Perennial Eye

a submission for Sepulchre Roots

We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity,

and it was not meant that we should voyage far.

-H.P. Lovecraft

Last night, the dark called to me.

It wasn’t the first time.

Now that I think about it, I’m sure I’ve heard the call before: alone in my room or in the quiet with my thoughts. But this day was different.

It began in early June, on the banks of a Carolinian marsh. Cicadas wound up and released sighs in unison.

“Action!” I cried.

None of the camera crew bothered with their shirts. We tucked them into the bands of our shorts and wrapped them around our sweat-ridden brows. Girls came prepared with sports bras and bikini tops.

I stood with my back to the shore, camera aimed at our subjects. It was going to be good. It was going to be great. Of course, I thought this as I created. To be an artist was to engage in partial divinity. Mortality lends itself—paradoxically—to simultaneous visions of grandeur and bitter self-hatred. The scraps of the divine within me, flashes of brilliance, kept my feet upon the path.

I was brilliant,

I was manic,

I was a demigod.

Later, I would feel the crushing weight of this inferiority as I strung together scenes under his watchful gaze.

The man in question wrapped his hand around my belt loops, guiding me back through the cats’ tails and over rocky ground.

“Careful, Addison,” he whispered. I felt his voice before my ears registered. His ring finger brushed my lower back. I knew it was his ring finger: his gold band pressed into my freckled skin. I leaned back into his grip. The actors were stripped from sight, their black cloaks absorbed by the swamp.

And then it was done, the final day of filming closed.

“Bye, Dave.”

“Bye Addie.” My nickname now. It was a show of careless affection that anyone on the team would offer. The farewell was brief. When we spoke, we looked into each other’s eyes. That was as far as our intimacy got. Or maybe it was all in my head. Maybe I was just weird and saw things that weren’t there at all.

Sheri laid an affectionate hand on my head. She would have been attractive without the large coke bottle glasses she insisted upon wearing. And she had this habit, an infernal one, of licking her thin lips into a state of irritation. I wanted to offer her chapstick. Gold glittered on her finger, the other half to Dave’s. “I just love your hair,” she said. Her fingers glided through a thick sea of red. A knot snagged. I refused to wince. I smiled at her instead, pleased by the compliment. It meant that she still liked me. It meant that she had not yet caught wind of my feelings toward Dave. This was a relief. All of it was part of the same stupid game: lust, guilt, relief, embarrassment; lust, guilt, relief, embarrassment.

At the very least I owed her that guilt. It was lumbering, slow Sheri who’d “discovered” me as my art teacher. Her own talent lacking, but her palate was decently-formed. She introduced me to her husband by bringing him into the dark film studio I used without the university’s knowledge. I reflected on this meeting often.

I had carefully combed through and selected a film for their viewing. It featured men in rumpled suits arranged around a romanesque auditorium. They laughed, cried, and rocked; all in various states of hysteria.

“It’s good, just… very dark,” said had Sheri with a little huff of laughter. “Why don’t you show Dave something else you have—?”

“Inspired by Goya?” he’d interrupted.

I looked over sharply, meeting his eye. “Yes.”

“The Madhouse?”

“Yes.”

He didn’t say anything further; made no comment on the quality of the image nor the feelings it evoked. Dave just nodded. He arranged for me to receive a large sum of grant money and bestowed reigns over the project.

Some days later, we reconvened. They wanted to observe my latest draft. Before I played it in full, I found myself compulsively adjusting details. I hyper-focused on the actor’s faces. They wore masks, visages twisted to express extreme emotion. “It’s not right,” I muttered.

“How long have you been here?” asked Sheri.

My eyes flicked to the clock at the top right hand of my computer screen. Nearly twelve hours had elapsed. I lied: “Since noon, I think.”

Then, without waiting for further interrogation, I hit play.

“No sound just yet,” I said, “it’s still too raw.”

In the darkened room, the light of the screen cast strange shadows on Dave and Sheri. Dave was as impenetrable as ever. He sat with his arms crossed, head tilted so that his chin nearly touched his chest. I admired his form from my periphery: the broad shoulders and aquiline, regal shape of his nose. He didn’t look like a man who belonged in the arts.

