The May Editor's Pick Story is by James Marlow

Please feel free to email James at: marlow76@hotmail.com

THE NEVERMORE
by James Marlow

My sanity is a slippery thing. I’ve tried to maintain a grasp on the fleeting eel and have managed so far, but he is a tricky devil. Sly and impish. I feel I’m running out of time. Thankfully I only need an hour, maybe two, then I shall embrace madness like a long lost lover.

The only problem is I fear I’m sane. Completely and utterly functional. If that’s the case, I will go mad.

Am I rambling? Maybe? Possibly? If so, I must pull myself together. My date with insanity will not wait. I have found she is a fickle mistress, one who doesn’t like to be told no. So I will heed her call. Why, you ask? Why would I go willingly into the mouth of the beast? I’ll tell you.

A little over two weeks ago I was re-reading some of my favorite Edgar Allan Poe poems. I had just finished The Raven when there came a tapping at my door. I uttered a startled laugh at the irony as I put the book down.

“Is that you, Mr. Raven?” I asked. “Come a-rapping on my chamber door?”

I noticed the oddity of the tapping. My home came equipped with a steel front door and the sound the tapping produced struck me as strange. It was not the hollow boom of a striking fist or the rap of knuckles, nor the slap of an open hand. This sounded metallic. Robotic. Unearthly.

I stood with my hand knob height, about a foot from the door, and felt goose bumps start their slow crawl. The sound of the tapping was eerie, but the consistency was what got me.

It was constant but unhurried, almost as if my visitor had eternity to wait on my stoop. It wasn’t soft nor loud, angry or passive. It was just a perpetual tick, tick, tick every second and a half or two seconds.

It was…disquieting to say the least.

My mind flailed at what could be making the sound. I briefly wondered if Jenkins from the Physics Department had set up some kind of perpetual motion machine at my door as some kind of joke. Only Jenkins, like so many in the Physics Department, has no sense of humor.

Still, nothing else came to light but a thought did circle back in darkness. I was half aware of this lurking idea but wouldn’t let myself focus on it. One bit of poetry kept echoing inside my head. I put this down to the Poe I had just read but it persisted.

The Nevermore knocking at your door
Bringing fearful days, forgotten lore
Shall not beg, shall not ignore
The Nevermore waiting outside your door

I admit not the best prose ever written but it stuck in my brain running melody to the cadence of the taps. Those damn mechanical taps.

I still stood close to the door and this, I believe, is when my mind started sliding. “It sounds like a claw,” I spoke softly, as if in awe.

No sooner had I spoken than an image leaped from beneath the shadows of my mind.

I pictured an unknowable thing, gigantic, eternal, with coarse hair and dying eyes. One elongated arm snaking to my door. A bent finger extended and a yellowed curved claw tapping on my door. This was no raven sent to call. This was a beast (Nevermore) come to claim my soul.

I ran back to my chair and sat down. I needed to catch my breath. To clear my head. I needed to think.

I knew my vision wasn’t correct. It couldn’t be. Nothing like the thing (Nevermore) could exist outside of nightmare or fiction. I knew that, and I want to make that clear.

I also knew that the Nevermore was exactly what was behind my door.

You can see how sanity may start to slip in such a case.

I left the tapping and went upstairs to my bedroom. I have an old shotgun in the closet and almost grabbed it. The notion felt futile and I left the old double barrel where it sat.

I could still hear the Nevermore (see how easy the name became comfortable to me?) but it was faint. Sitting on the bed, a new idea struck me. My room, and more importantly my window, is right above the front door. I could open the window, lean out and see what was at the door.

I actually smiled as I walked to the window. I would get to the bottom of this. I had my hand on the cord for the blinds when I had an insight, an epiphany like my vision of the Nevermore (there is no Nevermore), and nothing will be there. I’ll still hear the tapping but the porch will be empty. I also knew (I can’t explain how I knew, but I did) that I could leave through the back door, it was safe, go around to the front and see nothing. The air might feel a bit cooler and reality may feel slippery, but nothing else.

I also knew I could go in the front door. Going in would be no problem, it’s the coming out that had me worried. This is a one way portal to…to wherever. Nowhere.

That night I called my boss and took a leave of absence from work, (I’m an English professor with tenure, so if I didn’t go a bit batty every now and then, the Dean would start to worry) stating mental stress.

I spent a week brooding and listening to the eternal tapping. I did what I could to keep my sanity. I turned the TV on as loud as it would go. I put on a Metallica CD full blast, ran the vacuum, the blender, and still I could hear the tapping. It echoed in my skull. I could feel it in my thoughts.

I could hear it in my bones.

I decided to experiment.

I ordered a pizza.

Sir Guido’s delivers and though I’m not crazy about the pie, this was for science. Kenny, the pizza boy, arrived an hour after I called and rang the bell.

