The Happy Room

Dear Reader,

Please note that the following story contains imagery of self harm, suicide, and declination of mental health. If you or a loved one are struggling with thoughts and/or affected by mental illnesses, please do your best to reach out for help. 

The Happy Room

Hedwig Bauer sits at his desk pondering with his hands clasped together. He is a gentleman who knew nothing but the time he spent adventuring the world and history itself. His intricate office patiently lies still as does he. The enclosed room was spacious but decorated from every corner, feeling much more constricted. He didn’t mind the claustrophobic narrowness, these relics were antiquities and artifacts from previous adventures. They must be treasured to keep their memories and dreams alive, he figured. With the limited internet access of his predated laptop, he stares at the screen as it dims from the lack of interaction. His heavy sighs matched equally to his daunting stature. Though the organized clutter of historical artifacts and documents littered the office, he navigated through them with ease. 

Gentle Hedwig Bauer paced back and forth with his hands behind his back. His eyes locked to the tiled floor. Beethoven fills the air on the record player, it was one of his favorites. His eyes danced among the room with the sounds of Symphony no. 7. Trophy heads of animals watched from the side wall with their own glazed eyes. He, himself, has observed everything in the room, as well. Too many times. There wasn’t anything he couldn’t have known about them. All he knew was what the laptop had offered and what he had learned before. 

He knew by the end of the day, it would only repeat itself. The record player scratched, playing again and again. The legible notes and essays on the paperwork fades. The sharpness and definition of every visible object blurs into obscurity. Everything in the room will become a gray scale, and then darkness envelopes until everything resets once more. He couldn’t explain this phenomenon. For he had countlessly tried to find an answer. He had been living the same day everyday. Aside from insanity, acceptance was the only other answer he surmised in the inevitable pitch black darkness that came after. 

Hedwig Bauer wasn’t sure how long he would stay in his room for much longer. His memories could only last him for so long in this soon to be abysmal cage he called an office. He returns to his desk and watches the screen. No notifications, no emails, and no contact. He knew all that he loved in his memories and prized possessions would disappear from him. There was no way out of it, no possible means of a concept of escape. The only door out of the room is locked. And it has never been unlocked before. He, like this room, will once again be empty. He wasn’t troubled nor was he anguished at the thought. 

“What’s one more day?” He asks aloud. 

Hedwig B. unlocks the side drawer of his desk and pulls out a metal case. Clicking open the clasps, he reveals a handgun and a couple of bullets rattling around outside its container. From the canvassed artwork to the invaluable and treasured gemstones locked in display cases, they all began to blot. The symphonic music distorts with every repetition. Skewing and lowering each time. He originally stood in a warm glowing amber lit room, fit for any historic museum exhibit. It was soon replaced with darkness where only the laptop screen glowed blue. Despite the lack of vision, his memory proved true as he flawlessly loaded the .45 handgun with the few bullets he had. He remembers all the times he’d dismantled and reassembled the thing. Too many times to count. Each memory blends in with one another now. Hedwig caressed the safety lock and flipped it. He pulls back the slide and holds it steady in his unshaken hands. He leans onto the table staring at the screen. Time only slowed down with every waking moment. 

“What’s one more day… with the same taste of metal?”

His thumb pulls back the familiar hammer and slowly returns. No tears, no shakiness, and no hesitation. He was no stranger to the end of a barrel. He takes a couple of breaths before pulling the trigger once again. In between each breath he waited. Nothing but silence and the scratch of the record player accompanied him. Before the third and final breath, he hears a knock. 

He had grown apathetic to the repetition of the life in this room, even his memory grew dim as to when he first arrived. He had simply existed here all this time. The foreign noise crashed into the pit of his stomach. His eyes locked onto the shrouded image of the door. Such a sound was a rarity for a door that has never been able to open. Isolation was the only company he knew. He repositions the gun towards the door, expecting the worst to come bursting through. Hedw steadily glides through the maze-like office and reaches for the door handle, secretly hoping that it wouldn’t turn. His hand applies pressure to the embossed handle and with the click of the locking mechanism, the handle fully turns. He had no recollection of being able to open this door. Merely impossible from all the previous attempts. This time was different for it came with a knock. He pushes open the door slowly all while a creeping noise rises. It then floods into his ears, drowning out the distorted symphony of Beethoven. The Gentleman realizes that the noise was not garbled discordance or a cacophony of clamoring. They were words. Spoken words.

