Untitled
The camera sweeps across the scene to a man. He is sitting in the corner of the room, staring off into space. He notices the photographer and tilts his hand in a kind of wave. His eyes never seem to focus.Everything blurs for a second, and then all that can be seen is the floor. It bobs up and down in the frame as the photographer walks around the room, seemingly unaware that his camera is still recording.
Fred scratched his beard, his eyes sweeping across the room in search of anything more to look at than a dirty-looking man and the shapes in the wood floor. He remembered once losing his keys in his garden. They had disappeared with a rattle of metal and he spent a good forty five minutes looking for them. When it seemed he had looked everywhere, he began looking under rocks and pots. This was like that. No matter how hard he looked, interest was not to be found in this room. If he wanted that, he would have to go somewhere else.
I lean back against the wall. The rough hewn stone at least offers some variety of sensation. Makes it a bit less like one of those white sensory deprivation rooms. A shiver runs down the length of my arms. It might have been wiser to bring a sweater or something. But that isn't what I am here for. It would be more productive for my mind to dwell on more relevant things.
The environment in the room is so painfully boring. I sweep my hand across the cold floor and gather some dust in a pile. In my mind, I build up a mountain range over the unsanitary collection of various particles. That makes me realize how dirty this place must be. I wipe my hands a few times on my pants and pull out some hand sanitizer to disinfect my person.
With a fingernail, I flip up the cap, and then squeezed a light green gel onto the palm of my hand. I close the bottle, drop it into my pocket, clasp my hands together, and began viciously rubbing them together.
I bring my hands up to my face to smell the sharp, beautiful smell of the hand sanitizer. It fades quickly and they are left a bit more moist, coated in a bitter taste known well to people who like to wash their hands with it before eating. I resume my gaze into the wall at the other end of the room.
A moving figure enters my vision and I recognize the camera man's posture. He has the camera pointed at me. Slightly annoyed that he hasn't bothered too ask to film me, I give him a jerky, cut-off half wave with my fingers. The camera holds still for a moment, then he brings his arms down, holding it with his right hand and starts walking around the room.
He too is looking and failing to find anything interesting in this almost featureless room. My arms are damp with sweat.
The scene, cropped into a rectangle is almost motionless. It sways just about imperceptibly. Two men are sitting at the far end of the room. They are only a few feet apart from each other. One is dressed rather casually in sweats and a black shirt. The other is in a business suit. His hair is the tangled ghost of a sharp haircut.
The one in sweats sways restlessly, legs drawn up to his chest. There is no expression on his face, but he somehow still seems to be conscious and sane. Business suit man is also rather restless, but that can only be seen just barely in the beat he is tapping out with his shoe.
The whole room turns on it's side with a rustle and a dull, plastic sound. Everything is a blur again and then the camera is focusing on the two men. The rather disheveled looking man in street clothes has curled up on the floor. He is breathing, but only very slightly.
Fred glanced at his informal companion. He was on his side, still with his knees drawn close to his chest. It would be so much easier to just sleep until they all had to leave. Better not to risk missing it though. The humidity loosened the threads in his suit and he was able to relax a bit. Leaning against the wall, eyes half closed, he felt ready to complete the objective. With any luck, they wouldn't starve during the wait.
It happened almost in stages. I rest my face in my hand and lean my whole body on my elbow to get more comfortable. That is nice for a while, but then my arm goes numb. Small, precise, needling pinpricks of sensation envelope my hand. It feels cold and wet. I shift a little and it only gets worse.
I lean forward on both elbows with my head between my legs, resting on my hands. My back doesn't quite bend right to accommodate the pose. I ease myself onto my side and close my eyes. I won't go to sleep. Can't afford to miss it. I'll just lay here and think about movies and stormy nights sitting at my computer.
The man in the suit has almost closed his eyes. He is nestled into his suit and barely moves. Consciousness appears to bubble back up and his eyes snap open. Slowly and with some degree of difficulty, he stands up and stretches. His head and upper torso disappear.
Stiffly, the man in the suit begins walking. He goes out of frame and comes back a few seconds later, filling the whole screen. He disappears and returns at the opposite side of the room again.
Fred felt his conscious mind beginning to melt away. Physical will was replaced by a longing for rest. His sense of time was inconsistent. It seemed to spurt out and then start dripping like a hose that had been bent. That wasn't completely the effect of the sluggish state of mind that was easing him into a deep sleep.
He suddenly realized what was happening and stood up on wobbly legs. In an effort to regain his consciousness, he made himself start walking around the rectangular establishment. The informal one arched his back and blearily opened his eyes.
A quiet clipping noise, like the sound of high heels on concrete. It's quiet, but I still notice it. The noise gets louder as the high heels lady comes closer. It somehow has a different quality from everything else. Maybe its' constant regularity. It gets louder than ever, then almost disappears. A few seconds later, I start to hear it again.
I am laying down on my face and I open my eyes. There is a lady who goes by. She fades away, and then returns as a horse with two legs. The optical manifestations are all different, but the noise is the same.
There is an echo now. And everything is gone. It's all a strange landscape of shades of red. They are moving synchronous to the sound. A sensation is suddenly present. It feels too far away, but it's connected somehow. I realize it's my hand. The other hand fades into my version of reality. Then my legs. Then my face. I open my eyes. A shiny black shoe flies right by my face.
The informal one sits up and looks around. His eyes are wide. A gasp of air exits his mouth, shrill and abruptly cut off. The man in the suit looks at him and the frame shifts as the cameraman focuses on him, guiding the camera with his feet. Suddenly,the floor is all that can be seen. There is a sound like a button being pressed and then...Nothing.
Fred looked behind him at his companion in sweats. It looked like his mind was already beginning to fester in this environment. That couldn't be allowed to happen. If one of them went, the other two would soon follow. He clawed around in his pocket for something. Anything, really.
There was only a pen. Thin, shiny black. It was a simple design. His own design, actually.
Joints burning slightly, but in what felt like a good way, he knelt down and offered the pen to his companion. Unfocused, confused eyes looked up at him. "It'll make this place a little more interesting." Fred said, "Draw with it and stuff. We could play games too, if you want." He took it and pushed the tab that connected the cap to the body. It slid off with a click. "Thanks." Leaning into the wood, he began to draw.
I sketch some lines onto the floor. The pen slides across the floor a bit too well. If I had some sandpaper, I could have made a much better drawing surface. But this is fine. My mind feels more active than it has since I came in. My friend is facing me, kneeling on the ground.
It is a new video now. The perspective is higher than it had been for the majority of the last one. "Stupid shit." A voice comes from somewhere behind. The other person looks up from what he is drawing. "It's not the equipment that's at fault. It was you who forgot to turn it off." He disappears from the frame.
Everything spins around as the cameraman shifts it to the angle of the artist. A little bit of hair is visible at the bottom of the frame. His arm reaches out to create lateral detail on the inside of the door he has been drawing. A few more smaller lines and the material of the door has some definition. It looks like a heavy bamboo screen.
Fred looked at the drawing. He looked to his left. And back again. "Maybe you should draw something else." He said. His companion looked up. "Oh. Sure." He moved to a clean section of wood and started drawing.
With skill that must have been learned from a lot of practice, he sketched the shape of a slim face with four very light markings in the lower half of it.
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