“Come in,” I said. I wouldn’t be tricked by answering the door.

Kenny came in, dropped off the pie, made a three dollar tip and left.

As soon as the door closed I ran to the window. I hadn’t heard a scream but didn’t know if I would. Kenny was pulling out of my driveway and I ducked down before he could see my slack jawed look.

How did he survive the Nevermore, I thought, followed by, There’s your answer. There is no Nevermore, it’s all in your head. I pushed that thought away and focused on my internal data. Was the portal only intended for me? Possible, but that didn’t feel right. Such a thing as the Nevermore, although it came for me, wouldn’t be picky.

Kenny never shut the door.

The thought floated in on a cloud of redemption knocking aside doubt. Of course, how could I be so dumb? Kenny circumvented the Nevermore by coming in the door, and if the door remained open…

“A door can’t swing both ways at once,” I said aloud and laughed.

I needed another test subject.

Classy Escorts claimed to have “Classy Ladies and Handsome Gentlemen” available for an evening of “Comfortable Enjoyment.” I didn’t care about comfortable enjoyment or if the ladies were classy.

My taste ran differently.

My call was answered by a polite man named Edgar (a coincidence I’m sure) who asked all the pertinent questions.

“Yes,” I said. “A redhead is fine. Casual dress. We’ll be staying in for, um—” Here I floundered a bit. “—for conversation.”

Edgar took my credit card information but said I should feel free to tip my date in cash should I feel the desire, and laughed.

The door bell rang at nine and I yelled to come in. A pretty redhead in a miniskirt, blouse, and heels walked in. She seemed nervous but relaxed after I introduced myself and made it clear that all I wanted was to talk.

Her name was Lenore. She was twenty-two.

I will admit that when she told me her name my mind twisted a bit. I came close to laughing. The only thing that stopped me was the knowledge that once I started to laugh, I wouldn’t be able to stop. Still, this was one too many coincidences to handle.

We talked because I’d paid for two hours of company but my mind kept drifting. Lenore didn’t hear the tapping or else it didn’t bother her. She was telling me about how she didn’t think the escort business was for her. I nodded in all the right places but couldn’t focus. Every tap was a thunder peel echoing in my brain. I had to get her out of here. I had to see.

“So quit,” I interrupted. “If it’s so bad, quit. Walk away, whatever. Just stop complaining. No wonder men just use you for sex.”

This was harsh on my part and I felt terrible. I also felt giddy with excitement.

Lenore acted as if I’d slapped her. I could see tears forming in her eyes and I hoped she would storm out, cursing me the whole way. After all, I was conducting an experiment.

“You’re an ass,” she said and grabbed her purse. “I’m leaving.”

She walked to the door and my pulse quickened. Here it was: vindication in one form or another. She paused with her hand on the door knob. Does she finally hear it? That Morse Code signaling destruction? For whom does the tapping toll? It tolls for thee.

Lenore turned the knob.

I couldn’t watch as she opened the door. Did I feel a sucking sensation in the air, like pressure equalizing? I might have but I can’t say for sure. I didn’t look towards the door until I heard it shut. I was afraid that one glimpse of the Nevermore would send me rushing into its dark embrace.

I called the escort service the next day and was told Lenore no longer worked there.

I am still of two minds as to what is going on. Half of me believes that Lenore took my blunt advice and quit the escort game. Perhaps she’s a waitress in some chain restaurant now. One where you have to wear silly buttons. Or maybe she decided to go back to college. Maybe I’ll see her in my class when (if) I come back from my little sabbatical. The other half is equally convinced she became a victim of the Nevermore.

This started the second most hellish week of my life and led to my inevitable decision.

The constant tapping still defined my waking hours but the nights, those unending dream plagued nights, are what finally did it.

In my dream I’m floating through a thick cloud of black. I sense a shape in the distance, a monstrous eternal something that defies explanation. I know that this is the Nevermore. I can hear screaming and know this is what Hell sounds like. I hear a woman’s voice accusing me. I was right, it seems: Lenore is engulfed in the Nevermore.

I awake shaking and covered in sweat. Tears stain my cheeks and a thousand apologies die upon my lips. After a week of this I came to my decision. I could end this torment once and for all. I will open the door. Either way madness will greet me but I’ve made my peace with that. At least I’ll know I’m mad and won’t be bothered with answers that have no questions. I’ll not worry after the unknown.

When I open the door I’ll know peace. Nevermore.

James Marlow has been writing fiction in one form or another his whole life. His stories have been featured in the anthologies: What Fears Become, Shadow Masters, and Death Head Grin Anthology Vol.1. His lives in Indiana with his wife and his children and is very busy not being idle. Find him on Facebook by searching James J. Marlow.