Sheri tsked. “It’s dark,” she said. I could tell she found it repulsive.

Bitterly, I sighed. “It looks like the intro of American Horror Story.”

“Kitschy?” offered Sheri.

“Yeah.” I couldn’t help but agree. There was something wrong and it’s wrongness plucked and preyed upon my nerves. Suddenly, I wanted the couple to go away and leave me in peace. “It’s not done, of course,” I hurriedly added.

I leaned over the computer and spent a good forty minutes editing the images while Dave and Sheri watched. Neither spoke. They watched me at work. Occasionally, Sheri would indulge in scrolling her through iPhone. Dave did no such thing. He sat in silence.

I could feel his dark eyes boring a hole into the back of my head. Excitement burned a hole in the pit of my stomach. There was, of course, also the sense of inferiority as he watched me. I wanted him to like it, to think and say that I was special and good. I called through my work; metaphorically tugged at the hem of his pants like a child. Look at me, look at me, look at me!

“How’s that?” I asked. I hit play.

The film rolled for a minute before anyone spoke.

“It’s alive,” Sheri whispered. There was a rustling as Dave’s arm lifted to gesture for silence.

Indeed, the film grain shifted and undulated. I felt my upper left eyelid twitch. Maybe it wasn’t right, but it was going somewhere.

“Oh, I can’t look,” Sheri whispered. “I’m so sorry.” And she did sound sorry.

I offered an apologetic smile. “If it’s too intense, we can circle back tomorrow.”

When Sheri looked at me, a queer look came over her face. She averted her gaze and her nose wrinkled. There it was again: disgust. I was confused. Was she disgusted with me? Did I make her uncomfortable?

“No, no.” She waved me away. “I’ll take a walk. You two finish up.”

We continued to watch in silence for some time. He rose exactly one minute deep into the film. Suddenly, I was hyper-aware of how loud I was breathing.

I felt his hand on my shoulder. “It’s good, Addison.” He squeezed. I could see a faint reflection in the computer’s monitor. He was standing, only his torso was visible behind me, but I could make out the muscles in his forearm. They tied together neatly as he flexed. Faintly, I wondered what would happen if I looked up. What would I find on his face?

When I dared to breathe, I inhaled the faintest scent of aftershave.

I swallowed. “Thank you,” I said.

Dave spoke once more: “I think it’s erring toward antique horror.”

I risked a glance off to the side, almost over my shoulder. “Hm?”

The heaviness of his hand left me. Without elaborating his previous statement, he waved to the screen. “Let’s have at it with the audio.”

I handed him a pair of headphones. Finger on the mousepad, I returned the film to its beginning. Dave motioned for me to click play. I did.

There was some silence.

It sounded like the audio track was snagging on something physical.

I paused. “Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

He took up the headphones and placed them over his head.

“It seems like the mic was rubbing against something,” he mumbled.

“No, no,” I whispered. I turned up the volume. “It’s like…” I trailed off, trying to find a way to describe a sound that was, quite frankly, indescribable. It was akin to a moan, high-pitched. Like a violin’s weeping. A whale, perhaps? I was unsure.

I couldn’t place it. My eyes slipped shut and I listened. It was like… something simultaneously familiar and alien. It pressed against my ears the same way water did at the bottom of a pool.

I shivered.

When I opened my eyes, I saw Dave had taken the headphones off. His face was drawn.

“What?” I asked.

He didn’t respond. He stared into space, index finger and thumb rubbing together. “R’lyeh,” Dave mumbled.

“What’s that?”

He started. “What?”

“You said something about Raleigh?”

He dark brows knitted and then relaxed. “Nothing.”

My face reddened, embarrassed by the speed with which he’d dismissed my concern. Did he not care that I cared?

I stood without reason and wiped my palms on my jeans. “Someone must’ve dropped the mic in water,” I muttered.

“Throw it away.”

I turned my head toward Dave sharply. “What did you say?”

