, exactly what’s going on before I either start getting violent or surrender myself to the nearest psychiatrist.”
“Ok,” replied Ramon, “Remember when you worked at ‘Lawyers For All? In The Strand?”
“Er... Yes,” said Anderson cautiously.
“Well,” Ramon continued, “as you correctly stated earlier, I was one of the cleaners, actually part of a team that serviced the entire building in which your offices were located.”
“Ok,” said Anderson. “I think I do vaguely remember you, but I don’t believe we ever spoke.”
“Oh, we spoke for sure,” said Ramon. “Or rather, I spoke but you never really listened, and this is where it gets interesting!” A sly smile showed itself upon his thick lips.
It was true Anderson had a memory of the man, but it was at best a trace memory, a fragment so insignificant it was hardly there. He certainly had no recollection of ever conversing with a Columbian. “So let’s hear the interesting part,” he said.
“Well,” said Ramon, “How can I explain this...? Okay, have you ever stepped into a bar and stood waiting to be served only to find that you are completely ignored?” (‘Okay’ came out as ‘hokay’).
“I suppose,” said Anderson.
“Hokay!” Said Ramon. “But not just ignored, I mean completely unacknowledged, like you were invisible. The barman finishes serving the person next to you and then wanders away, despite you waving your money in his face. Or he turns to the customer next to you, who arrived after you and then, as you stare into his eyes, still waving your money, he finishes serving that second customer and moves to another. Or he wanders off to speak to his equally oblivious colleagues, anything but pay you the slightest attention.”
Ramon had mimed the scenario as he described it. “Have you ever experienced anything like that, Mr Anderson?”
Anderson didn’t have to think about this too much. For him the premise put forward was very familiar indeed. In fact it was one that occurred with increasing frequency as the weeks of not working accumulated. It didn’t necessarily mean anything though, did it?
“Sure,” he said, “but doesn’t that happen to everyone at some point?”
“Yes, of course it does,” Ramon replied. “But that’s only the beginning. Eventually such a person, a vulnerable person, might come to expect that kind of treatment, come to accept it and see it as normal. Not all, but some, and the ones who do... well... sometimes we fade. Not from reality but from perception, like we cease to matter. We’re still here, just not significant enough to notice. It happened to me, and now it's happening to you.
Silence.
This wasn’t making sense.
Are you sure, Anderson?
Yes, I’m sure. How is this making any sense at all?
Isn’t it actually making a whole lot of sense?
The damned inner voice.
Haven’t you passed through the last three months as if you weren’t here? Does anyone call you? Speak to you? How many bars have you sat in for hours, alone, with not a second glance from a living soul. In fact, think about it Anderson, as drunk as you were, didn’t you sometimes vacate those establishments without settling your substantial bar tabs? Weren’t you just allowed to leave as if you’d never arrived?
Anderson wasn’t one hundred percent certain, but he thought his inner voice could be right. (How he hated the inner voice!)
Ramon had turned his attention elsewhere, carefully scrutinising one of the many DVDs (The Vanishing) that occupied Anderson’s crowded, too-large-for-the-room, shelf unit.
Anderson’s mind began to enter free fall. Despite the alcohol, a cold and absurd sense of reality was starting to take hold. Perhaps he was experiencing shock? If so he had to collect himself, now was not the time to lose it. “How did you find me?” He managed to utter. “And what’s with the pen? Is all this really true?”
Ramon blew dust off the DVD and placed it back on the shelf.
“It’s all true, Mr Anderson. As to how I found you: pure chance, consider yourself lucky. My life as it is consists mainly of wandering, scavenging, sleeping where I can. Though I must say my lack of presence helps in that regard, I’m simply not registering on anyone’s radar so I pretty much go where I please.”
He wandered back to the kitchenette and topped up his small measure of vodka.
“A couple of days ago I found myself right outside your door as you arrived home. It was about three in the morning and you were stumbling about very comically. It’s unlikely you’d have remembered me, even if you could see me, but I remembered you. And even though you barely noticed me back at LFA, I never disliked you. Not that much. So, anyway, I recognised the signs, I’ve seen them many times. It was obvious you hadn’t been looking after yourself, you were alone and your clothes looked like they could operate under their own initiative, given half a chance. So I took the opportunity and slipped in behind you and I’ve been living here with you, in your flat, since then.”
