Brotherhood of Shades

“That is because it is not quite real; we are currently within the Memoria,” D’Scover explained. “This is a place constructed entirely of your memories and life experiences. The corridors look solid enough until we go beyond that which you have seen. You have never entered any of the rooms off the corridors and so they do not exist because you have no memory of them. In fact, as you were wheeled through the hospital to your room, you only saw the ceiling and because of this the floor does not exist here.”

Adam looked down and the floor was not there. It was not that it was a hole, but it just simply did not exist. It was rather like trying to look at stars: the harder you stared, the fainter the image became. The effect made Adam feel slightly sick.

“Hey, how come I can still feel sick, even though I’m dead?” he asked. “Shouldn’t all that sort of thing stop?”

“You feel sick because you can still remember what feeling sick is like. You know what would have made you feel sick, you remember, and it does make you feel sick. You do not actually feel sick, you just think you do.”

“Easy for you to say,” Adam grimaced, “but I feel like I could make a proper mess of your shoes, real or not. So, what now?”

“Now I have to take you through some of your memories so that you understand yourself and your life.”

“Really? God, that’s a bit depressing, isn’t it? Can’t I just skip on to the next bit?”

“That is rather a rash request,” D’Scover said, “considering you do not know what the next bit is.”

“Ah,” Adam nodded, “now that’s a fair point. OK, lead on, Mr Spooky. Let’s get on with this.”

The corridor began to fade and was replaced with a large open green space surrounded by a blurry green wall. The green began slowly to pull itself into focus and showed itself to be a large park ringed with tall trees. A small brown dog appeared from nowhere and ran off into the trees, hotly pursued by a young girl calling for it to stop. Other details of the park smudged into existence – a set of swings, a slide, a paddling pool full of children – all fulfilled the illusion that the park was real. D’Scover looked around at the environment gradually forming about them both.

“What is this place?” D’Scover asked. “It must be an important memory of yours.”

“It’s the park where I lived last summer when I ran away from that bunch of nutjobs who called themselves my foster parents,” Adam replied incredulously. “It’s so real! Is it real?”

“That all depends on your definition of the word real,” D’Scover replied enigmatically.

“If I can touch it – it’s real,” Adam grinned, pleased with his cocky answer.

“Ah, but if something is out of reach, too high up to touch, does it mean it is not real? A mountain top, the sky, are they not real?”

“Now you’re just messing with my head,” Adam laughed. “No, this place looks too real to be in my imagination, just like it did when I was here last summer. Everything’s the same, the ice-cream van, the kids in the paddling pool, the park keeper telling off the kids for riding on the grass, it’s all the same as it was back then.”

“We have not travelled in time, and so how do you suppose that we can be here last summer?” D’Scover quizzed.

“OK, let me think,” Adam said, walking round the grass in front of the paddling pool. “Well . . . I suppose . . . this is my clearest memory of the park . . . and so that’s how I’ve recreated it in my mind?”

“Excellent, a brilliant supposition and quite accurate.” D’Scover was relieved; the boy did indeed show promise.

“Why are we here?” Adam asked, bending to touch the grass beneath his feet and marvelling as it smudged like wet paint. He watched as it settled and once more became lush green turf.

“This is one of your good memories shown here in the Memoria, but you may have to let it go,” D’Scover answered. “You must listen very carefully to me now. We should sit down; this may be a difficult stage for you.”

He looked around for a bench to sit down, but there were none visible.

“Hey, that’s not right,” Adam grumbled. “There were loads of benches in this park. I should know, I slept on most of them.”

He closed his eyes and screwed up his fists, concentrating hard, and a grey mist began to take shape beside them. The blur struggled in and out of focus for a few seconds before settling into the shape of a shabby bench. It was just about wide enough for two, but still much smaller than a normal park bench. D’Scover watched in amazement; no one had ever mastered such object control their first time in the Memoria – no one.

