THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 6

And then I was a little boy again.

I stood in front of a large table littered with colour. Boxes wrapped with silky ribbons, small cups and paper hats. My chin barely came up above the cake before me.

All around me people were saying “Blow” along with “Make a wish”

So I did, I blew as hard as my little lungs would allow. All seven red candles went out and a cheer sounded in the room, then clapping, a hand on my shoulder warmly congratulated me.

I stared down at what I had done. Seven dead candles, evenly spaced on a brown chocolate circular treat.

Suddenly I was overwhelmed with the sense that there should be more candles, 14 in fact. Or maybe not, I either thought that or that there should be two cakes.

One for me and one for someone else.

“Happy birthday Lucas” was the motto of the event, it resounded constantly around me as people gathered around my mother who was serving slices of the delicious sweet.

I kept thinking they should be singing it to someone else.

The day progressed as it always had done. I ate cake, I played several party games with my young friends. Then, tired and weary, my parents put me to bed.

As I lay in my bed, eyes slowly closing, I felt the black creeping back in from the horizons of my vision. I tried to remain awake, willing my little body to fight the onset of sleep but it simply wasn't strong enough. The black leaked in more quickly, blotting out all around me until there was nothing at all.

It was just black, nothing more.

Then everything shook and the black began to part, shifting sideways and revealing a dim light.

I was back in the room, sat directly in front of the mirror. It still did not reflect, it was still just the pool of viscous unknown I had traversed.

The journal was still in my hand, so I chronicle the events that transpired on my voyage.

The room still has no door or window, the lamp is still the only source of light, the mirror still the only other object.

The only sense I get at this point is that there is someone, or something I need to find on the other side of it.

There is no question in my mind about going back in.

THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 5

??????????????

I must have fallen asleep

I have lost track of the date and time. Before, when sleep was eluding me, I used the brightening and dimming of the room to gage when one day ended and the next began. When I fell asleep under the bed it was becoming light, now it is a pitch black that seems almost unnatural.

How long was I asleep?

I can just about see that I am holding the journal, hopefully these markings are legible and my hand is actually scrawling what I ask it to. I hope that it too has not succumbed to the engulfing otherness that seems hell bent on….well, I don’t know how to finish that sentence.

I realize now that this is the quietest and most still the room has been since this all started. Everything feel stale and inanimate, even the air, even me.

I edged my way out from my makeshift fortress slowly, none of my movements causing the record to start up again and the faithful dancers to answer the call. I got up to my feet, startled by the reversal of the maddening rhythm into a deathly quiet.

Cautiously, for fear on awakening the now sleeping giant, I tiptoed over to where I figured the light switch should be. I groped at the wall with my fingers, searching for the familiar square plastic signifier but to no avail. I ran the length of the wall with both hands, my search now frantic as my perplexity mounted. I realized that not only was the switch nowhere to be found, but my desk which normally sits against the same wall seemed to have gone.

For a moment I considered the possibility of complete disorientation, trying to assure myself I was actually not where I thought I was.

Then I tripped over something.

I recoiled in anticipation as my body thumped the floor in an unbroken crash, but nothing happened. No one came to dance, no one even sounded the music.

I gathered myself after realizing nothing was coming and searched for what had caused me to fall. Near my left foot I found something small, a base with an elongated plastic beck coming off from it. I shaped it in my hands, trying to
decipher it. Then I found a switch.

As soon as I pushed it a dim yellow glow penetrated the black around me. It wasn’t much, but it bathed everything enough for a pale visibility. It was a small black table lamp.

I have never seen this lamp before. It is not mine, I am more sure of this than I have been of anything since this ordeal began.

I gazed around at what I can only call my new surroundings, for so much has changed that I don’t appear to be in the same place anymore. The contours of the room are the same, but that is all that I can call familiar.

Apart from the bed under which I awoke, all of my furniture has gone. The only thing that is here is the package, which now appears to be roughly six feet tall and three feet wide. I was right.

It leans against a bare wall to my right.

Now that the dancing has stopped, now is the time to open it.
The paper covering whatever was inside was thin, tearing easily with the slightest tug of my hand.

Then, as more paper fell to the floor, I began to notice light bouncing back.

I tore at it more quickly, needing to know if what I had seen was correct. Finally, when the last piece which covered the part directly in front of my face had been shed I stood back to see what I had uncovered.

It was me, standing there, looking back at myself. The dim source of the lamp revealed it clearly enough. I was standing in front of a full length mirror, its dirty glass reflecting the scene of my existence.

But not quite.

It is me and is not me.

As I drew closer towards it I realized it was emitting a low grade hum, barely noticeable, yet definitely a constant drone.

Then, with my face almost touching the glass, the reflection died.

The mirror turned black, no light bounced back, I wasn’t there anymore, just black, a cruel almost viscous black like oil was all that looked back at me.

I reached out my hand and tentatively placed my fingers to it. My entire hand went straight through, passing past the dark into the unknown, feeling only cold and space. I pushed my arm in further seeing if there was anything to feel.

I found nothing.

Petrified by the unreality of these events, I turned and ran to the door, or rather where the door should have been, but nothing was there, only more blank wall. I circled the room realizing now that the window had also disappeared.

This place is a tomb.

I walked back over to what was the mirror, weighing up the decision that seemed to have already been made for me.

So, I clutch this journal to my chest in the hope that it can go through with me.

With no other option, I step into the mirror black.

THE JOURNAL OF LUCAS BROWN. PART 4

March 30th, 2001

However bizarre my circumstances appeared before, they now feel like a pleasant precursor to my current situation.

This, quite frankly, is a nightmare.

The dancing has reached a speed so intimidating that to feel it swirl around me is to feel the very presence of death, or nothingness.

Nothingness sounds worse than death.

I pulled the blankets over my head in an attempt to conceal myself and make believe I am part of a different reality altogether but the rustling noise of the material against my skin made me sob uncontrollably which only pleased the dancing and caused it to accelerate even faster and wildly mock my despair.

I grit my teeth and rolled off the bed, hitting the floor with a thud that sent the dancing and my mind into true turmoil, a swarm of restless bees filling my head and rampaging within its confines, smacking against the walls in quick succession.

Each one the same yet not the same.

I moved my hands and feet and squirmed under the bed, trying to find solace from the humming assailants. I lay there in the dark, stiff as a board. I did this for a while, trying to collect myself until the point where everything reached a level I dare say is manageable.

Then I remembered my experiment.

I wanted to check the package. I wanted to see whether I was right about its shifting, but I could not face the long walk to the cupboard. Instead, I shifted myself sideways as quietly as possible so that my head peered out from beneath the frame of the bed. The dancing stirred slightly but died down back to its usual steady murmur.

From my position, and there is no doubt in my mind about this, the drawer is now protruding outward, the package must be forcing it forward as it expands. I can see a bit of its packaging poking out through a slit between the drawer and the wooden unit holding it in place.

I don’t know how it happened, but I found my journal under the bed with me along with the pen I have been using to chronicle these happenings.
What does this mean?

I must get the courage to go over there, to open the package.