At this juncture, the Somnologist—knowing, as he did, only the bare outline or ‘skeleton’ of the unprecedented marital discord which the alleged ‘snoring’ issue which had brought us to his Memorial Clinic had precipitated between Hope and myself, and evidently misapprehending my somnolent or dolorous cast of countenance as ambivalence or an insouciant passivity or ‘apathy’ (Hope’s own mien, meanwhile, had gone ominously rigid or ‘hard’ in the face of this sudden apparent diagnostic ‘volte face’ or reversal and the M.D.’s evident vindication of my own long held claims that the specific episodes of ‘snoring’ which had so aggrieved her were, strictly speaking, in fact the ‘unreal’ products of either a dream or the ‘loosened associations’ of nocturnal or oneiric ‘Night terrors,’ precisely as I had claimed repetitively throughout the previous cold weather months’ traumatic and devitalizing conflict, the vessels and tendons in her neck flaring involuntarily and her narrow, somewhat lupine and leathery face’s every line, fissure, wrinkle, seam, pleat, lesion, pouch or ‘flaw’ standing out as if starkly high-lighted in the muscular rigidity of her expression; she looked, for a moment, literally decades above and beyond her true age, and I could well imagine the oblivious or unwilled affront which our Audrey’s own ‘dewy’ or epithelial complexion must have presented to Hope before her banishment out-of-State, Audrey comprising an, as it were, walking compendium of all the daughterly charms Hope so feared acknowledging were now ‘behind’ her. [See, for instance, the prior early Spring’s ‘Elective’ or ‘non-essential’ and hence uncovered out-patient procedure to have the Varicose veins removed or erased from the rear of her bottom and legs’ upper portion, her convalescence from which was plainly so rebarbative and, frankly, sad or pathetic in its impotent vanity and, as it were, ‘denial’ of what had, in fact, long ceased to make any substantive difference. (“not start this again my”)]), now felt absently or ‘unconsciously’ at his forehead’s keratoses, and—in yet still another apparent, confusing or ‘paradoxical’ diagnostic reversal (pace his phlegmatic or sanguine demeanor, the Somnologist’s ‘bed side manner’ left something to be desired, Hope and I had both agreed)—averred (meaning, the Sleep specialist now averred) that, yes, technically speaking, my wife’s accusations as to ‘snoring,’ while based on (in his terms) ‘interior, dreamed experience’ as opposed to ‘exterior sensory input,’ nonetheless were, in a Medical or scientific sense, ‘technically’ correct. With the large collection or ‘ring’ of insulated keys now in his left hand, and addressing some type of facial signal or ‘cue’ to the nubile technician, the neutrally objective Somnologist stated that the ‘low’ or Infra-red light videotape of two such ‘Fourth-’ or ‘Paradoxical’ sleep stage intervals immediately prior to Hope’s loud accusations of my ‘snoring’ would, he said, confirm that I myself had indeed, within these intervals, been engaged in the ‘occluded’ or, more formally, ‘nasopharyngeal’ respiration commonly referred to among the lay populace as ‘snoring,’ this being a transient or recurrent phenomenon or condition often common to males over 40 or more, Dr. Paphian explained—particularly in those whose nocturnal posture was, by habit (like myself ’s), supine as opposed to prone, lateral or ‘foetal’—and occurring predominantly in human sleep’s medial or ‘deep’ stages Two and Three of sleep. Apparently, however, the ‘Fourth-’ or ‘Paradoxical’ stage’s paralysis of certain key laryngeal muscle groups rendered actual ‘snoring’ as or while one actively dreamt during R.E.M.