Anderson stared, this was just too much. “And the pen?”
“Oh, I managed to hang on to that somehow. My father, who I was named after, gave it to me before he died. I’ve always treasured it, and apart from these rags...” Ramon indicated his dishevelled apparel. “...It’s the only possession I have. Anyway I tried, but as close as you are to your D-Day...”
“D-day?” Said Anderson.
“...Disappearance day, it’s what I call it,” Ramon answered. “As I was saying, as close as you were, are, to your own D-day, I still couldn’t get your attention. So I left the pen there, on that shelf, in the hope you’d see it and start to remember me.”
Ramon pointed to the place where Anderson had found the pen. “And you did. Eventually. It took you long enough, though.”
“Wait, what? You’re telling me you’ve been here for two days?” Anderson couldn’t believe it. How could that be possible? Though not tiny, his flat certainly wasn’t large and he thought he’d notice if there was someone else living in it. Then again, if what Ramon said was true...
Ramon strode over and sat with a considerable ‘whump’ beside Anderson on the sofa, sending a burst of dust into the atmosphere. “Like you, I was on the road to ruin. I was also on my own in a foreign country. No self worth, no friends, parents dead. I lived in a two-room apartment, and as my situation worsened, my vitality, what little charisma I possessed, ebbed out of me. Unlike you I had no one to help me, to warn me of what was happening and eventually a young couple moved in and took over. Without even realising I was there! Can you imagine that? When I left, the pen and the clothes I was wearing were all I took. Mainly because anything I wasn’t wearing, they threw out.”
As Ramon spoke, something had occurred to Anderson. “Hang on, if all this is as you claim...” He held up a finger to stop the flow of words he could see were about to erupt from the Columbian’s mouth. “...and no one sees you or is even aware of you, couldn’t you just live anywhere? Buckingham Palace, for instance. Doesn’t seem so bad to me.”
Ramon offered a patronising smirk. “Exorcists, priests, psychic investigators, busybodies! They always turn up in the end and chase you out with their annoying bullshit. Spend enough time in someone else's house and they start to sense you. You eat their food, sleep on their furniture, watch their TV and forget to turn it off, whatever. Eventually they become aware of you, in a sort of abstract way, and come to think they’re suffering a supernatural infestation. Actually it explains a lot of life’s mysteries.”
Anderson nodded, that did seem plausible. And it did explain a lot. He looked up at a clock that hung crookedly, momentarily surprised it was still working (he had no memory of ever changing the batteries), and saw that over an hour had passed.
“So you’re here to warn me, is that it?”
“I suppose so,” said Ramon. “If it’s not too late. I’ve tried to help others without success, but you’re the first I’ve encountered who I thought really did have something to live for: a career, a beautiful girlfriend, a proper life!”
Some career, Anderson thought bitterly. He hated being a lawyer, one who clawed compensation from unsuspecting companies whose slow-witted employees thought they deserved recompense for slipping on a grape. Or a piece of wet paper (surprisingly common).
As to the girlfriend, there wasn’t much joy there either. Suze grew tired of the increasingly drunken, bored and dissatisfied Anderson and had high-tailed it out of the relationship some months ago. Looking for greener grass no doubt.
Almost exactly three months ago come to think of it.
Quieten down, damn inner voice!
He couldn’t really blame her. Dealing with him must have been a real chore. Out all night, grumpy and complaining most other times. He wasn’t at all surprised she’d left him.
Could he change?
Looking at Ramon now he felt he saw something of his own future; a literal nobody with nothing to look forward to. A permanently inebriated bit of flotsam drifting from place to place as no one cared.
Or worse, noticed.
The realisation of this jarred him and suddenly it was difficult to breathe. He cast his eyes downward and an errant tear dropped into the empty glass held loosely in one hand.
He could change.
You have to.
“Can I be saved, Ramon?”
Ramon, seated next to Anderson on the sofa, looked at him and smiled. This time without reproach.
“It’s up to you, Mr Anderson,” he said, draining the last of his drink. “Maybe. I never knew what was happening to me so I didn’t do anything, I allowed myself to fade. No one came to offer advice. As I said, I’ve tried to help others but they never listen, they’re too deep into their own despair. You remember Mr Abbot, the accountant?”