“Oh…” He shook his head and removed the headphones. It was unlike him to be at a loss for words. Silent, yes, but never unsure. Dave cleared his throat. “I said let’s give it a rest for today. Um, you might want to start from scratch.”

I felt my heart sink. “From scratch?” I echoed. “Even filming?”

“Yeah.”

I dropped a hand onto the desk and felt my fingers curl into a fist. “From scratch,” I said once again. “You really think so?”

“I really do.” His voice was flat, disinterested.

I pressed my lips together in a tight line. “Fine.”

Neither of us moved. I waited for him to follow up with something else, some explanation. He did not meet my eye. I felt shame and guilt. Did I do something wrong?

What did I do wrong, what did I do wrong, what did I do wrong?

I dreamt of him that night. I was in the bath, walking my pale feet up the porcelain tub toward the faucet to turn off the water. As I did, my face sunk beneath the surface. I left my nose and eyes above the water in childlike fashion. I could make out the nail polish on my toes—red, of course.

Yet, though I turned the faucet off, it wouldn’t stop. The water continued. It filled the tub to the brim. I heard it overflow, it hit the tile with a great splash.

Dave watched my attempts from the corner. He was sitting on a director’s chair, expression unreadable.

The scene should’ve felt lush or provocative and yet it did not. My face was not flushed with heat. Everything was still; almost sterile.

“You could help,” I said, lifting my head fully.

But he sort of melted into the shadows and the walls fell away. I was cold. Something whispered in a disembodied voice. No. No, it was not a whisper, it was a stirring.

I sat up. Water dripped from the tip of my chin. The faucet had ceased its rush and now everything was so terribly silent. I wrapped my arms about myself. The water lapped at my knees. Something was in there with me.

The dark swallowed me. Something lived there within the enormity and I could taste its indifference. I feared for something at first to lunge at me, for a tentacle to wrap its lascivious limbs about mine, but that would be too personal. With that understanding, a greater terror took hold.

I’d already been consumed.

Then, I was awake.

Thrumming in my head was that same aquatic echo. I turned on my side, eyes wide and pressed my face into the pillow in a desperate attempt to ground myself. The threads of a cheap fabric cut into my cheek.

“It’s not real, it’s not real,” I whispered to myself.

But I could not be convinced.

As fear evaporated, though, another thought took hold. This sound was an indicator of my talent. It was something others couldn’t see, but should. Perhaps not for their sake but my own pride. I rose and began to pace.

I would capture it, it must. For the sake of recognition. Perhaps if I did, Dave would once again see my genius.

But how?

This question reeled in my mind on the bathroom floor of my apartment. I felt the rim of the bathtub press uncomfortably into my spine. I didn’t mind. It kept me awake. It was 4AM; long past the witching hour. The hour mattered not because it followed me. I laughed as I thought this. I gnawed at the cuticle on the side of my thumb. Catching my reflection in the mirror, I halted. My eyes were wide and gaunt, the bags beneath revealed exhaustion. Pale, I’d always been pale, but now I was translucent. My posture was hunched.

I scrambled to my feet. As I did, my breathing hitched. Tears stung my eyes and my face contorted. With haste, I averted my eyes from the mirror. I was pretty until I cried. I used to think that I was a sad person. Now, I wouldn’t say so. When I really think about it, I only cry when I don’t get what I want.

With a sigh, I resigned myself to return to bed. I had to volunteer at a community fair the next morning. After, I would begin my documentation of the sound. I sighed, satisfied with my conclusion.

I padded softly over the carpet and entered my room. The shades were wide open. I preferred it that way so that the morning sun would rouse me and the moon would watch me sleep. Now, however, summer rain lashed at my window. That, and the ceiling fan, welcomed me forth.

Weariness struck me.

The radio on my digital clock droned:

An off-shore oil platform¹ in the Pacific was destroyed in the early hours of today. Its crew were lost and, as of now, there are no known survivors—

I switched it off and crawled beneath the comforter. After some hours of watching the rain and streetlights cast shadows on my wall, I fell into a restless slumber.