- or ‘dream’ sleep physiologically impossible. All the Sleep specialist’s information was concise and bore directly on the matter at hand. My wife, meanwhile, was massaging her temples in order to signify stress or impatience. The Conference room’s somewhat subordinate or ‘junior’ aide to the Somnologist’s Sleep team—a roughly college age young man (or, in today’s more popular nomenclature, ‘Dude’) who wore, beneath his unbuttoned and not altogether spotless or sterile ‘lab’ coat, a pink, faded, red or fuchsia cotton ‘tee’ shirt on whose front appeared the line drawing or caricature of a nameless but somehow ‘naggingly’ familiar or famous person’s stymied or confused looking face, below which, on the garment’s fabric, appeared the statement or caption, ‘MY WIFE SAYS I’M INDECISIVE, BUT I’M NOT SO SURE,’which was almost certainly not meant to be taken seriously or at ‘face’ value but was, rather, some form of droll or ironic sally—now returned from his brief hiatus from the Conference room with a small, boxed set of ordinary or ‘commercial’ VHS type videotapes, which were labeled in black, felt tip ink, ‘R.N.’ and ‘H.S.-N.,’ along with Hope and myself’s respective P.P.O. and D.M.C. ‘Patient codes’ and the dates of the relevant Wednesday nights during which the actual filmed sleep ‘experiments’ had been held or conducted; and this youth and the (“only hurt a tiny”) Somnologist conferred together over a brushed steel or aluminum Medical chart holder respecting precisely which tape to ‘load’ andor ‘cue’ in order to empirically verify the Somnologist’s diagnosis of Hope’s accusations’ ultimately unreal, oneiric or ‘Paradoxical’ content. Hope, at this point, leaning once more slightly forward and furiously twitching or ‘joggling’ one high heeled shoe of her crossed legs, posited or inquired whether, from the sum total of the Clinic’s diagnostic data, it might be thus possible that ‘he’ (meaning, I myself) could somehow be deeply asleep and ‘snoring’ in the Sleep chamber’s bed and yet could simultaneously be dreaming the precise ‘sensation’ or ‘experience’ of being still somehow, as it were, still fully ‘awake’ in the narrow, firmly reinforced Clinic bed, a possibility which (Hope suggested) would account for my sincere or heartfelt ‘denials’ of having been asleep whenever she finally ‘[couldn’t] stand it’ and cried aloud in order to wake me—to which, interjecting somewhat irritatedly in response, I myself pointed out the obvious ‘hole’ or logical flaw in Hope’s theory’s scenario, and asked the Somnologist to stipulate once again, for, as it were, the ‘record,’ that, according to his explanations respecting the well known stages of human sleep, I physically could not be ‘snoring’ when (“dreaming”) dreaming, since, by basic logic, if I were, a., literally ‘dreaming’ that I was awake, I would, b., be, by definition, in the ‘Fourth-’ or ‘Paradoxical’ stage of sleep, and thus, c., due to the ‘Paradoxical’ stage’s well known laryngeal paralysis, I could, d., not be producing the rasping, gurgling or ‘nasopharyngeal’ snoring sounds which in fact Hope had herself in reality only dreamt that she’d heard me producing in situ. Both Hope’s shoes, gloves and expensive purse or hand bag matched perfectly in regards to color and constituent leather texture; she also always smelled quite fine. It was in or around this point that the lissome, mature, voluptuous but somewhat severe or ‘forbidding’ technician began to insert or ‘load’ a given, selected videotape in to a receptacle or ‘slot’ or ‘hole’ in the Monitor’s rear, and—utilizing a sheet of coded (“Please!”) Somnological data and the hand-held remote—to begin to ‘cue’ the ‘low’ light recording to the relevant stage Four or ‘Paradoxical’ interval just prior to (one would presume, based on the Sleep specialist’s ‘prolegomenon’ or gloss [physiologically, I myself still remained ‘At attention,’ one might say]) a sudden, aggrieved and high volume accusation of ‘snoring’ on my wife’s part.