“Oh yes, Abbot, whatever happened to him? Don’t tell me...”
And then Anderson remembered.
Abbot had worked at LFA far longer than Anderson, he’d been there Lord knows how many years before Anderson arrived. Now that he thought of it, he couldn’t recall ever seeing Abbot speaking to anyone. Always at his desk, either working or eating a sorry-looking packed lunch, Abbot was a social outcast. And then one day he just wasn’t there and a new, more vivacious accountant had entered to replace him.
A feeling of guilt overwhelmed Anderson as he realised he’d hardly said a word to the man. Only now did it seem strange that Abbot’s departure hadn’t elicited a single comment, an iota of gossip, from anyone at all.
“Tell me what happened to Abbot?” Anderson said quietly.
Ramon, who had been studying Anderson carefully while he thought about Abbot, broke out another of his broad grins. “He’s still there!” He cried.
Of course, thought Anderson. He could imagine poor Abbot looking on as another, more charismatic accountant, took his place. By now he was probably feral, for it had been a year or more since Abbot’s D-day.
A feral accountant stealing food while forlornly roaming the offices of ‘Lawyers For All.’ You couldn’t make that up.
“Well,” Ramon announced. “I think my work here is done. Say, could I borrow a pair of your trousers?”
The sofa seemed to emit a sigh of relief as they both rose and Anderson walked to his musty bedroom to retrieve a pair of old tracksuit bottoms.
Back in the living room he handed them to Ramon. “Here, have these. They could probably do with a wash...”
“No worries,” said Ramon as he shed his extremely worn pants and roughly pulled on the leg wear. “These are great.”
Opening the front door, Anderson offered his hand to the Columbian who took it and shook vigorously.
“Thanks,” said Anderson, “I think you just changed my life.”
“Good luck,” Ramon said as he let go of Anderson’s hand and began shuffling down the outer hallway in the direction of the apartment building’s exit.
“Remember,” he called back. “What happens now is up to you. You still have a chance, so take it!”
Anderson closed the door and went again to the living room window. As he looked out he saw it had started to rain. Pavement shone wetly in the glare of streetlamps as the unusually large crowd of dark figures headed off to unknown destinations. Oddly, he had no desire to drink more vodka. Instead, he thought, I’ll have a nice cup o’ tea. If I’ve got any, that is. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d drank tea and the idea of it made him smile.
Yep, this is a new beginning.
The damned inner voice. Only now it didn’t annoy him as much, so positive was its tone. He realised he was feeling an extraordinary sense of relief as he took a mighty breath and let it flow out in a glorious exhalation, noticing how a bloom of mist spread across the pane.
It was as he looked contentedly at the light filtering through the hazy glass that he finally became aware of the others and was all-at-once engulfed by horrifying clarity. For it was just as Ramon had said, they were many and they were everywhere; hundreds of invisible people as far as he could see, each consumed by their own personal nightmare and the awful knowledge that they no longer mattered. Back and forth below him the multitude filed, all staring up with expressionless, grimy faces. Each clothed in little more than rags.
And though they were many they went unseen by the regular populace who even now walked among them, umbrellas unfurled, oblivious, as if caught en masse in a peculiar form of determined indifference.
You've been seeing them for days.
Another unpleasant cocktail consisting of two parts black dread and one part cold panic swept him up. “No, no, no, no, no…” he went on repeating.
From his front door came the rattle of a turning key, followed by voices. The door opened and a woman’s head appeared, peeping in, looking directly at Anderson.
“It’s ok, he’s left a lot of junk behind but he’s gone,” the woman said. “Come in and take a look around, but watch you don’t trip.”
The woman entered, shaking a wet umbrella, while a young couple followed, heads swiveling to take in the apartment.
“Nice view,” the youthful man said, staring at the white-faced Anderson.
And then he looked away.
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Valerie Allen
08/31/2023Don't let it happen! We're all significant and unique in our own way. The important thing is to reach out to others; we cannot be passive in our social interactions. Good point in your story for all to ponder. Thanks ~
ReplyHelp Us Understand What's Happening
Paul O'Brien
09/01/2023Hi Valerie
Thanks for reading and commenting. Means a lot!
Have a great weekend.
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