White Space

Her invention must be dud because she’s been so secretive about it. What was it supposed to do? I expected more angst or bloviating, something. Her obsession was wasn’t with me, not any more. It was obvious to me now that she was hanging around for the money, to indulge her crazy ideas.

I suggested a sail to get her out of her cave, to spend time together, and she agreed, reluctantly.

“Can you trim that jib a bit?” she said. We sailed out into Nantucket Sound on a day we should have stayed at the dock. There was a small craft wind advisory, and the salt spray pounded our faces with every wave. She muscled the helm in her silent struggle against an indifferent ocean. It seemed like her internal metaphor. We argued about turning back. With lips pursed she said, “You’re such a wuss.” After that, silence and grimaced expressions. When she had had enough windward thrashing, she spun the twenty-four-foot sloop around without warning to run before the wind, transforming the boom into a giant baseball bat looking for a head to crack, and we rolled our way back, see-sawing and careening on every swell.

“I want to show you something in the lab,” she said when we returned to the house. She had never asked my help before, so I was pleasantly surprised, and curious. I followed her to the lab which doubled as the game room. She put a bizarre-looking device on my left arm, then hit a key on her computer. The device was heavy, with a ring of magnets and a small display. 

“I need you to wear this while we play,” she said.

“OK. What is it? What are all these things on it?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

She enjoyed being superior. I would never come close to matching her intellect, but she didn’t have to rub it in all the time. Then she whipped my ass in ping pong.

“Jeeze, can’t you give me the slightest challenge? 21-12 is pathetic.”

“Sorry I’m not a wunderkind like you. Do you even like me anymore?”

“Don’t be such a whiner. Of course, I like you.”

That night she attacked me in bed, a frequent event, and it reminded me why I endured her verbal abuse.

“No, no. Don’t take it off. Keep it on your arm for the night. The experiment is still running.”     

“OK,” I said, like a good lab rat. Then, I drifted off to sleep.

The next morning, I woke up feeling disoriented and couldn’t remember where I was. We sat on the porch and had coffee, looking out at the seagrass and the empty beach.

“How did you sleep,” she asked.

“Good, but I still feel really tired. I had an incredibly vivid dream. I was floating in this space with nothing but shades of white and gray in every direction. Then I heard your voice and some other guy’s voice. Both of you were giggling. Then, you went at it a few feet away from me. You never screamed like that with me! God, it was too real! I couldn’t see anything, but the sounds were clear. I heard you leave, then nothing except the wind.

“Really. That’s interesting. Are you feeling jealous right now?”

“Well, actually yes.  Jealous—yes—jealous and angry. But I know it was just a dream.”

“Your dream. The jealousy will fade fast.”

“Does this have anything to do with your experiment?”

“No, why?”

“Because it was a weird coincidence, that was so damn real, like it actually happened. I’ve never experienced a dream like that before. I can’t shake it.

The feelings persisted. I was in a jealous rage all day, battling what my logical side knew was a fantasy. Before we went to sleep, she asked me to strap on the device again, but I refused. Somehow, I knew there was a connection between the device and my dream, despite knowing how irrational that was.

It took a while to fall asleep. She was already snoring. I stared at the ceiling for at least an hour, then fatigue drew me into a deep and restful sleep that seemed like a long time—longer than eight hours. It’s hard to say. Then, consciously, I awoke. There, in the same white space with no up or down, no sense of boundary, witnessing without eyes, I replayed the trauma of her blatant infidelity. Desperation crept into me slowly as I realized it was not a dream, and I was not dreaming now. I was conscious, and trapped.

Then I realized the jealousy was gone. It didn’t matter. I realized she meant nothing to me. The sex didn’t matter either, and her psychological abuse could no longer touch me. In a very real sense, within this white prison, I was free. At least from her. The problem of getting out of this, whatever it was, remained.

The light in my white world began to shift with the passage of time. I knew there was a physical world beyond this space. I could hear it. Unlike my first experience, this torturous waking dream lasted the entire day.

It started getting dark, and I heard distant voices. There was animated conversation and commotion as the voices grew louder and came closer. To my shock and surprise, I recognized the male voice. It was mine.

“I’m taking it off,” my voice said. I heard the device drop to the floor.

“No! You can’t! Not before I reset it! There’s a problem! Put it back on!

Then with a plea that sounded final, she said, “Let me reset it. Please! Put it back on!”

Then words I would never say flew out, “You bitch! I’m going to kill you!” There was a blow and a body fell to the floor. Heavy breathing, and a computer beep was all I heard. I assumed my physical body had killed her, but I had no idea why. In a whisper that sounded like it was one inch away, I heard, “Now, I’m going to kill you,” my voice said to me.

I opened my clenched hand, and saw a crushed ping pong ball. There was Claire on the floor, bleeding, motionless.

The computer beeped, twice.