Whether seemingly somewhat forebodingly or not, both all exterior or extraneous noise and my own neglected pager itself—as well as the swart, handsomely dressed Medical administrator’s audible imbibation or ‘slurping’ of his hot tea (a personal pet peeve of mine since childhood, followed as it was by the somewhat affected knuckle across the upper lip)—appeared at this point in time to cease, producing a sudden and somewhat dramatic or unsettling silence or distended ‘pause.’ Meanwhile, on the room’s Monitor, the video recording, which formed or comprised a diptych or ‘Split screen’ image, showed Hope and myself’s darkened Sleep chamber in a low amber light which was evidently distinctive of the appearance of low light film, the screen’s upper left and right corners displaying both the relevant date and ‘0204’ (or, 2:04 A.M.
in scientific or ‘Zulu time’) along with each successive second and decimal increments of same, with the (from our perspective) dextral or right hand side of the video display being comprised of a sustained, Infra-red close up (or, ‘tight shot’) of myself in the bed, deeply asleep, supine on my back with my hands on my chest, and—far more unsettlingly—of my own face, asleep. I myself had, not, of course, surprisingly, never seen or observed my own ‘unconscious’ face prior to this time; and, in the Monitor’s diptych’s recto or, as it were, right or ‘starboard’ portion’s unblinking close up, it was now revealed as being not a face I in any way recognized or ‘knew,’ with its slack jaw and protrusive jowls, hands on my chest spiderishly twitching, lips fishily loose or agape; and, although there was (to the Sleep team’s consternation and whispered colloquy among the aides and technicians at the Monitor’s rear, with which there was evidently some technical ‘glitch’ or malfunction) no audible sound (Hope, gazing in rigid fascination or horror at the dextral display right along-side myself, herself was silently ‘frozen’ [or, ‘paralyzed’ (“or hurt you if”)] in mid gesture, her pupils quite large and liquidly black), the flaccid mien, gaping mouth, slack jaw and puddled and quivering jowls I’d never ‘envisioned’ lying down (for, as with most husbands, I had, of course, only seen my face when seated or standing erect at the mirror, as in shaving, removing unwanted nasal or auricular hairs, masturbating with a saffron scented under-garment, tightening the knot of my tie and so forth), as well as, despite the recording’s defective audio portion’s absence of sound, the variably changing shapes and contortions of my unconsciously open mouth in the close up sleeping shot or wee hour ‘scene,’ as Hope and myself watched in rigid fascination (as when passing the wreckage and prone, twisted figures of a vehicular accident or ‘Crime scene’), signifying or ‘meaning,’ in other words, that the distinctive, alternating shapes of my image’s mouth’s slack lips, as well as the small bubbles of saliva or spit which alternately formed and dissolved at my open mouth’s corners (there was labial ‘film’ or paste in those corners, as well, gummy and sepia colored, distending slightly as my mouth changed shape), signified undeniably that sounds and noises of which I had no conscious or ‘voluntary’ awareness were in fact escaping my throat and mouth—no one with eyes could deny it—and, as the video camera’s focus ‘tightened’ or closed further in on my wholly unfamiliar, inhuman, unconscious visage, I either saw, hallucinated, ‘imagined’ (Hope at this juncture still rigidly or foetally ‘frozen,’ open mouthed and saucer eyed, as both the forbidding technician and Latin executive began to peel their respective faces off in a ‘top down’ fashion or manner, beginning at each temple and pulling downwards with sharp, emphatic, peeling or ‘tugging’ motions, the Cuban’s foreign wrist watch and hands a mass of amber lesions) or actually watched or literally ‘witnessed’ one sleeping eyelid open just a crack, ever so slightly, allowing a minuscule sliver or ray or ‘blade’ of light—as in, for instance, under a dark bedroom’s closed door when the hallway light outside is illuminated or ‘turned on’ as a heavy, familiar nocturnal tread slowly ascends the Victorian staircase to the bedroom door—from the rapidly moving and unconscious eye below, seeing as well in the Split screen’s right- or ‘off’ side’s shot my own wet mouth and slack, soft and spreading cheeks now begin to distend in a ‘grinningly’ familiar and sensual or even predatory facial ex
“up. Wake up, for the love of.”
“God. My God I was having.”
“Wake up.”
“Having the worst dream.”
“I should certainly say you were.”
“It was awful. It just went on and on.”
“I shook you and shook you and.”
“Time is it.”
“It’s nearly—almost 2:04. I was afraid I might hurt you if I prodded or shook any harder. I couldn’t seem to rouse you.”
“Is that thunder? Did it rain?”
“I was beginning to really worry. Hope, this cannot go on. When are we going to make that appointment?”
