Fear Itself

This was meant to be an essay (I know, I said no essays - so sue me), spawned by a recent conversation I had, about the nature of the made-up horrors that frightened me as a child.

However, I was in a dark mood when I sat down to write (care to guess why?) and this is what came out. I was like pulling teeth writing it, and I don't particularly like it, but word count is word count.Essay, brain permitting, will be forthcoming.

Roosevelt said the only thing we have to fear “is fear itself.” And to him I say “Poppycock.”I don’t fear Fear – I seek it out, I revel in it. The tingle that starts on the back of your neck and makes all the tiny hairs rise, spreading down to make your shoulders rigid, snaking its way around your heart and lungs to make the beat faster, the breath quick and shallow;– then finally nesting itself in your stomach – no longer a tingle but a nauseous flutter. It is only then my dears, my darlings, within that infinitesimal moment when Fight wrestles with Flight that one is truly alive.

If I am not striving towards survival, I do not live – I merely exist – like the millions of gray cloned zombies that shuffle haplessly down the street like so many clockwork toys.

Like you.

I watch you following their track: They wake in the self-assembled, flat-packaged beds, blink their way through pretentious overpriced caffeinated beverages and flock like sheep to jobs they can never enjoy – having let the easy weight of drudgery crush their empty souls long ago; they watch the clock, then fight hordes of traffic in race to see who can fall asleep with the television remote in their hands first.

Silly, pitiful creatures. Killing them really could be a kindness. Ah, you’re shivering, my precious. Do you feel it grabbing you – your pulse pounding in your ears, gravity pressing against your lungs like you’re underwater and unable to catch your breath? How I envy you right this moment! Delicious!

But you needn’t fear right now. There are those in my little fraternity who find their thrill in the kill, so to speak; that’s true; but I’ve always found it a bit distasteful. The coppery smell of blood, the sickly sweet of their panicked vomit; and the…shall I say…when their bowels release….I can’t even change my niece’s diaper without the sick rising in my throat – so well..let’s just say I have much too delicate a constitution for that sort of thing. This knife? Oh, precious sweetling! It’s just a prop, an artifice. I like the weight in my hands while I am talking to you. I like the way it glitters when I twist it in the darkness.

Here. See? It barely stings when it bites your flesh. Just a pinprick, a sting, a tiny little drop of scarlet. I was never much of an art afficiando – but I do appreciate the contrast of dark on light – the sinewy trail it will leave as it runs down your neck…although I am afraid that shirt of yours is ruined. Mustn’t be a slave to material things, though, should we?

If I couldn’t only make you understand the gift I am giving you…you do feel it, don’t you? Alive? Like your life has value and meaning enough that you want to save it – keep going. What are you thinking of? All those things you’ve been putting off? The opportunities missed? All the changes you’ll make if you survive? It’s good that you cringe when I get this close to you…good that you’re aware of everything – each rivulet of sweat seeping into your eyes, your lips – the heat of my breath on your face. But I can see you don’t believe me yet – something in your eyes. If I were to let you go now you’d be back to your gray routine in a month – with maybe a few new scars and a good pub story to tell.

When you appreciate the Gift – when you can trust me, then, perhaps, I’ll let you go.

Trust me on this at least, poppet; stop worrying the ropes: I’ve lots of practice; they’re tied good and tight. You’ll be sorry for the burns later.

I was once like you, pet; that’s the wondrous thing…it means with my help you too can be free..then we can…oh, dear, if it weren’t so dark in here you’d see I was blushing. I’m afraid I’m getting ahead of myself. I was never good at being gallant.

Ah…but you’re so lovely when you’re weeping. I wish I could crawl up inside your brain right now, and wrap my hand around your heart – and just…feel you…your essence…your will…your Life.

I’ve seen you, you know. At the movies – not just the mainstream ones either…but the classics, the foreign ones – all the repertoire pictures in those faded auditoriums of colleges and despairing movie palaces (full of their own ghosts)– the films and features people do not stumble on accidentally – they must be actively pursued – lovingly followed.

The first time I saw you – it was that Miike film at the art house – I only noticed you in passing – you and your loud friends laughing before the opening credits ran – mocking those around you; typical, superior androids, I told myself, not realizing they are just as programmed as all the other robots.

But even then, critiquing some brusquely critiquing some locally-made scholk film you saw, I recognized something in you…something familiar. I thought perhaps it was the tilt of your head, or that sharp tone in your laugh. But then the lights fell and you were forgotten.

Forgive me, darling? If I had only known then – known that I would continue to see you at every show I’d go to – from the obscurest to the most retro – that you’d be there, in the dark with me – seeking the dark with me.


I knew – it was at Calligari that I knew. I turned in the flickering darkness and there you were – just a few seats away…and the look on your face was…well, I daren’t summon heaven pet, but it was unworldly. All those around us – those philistines, those restless, silly creatures – we slumped in their seats – whispering or surreptitiously pushing tiny buttons on electronic devices or molesting each other below the armrests. But you…you were radiant and rapt – like you knew the story and were the heroine and I the doctor, and all the world around us thought itself sane and we mad and never knowing it was the reverse. That’s when I knew you went there seeking something…something I could help you find.

Oh, dear. I’m sorry to have to cut you again, pet – but if I am to help you – you must stay awake.

The films – the books, the carnival houses – they’ll give you the thrill for a bit; believe me precious, I’ve done them all, seen them all. But they are safe, too safe, and you can only fool the body into that fear for so long. It is manufactured, manipulated, unfulfilling. Soon enough you’ll crave more. True danger…true survival…true fear.

Then, you will know true release, true life.

What would you do, child, if I cut you free right now? Would you try to run - find your way through the darkness? Would you weep and beg me for your life? And if I put down the knife?

To live, could you kill me?

Would you kill me?

And if you did – how would you live?

Go back to that office where they don’t heed you, to your frozen dinners and Must See TV and fumbling, unexciting sexual trysts?

Is that living?

Is that what you’re struggling for, there in that chair?

I see you almost have the ropes undone.

That’s good, precious. That’s very good. Makes one feel almost proud.

I can’t let you go, of course, darling. Not back to that.

You’re going to have to show me your life will mean something.

Start now.