The Light from Hell -

The Appointment

The clock sat on the corner of my writing desk. A big, ancient thing with a key you had to wind. I had inherited it from my grandfather. He was an anatomist at a prestigious medical school.

The clock chimed a tired six strokes.

She was late again. I walked over to the window and pulled the curtain back. The street was empty except for the darkness falling on San Francisco. Nocturnal autumn winds twirled the fall leaves. A tribe of kids with angry Jack-O’-Lantern buckets patrolled the street below. No Lior.

I walked back to my chair and waited. Lior was my last patient. She was always late.

The second hand of my clock was casting an inexplicable spell with its quiet ticking. I heard the outer door of my office creak open. A slight breeze rushed into my room and teased some loose papers on my desk. It had the October bite to it.

Lior first stuck just her head in my office. A tumble of colors, scarves, hair dye, denim—peeked around the door. “Hey, Doc…”

“Glad you made it!”

She paused. Smiled. Looked around as if she expected to see another person in the room. “Did I mention last time—you’ve got a lot of books?”

“I do?”

She studied my bookcase by the door. “Uh-huh.” A new thought seemingly entered her brain, and she started to speak. Suddenly, she stopped.

“You’re about to say something?”

Lior smiled. “What?”

Then, in an explosive movement of body parts and midnight fashion, she glided towards me. With her came an invisible fog of smoldering and falling leaves. Her black leather jacket hung in tatters; beneath it, astrological tights shimmered faintly under torn denim. Lior always looked like she had fallen through a thrift-store constellation.

She ripped off her jacket and threw it on the chair opposite me.

She plopped down on the chair and tugged one scuffed army boot under her other leg. “Is this window open?”

“I don’t think so. Are you cold?”

“I’ve been cold all day. I think I am coming down with something.” She scrunched up her mouth and looked away. “I don’t remember your office being this dark.”

“You might be right.” It was like the room had grown darker once she entered. “There is a dimmer…” I pointed to the light switch as I got up.

“Doc, chill. It’s by the door?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “I’ve spent a lot of time here.” She watched the room as she adjusted the light. “Better?”

“What do you think?”

She walked back to her seat and looked at my bookcase by the door. “All those books about psychology and stuff?”

“What books should be there?”

“I dunno. So... I did some acid last night.”

“LSD?”

“… it was kind of amazing. Did I tell you about my artist friends last time?”

Time passed, and Lior talked about her artist friends and how she hated men who rode at the back of buses. But we never returned to the LSD trip.

“Lior...”

“I know, I know,” she said in a mocking tone. “We will have to pick this up next week.” She gave me a look of disappointment and then said sarcastically, “Have you got time for me to write you a check?”

“Sure.”

As Lior wrote it, she asked, “You going out for Halloween?”

Laughingly, I reply, “Me?”

“Why not?”

“I’m kind of old to dress up in a devil costume.”

“Why a devil, Doc?” she said, pretending to tease me.

I shrugged my shoulders. “I dunno.”

“Here’s your money. You know some of that shit is real.”

“Let’s talk about it next time.”

“I saw Lucifer last night,” blurted out Lior.

No one spoke. The clock answered six times.

Lior stared and paused. “It’s seven o’clock, William.”

Taking a breath, I explained, “I guess it’s broken.”

“Kind of like you, right?”

The vibrations in the room had changed. Lior had turned the relationship upside down. I wasn’t a therapist anymore, and I had no idea who she was.

“Goodnight, Lior.”

She got her jacket and all her stuff. Walking towards the door, she paused. “Hey, Doc, you afraid of the dark side?”

“Goodnight!”

She vanished from my office. No more patients, just a couple of charts and notes—the alchemical notations of care. At my desk, I found Lior’s chart.

Patient arrived late. She has been struggling with depression. The symptoms have moved from being angry about the loss of friends to delusions.

A noise from the waiting room. Footsteps. Then I heard the door of my outer office open.

“Lior, are you back?” I called out.

No answer.

Walking to my office door, I pushed it open. The outer office door was wide open. There was no one in the waiting room. A National Geographic had been tossed on the floor. I picked it up and threw it on the table.

A breeze from outside crawled into the room. That smoldering scent was lingering and trying to invade my office.

I walked over to the outer door. I looked out and down the stairwell. Empty. At the bottom, through the glass door, a child stood. The costume was disturbing. The mask should have been a painted grin, but it looked like an actual face—a real scowling face. I blinked and cleared my vision. The figure turned and was gone.

Back in the office, shadows were collecting. The room was in rebellion against the lighting of the office. The dimmer did nothing.

“Great. Thanks, Lior, for breaking my dimmer.” I yawned. “Okay. That is a sign for me to go home.”

It had been a long day.

The clock chimed. This time it was correct.

The streets were filled with demons, devils, and witches. I hoped by the time I got home, they had all found graveyards and realms of hell to eat their candy in. A light rain started, and the street lights blurred a bit from the artificial light. Usually, I don’t mind the dark, but as soon as I entered my apartment, I hit the lights. I was thinking about what Lior had said, and it was creeping me out. She wasn’t delusional, maybe depressed or anxious. Halloween, Lucifer, and a long day were making for an uncomfortable mental cocktail.

I sat in my study, which I had crafted like my great-grandfather’s room. I had gotten my hands on rare editions of Gray’s Anatomy. The cracked spines held horrible diseases that had all been cured. I had inherited a couple of monkey skulls—at least I believed they were primates’ bones. They lined the top of my bookshelves. Stuffed in a dusty bag behind a couple of books was a human head, a Borneo bushman had preserved. My grandmother told me it was her father’s favorite possession. I was sworn never to part with it. She referred to it as “George.”

“George, I hope you had a better day than I did.”

I liked sitting in the quiet of ancient medical wisdom. I noticed there was a book upside down on the bottom shelf. I pulled it out, and it was a King James Version of the Bible. That was very odd. I placed it back right side up.

The front door creaked open. It was almost time for my housekeeper to cook dinner. I wanted to talk to her about putting the Bible upside down.

“Hello, Anna,” I shouted out.

There was no answer. No housekeeper. I walked out of the study and turned on the hallway light. Nobody was there. I checked the door. It was locked. I went back to the study and poured another glass of Chardonnay. Then I remembered Anna was taking the night off.

I settled back into my favorite chair. On the table was a picture of my great-grandfather. I picked it up.

“I wonder when you were looking for bodies to dissect, if you ever got freaked out.”

I never noticed his eyes before. Intense, not in a positive way. It was like they were looking through the veils of reality. The sound of a paper bag rustled. Was George planning an escape?

“Nope, I am not looking. It is mice eating George,” I stated.

Checking my great-grandfather’s picture, I quietly said, “Sorry.” And placed it face down.

I thought I heard another scratching sound. Again, I stated, “Not looking.” I closed my eyes.

Clocks ticked. Footsteps of shadows ran down unlit hallways. And time passed. In a faraway world of dreams and sleep, something was ringing.