“Wait—am I even married?”
“Please don’t start all this again.”
“And who’s this Audrey?”
“Just go on back to sleep now.”
“And what’s that—Daddy?”
“Just lie back down.”
“What’s wrong with your mouth?”
“You are my wife.”
“None of this is real.”
“It’s all all right.”
THE SUFFERING CHANNEL
1.
‘But they’re shit.’
‘And yet at the same time they’re art. Exquisite pieces of art. They’re literally incredible.’
‘No, they’re literally shit is literally what they are.’
Atwater was speaking to his associate editor at Style. He was at the little twin set of payphones in the hallway off the Holiday Inn restaurant where he’d taken the Moltkes out to eat and expand their side of the whole pitch. The hallway led to the first floor’s elevators and restrooms and to the restaurant’s kitchen and rear area.
At Style, editor was more of an executive title. Those who did actual editing were usually called associate editors. This was a convention throughout the BSG subindustry.
‘If you could just see them.’
‘I don’t want to see them,’ the associate editor responded. ‘I don’t want to look at shit. Nobody wants to look at shit. Skip, this is the point: people do not want to look at shit.’
‘And yet if you —’
‘Even shit shaped into various likenesses or miniatures or whatever it is they’re alleging they are.’
Skip Atwater’s intern, Laurel Manderley, was listening in on the whole two way conversation. It was she whom Atwater’d originally dialed, since there was simply no way he was going to call the associate editor’s head intern’s extension on a Sunday and ask her to accept a collect call. Style’s whole editorial staff was in over the weekend because the magazine’s Summer Entertainment double issue was booked to close on 2 July. It was a busy and extremely high stress time, as Laurel Manderley would point out to Skip more than once in the subsequent debriefing.
‘No, no, but not shaped into, is the thing. You aren’t—they come out that way. Already fully formed. Hence the term incredible.’ Atwater was a plump diminutive boy faced man who sometimes unconsciously made a waist level fist and moved it up and down in time to his stressed syllables. A small and bell shaped Style salaryman, energetic and competent, a team player, unfailingly polite. Sometimes a bit overfastidious in presentation—for example, it was extremely warm and close in the little Holiday Inn hallway, and yet Atwater had not removed his blazer or even loosened his tie. The word among some of Style’s snarkier interns was that Skip Atwater resembled a jockey who had retired young and broken training in a big way. There was doubt in some quarters about whether he even shaved. Sensitive about the whole baby face issue, as well as about the size and floridity of his ears, Atwater was unaware of his reputation for wearing nearly identical navy blazer and catalogue slacks ensembles all the time, which happened to be the number one thing that betrayed his Midwest origins to those interns who knew anything about cultural geography.
The associate editor wore a headset telephone and was engaged in certain other editorial tasks at the same time he was talking to Atwater. He was a large bluff bearish man, extremely cynical and fun to be around, as magazine editors often tend to be, and known particularly for being able to type two totally different things at the same time, a keyboard under each hand, and to have them both come out more or less error free. Style’s editorial interns found this bimanual talent fascinating, and they often pressed the associate editor’s head intern to get him to do it during the short but very intense celebrations that took place after certain issues had closed and everyone had had some drinks and the normal constraints of rank and deportment were relaxed a bit. The associate editor had a daughter at Rye Country Day School, where a number of Style
’s editorial interns had also gone, as adolescents. The typing talent thing was also interesting because the associate editor had never actually written for Style or anyone else—he had come up through Factchecking, which was technically a division of Legal and answered to a whole different section of Style’s parent company. In any event, the doubletime typing explained the surfeit of clicking sounds in the background as the associate editor responded to a pitch he found irksome and out of character for Atwater, who was normally a consummate pro, and knew quite well the shape of the terrain that Style’s WHAT IN THE WORLD feature covered, and had no history of instability or substance issues, and rarely even needed much rewriting.
The editorial exchange between the two men was actually very rapid and clipped and terse. The associate editor was saying: ‘Which think about it, you’re going to represent how? You’re going to propose we get photos of the man on the throne, producing? You’re going to describe it?’