“What?” Adam was staring at D’Scover. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”

“You like to joke, do you not, Adam?” D’Scover composed his sombre face once more.

“Suppose so,” Adam said, “and I’m guessing you don’t? So why aren’t I freaked out? Why aren’t I running around doing the whole spooky oooooh thing and clanking chains like other ghosts? Why aren’t I scared stiff? I feel kind of . . . well . . . chilled.”

“I imagine that in life you had a somewhat pragmatic character, and that has traversed with you.”

Adam stared at D’Scover blankly for a moment. “Nope,” he said. “You’ve lost me, brainiac. What did all that mean? Prag what?”

“Pragmatic. It means that you were down-to-earth, practical, well grounded.”

“Oh yeah,” Adam grinned. “I was that, I suppose. Not easily scared, seen a few things that should have scared me, but I always figured that as long as I could always be quick on my feet, I could outrun most things. Mind you, not much chance of me outrunning death!”

“More jokes?” D’Scover asked.

“Not that you’d notice!”

They both sat on Adam’s bench and, for a number of quiet minutes, they did not talk and instead watched the park evolve around them. More people walked past and an ice-cream van jingled its noisy way along a narrow road dissecting the green field.

“The next issue is always a difficult one.” D’Scover broke the silence. “I will not deceive you on this. These memories are here to ease you through this state into the Passing,” he told Adam in a serious tone. “You must decide what you wish to see before you move on. Many of these memories will be lost to you for ever once they have played out here. It is important you discard any deep woes you may be harbouring as these can trap your spirit in one place.”

“The Passing? What’s that then? Is that the proper deadness kind of thing?” Adam asked.

“You could say that,” D’Scover replied coldly. “Grossly simplified but, basically, yes.”

“And what if I don’t want to go there? What if I just want to hang around the living and haunt someone?”

“Do you?” D’Scover asked.

Adam shook his head. “Nah, not really. I suppose I just don’t feel as though I had enough time to do anything, to really live. Like my life was over before it really got started and now I’m just going to fade away. D’you know what I mean?”

“I do.” D’Scover looked around at the verdant greens of the park and marvelled at the accuracy of this particular Memoria. “There is another way.”

“Another way?” Adam gripped D’Scover’s arm and was surprised that it was solid; somehow he had expected to pass through it. “Don’t mess me around here; if there’s something else I should know or do to stop from just . . . well . . . ending and me being proper dead, why don’t you just say it? I can handle it.”

“I will tell you, but you are not ready yet. The Memoria has not finished; you have more to explore.” D’Scover stood up and took a last look at the park. “Show me more.”

Adam stood up too and shoved his hands deep into his pockets.

“I don’t know what you want,” he shrugged. “How am I supposed to give you what you want if you don’t tell me? This is all way too much for my brain to cope with.”

“Just let your mind go, let the memories flow.” But as he spoke, the green of the park began to drift out of focus and was replaced with a dull red mass that wavered as though in a heat haze.

“I know where this is too!” Adam said as the image became clearer. “It’s the town centre, and that’s the library building.”

As he said these words, the building snapped into sharp focus. Again D’Scover was impressed with the detail. The Memoria was as clear and vivid as if they were standing on the busy street looking at the building. People streamed past them in a hectic flow to and from their work. The road ran with car after car in a steady river of motorised metal. Adam stepped out into the road and walked briskly towards the library entrance. The cars coming towards him just passed around him, as though engaged in an effortless and well-choreographed dance.

D’Scover watched this, pleased again at this boy’s seemingly natural ability to accept the Memoria and to understand its capabilities. He seemed to have no fear. D’Scover followed Adam into the entrance hall of the library and through its squeaky turnstile on to the main floor.

“I loved this place,” Adam said as he entered the building. “Always warm and safe. No one could try and rob you or sell you drugs in here. The librarians liked me and I could just read all day or use the computer, even have a bit of a kip if I wanted. Best place in the world. Look,” he said, in an almost reverential tone, “my favourite chair.”