The church was an old one. It’s sea-weathered walls stood on this land since the turn of the 18th century. It’s gothic-ness was eclipsed by flags and paper lanterns. They fapped gaily in the wind.

I sat on a low stone wall and readied my tools. Nearby, Harry Fernby was setting up his easel. Every year he’d sketch caricatures of churchgoers. I knew him from class and from when my parents took me to church. Charleston felt like a small town disguised as city.

There was a strength about him, both physical and intangible, that I’d noticed over time. He was small and thin at first glance. Then, later I recognized his wiry nature; the well developed frame beneath sun-warmed skin. I’d admired him in high school. Like many things, though, it came and went.

He met my eye and winced. “Goodness, Addie. Look a the state of you.”

I shot Harry a poisonous look. “Gee, thanks.”

“What’re you, sick?”

I sniffed as I uncapped the camera. “Maybe, I dunno.” My answer surprised myself; a rare moment of honesty. Quickly, I raised my eyes to his face to measure his expression. I could see concern. It made me uncomfortable. I looked away.

“My exams are coming up,” I said. “I have a lot of projects to finish.”

“No sleep, then.”

“Not really.”

“Stress dreams?”

“Why do you ask?”

Harry shook his head hurriedly. He jammed his no. 2 pencil between his teeth. I could hear the wood give way beneath his canines. Speaking around it, he said, “just asking. I’ve been struggling with it.”

“What? Exams?”

“No, stress dreams.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

I stared at him.

He continued to chew on the pencil thoughtfully. “Cicadas are quiet.”

Turning my head to the trees, I realized he was right. I felt my eyebrows raise.

“There’s something in the air,” he continued in a low voice, “and I don’t think everyone knows it yet.”

My breath caught in my throat. “What are you talking about, Harry?”

“You know,” he answered. “I can see it in your face. You’ve heard it. You don’t know what it is. I don’t know. But we can feel it. It’s coming.”

I looked down at my camera’s screen. It was recording, capturing my sneakers in the grass. My pulse thrummed in my throat. “Why, though?” My question was quiet, more for myself.

Harry looked up to the sky as another breeze rocked the oak trees. He spoke:

We are the music makers,

And we are the dreamers of dreams,

Wandering by lone sea-breakers,

And sitting by desolate streams; —

World-losers and world-forsakers,

On whom the pale moon gleams:

Yet we are the movers and shakers

Of the world for ever, it seems.²

He finished. We were both quiet a moment. He lowered his eyes to mine and smiled. “I don’t see you around very much anymore, Addie. I’d like to show you some of the stuff I’ve been working on when you’re free.”

I was taken aback. “Really?”

“Mhm. I’d like your opinion.”

I smiled despite myself.

That night, once again, I dreamed.

I stood on the edge of the pier. There was something in the nebulous dark.

I dreamed of cyclopean mazes and distant shores. I saw the sun-drenched sands of Nod. I walked among gods and creatures with no name. There, in that place beyond time, the wolves howled at the sun and the moon blinded me with its rays. Men came forth from foaming waves. I came to a land beneath water. It pressed in from all sides. Water filled my mouth and lungs. I saw masonry, catacombs whose architecture I did not recognize. Upon their surface was written indecipherable characters—at least to myself. All the while, my teeth chattered. What was this forgotten necropolis? Atlantis?

They came long before us and they crossed with great swinging steps. From the East and the West, from the North and South, they came! The ground shook beneath my feet. The largest of them all halted. It was so high above, I could not make out anything above its hips.

I was an ant, an insect.

The knees bent. To my horror, I realized that it was going to crouch. A high pitched ringing seized my consciousness. I gasped and clapped my hands to my ears. Madness, madness. I couldn’t understand.

A singular red eye turned down from above. It passed over me.

Humility, I felt humility.

I stood before the great beast and dared not look into its face.

This is a warning.

It is coming.

In his house at R'lyeh, the old one waits dreaming.³

In his house at R'lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.

ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.

I am awake and I feel his eye.

1.

Scoot

2. Ode by Arthur O’Shaughnessy

3. The Call of Cthulhu by H.P. Lovecraft