Hed Bau, the Gentleman, looks through the fully opened door and sees a handful of peering eyes set on him and his handgun. The faces wore concern but they were not distinct. Some had wrinkles and others smooth. All had lab coats. The Gentleman was baffled. 

“Professor, how do you feel?” One of them asked. 

“You’re okay professor, you’re back now.” Another assured. 

“…Where am I?” The Gentleman asked, shifting his eyes left to right.

He gazes all around the room and sees nothing but unknown technology. Computerized machines and towering hardware lined the white metal walls. There were no sun filled windows and no amber shaded lamps. There was no scarcity of blue screens, however. 

“You’re here at the RnD center, we’re tasked with you to research subconscious thought and dreams within the neuroses.” 

“What are you talking about, boy? I am a historian, what am I doing here?”

The Gentleman turns to his cluttered office, only to see an empty white room with a matching chair and table. 

“What happened to my office!?” He questioned, “What did you people do!?”

He raised his gun towards the researchers and demanded for answers. 

“You’re Professor Hedwig Bauer, you’re one of the top researchers in the field. And you decided to dedicate your life to it, quite literally, even.” One of the other professors explained. 

“‘Dedicate’… No, I refuse! You have the wrong person. I. Am. A. Historian. I collect artifacts and memories of the ages!”

Indistinct whispers conversed amongst the researchers as they wrote into their electronic tablets. 

“Do you hear me!? I demand-!” The Gentleman realizes the handgun he held was nothing more than a white plastic block. From outside his focus, a meek researcher approaches with a tablet.

“S-sir, you agreed to this yourself.” 

“Let me see that! …That’s… that’s my signature, I think. That’s not- that’s impossible, you’ve forged this!” He spikes the device out of the researcher's hand. “Take me back! This isn’t-”

“Dad- DAD! Listen to me!” One of the female students shouted, “You signed up for this.”

“‘Dad’? Who are you? I’m not your father!”

Her sorrowful eyes couldn’t break away from his. As the tears welled up in the corner of her eyes, she held up photographs of her with him. The distant and faded memories soon reappeared with every photo he flipped through. 

“You’re… my daughter, Raye?”

“Yes, Dad, that’s me,” she said, pointing at the photo, “and that’s Mom, see?”

“I can’t- why can’t I remember?” The distraught Gentleman asks. He held up the photo of a smiling child unable to fully compare to the crying girl that stands before him. 

“You have dementia, it’s been progressing faster than we were expecting.” She replied shakily. “It’s Sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease… they call it ‘CJD’.”

He watches his daughters’ increasing grief as she lists the symptoms and hands the photos back with a heavy sigh. 

“Of course… silly me, I must’ve forgotten.” Hedwig Bauer said pensively.

At the sight of her tears streaming down her cheeks, He felt something gnaw inside. Familiarity in her presence was something he couldn’t fully comprehend. The hollowness that encroaches on him marches steadily. Hedwig B. looks down at his clothes and registers the medical garb that wears him, then back to the empty white room.

“How long was I in there for?” Hedwig asks. 

“Four minutes, sir.”

“…Only four? It felt like years. I didn’t realize scaling time like this was possible.”

“Thanks to you, Professor, it was. Now, we had you fast before we ran the simulation on you, Professor. It’s all part of protocol. Once we run some cognition tests, you’ll be able to get some food afterwards.” Another professor explains. 

  “Can I get some water at least?” Hedw insists. 

“Protocol, Professor. As you told us yourself.”

Shaking his head, Hedw follows the researchers into another room, much like the previous. Several of them were setting up their tests for He, the Gentleman. They huddled around his table and recorded every note from the devices. 

“Take it slow, alright, Sir? It’s not every day that time gets altered by your mind.” Another researcher jokes poorly.

The Gentleman sits at his desk pondering with his hands clasped together. He is a man who knew nothing of the time he spent researching these illnesses and the field itself. The sleek laboratory bustled with anxious minds, unlike his. The enclosed room was spacious but empty in every corner. What’s one more day? he thinks to himself.