Eternal Return

by C. M. Barnes

Table of Contents

Table of Contents
parts: 1, 2, 3 4

conclusion

6/6/16 (cont’d)

There is another way. I hesitate to record it because it is so unbelievable, but I am already in deep, aren’t I? I have already seen impossible and terrifying things. Why should I hesitate to believe in more?

I didn’t discover it until late in the day, when the moldy dusk now filling the window over this desk first began to fall. It wasn’t included with “The Eternal Return” invocation proper. It was in an entirely different part of The Key, as if even the terrible authors of this infernal book feared its implications and wished to hide it away. I don’t blame them. It is horrifying... but also fascinating, so fascinating that it has taken hold of me with a power that feels inexorable. Yet, even now, I am not sure if I can go through with it. Who could be? And yet...

Imagine for a moment, Doctor, that you could be reborn into your youth. What’s more, imagine that you could be returned not only to all your physical vigor, your nubile grace, your spring-season charm, but also that you would retain all the knowledge you hold now, every bit of learning and world wisdom you could then use to your advantage. In exchange, you would have to undergo a horrific process of destruction — one that would result in the end of your current, degraded form at the hands of... no, say it! the teeth of awful creatures who would then bury the remains of you only so you could rise anew.

Let me say also, if only for the sake of completeness, that you would also lose your soul in the process. This is the horrifying, fascinating bargain I have just discovered. It would become the property of the great darkness beyond and would be imprisoned for all eternity in that shadowed dimension sometimes called Hell.

A terrible loss, to be sure, except — and here’s the selling point, dear Doctor — you could do it all over again! That is to say, every time that time begins to sink its fiendish claws into you, you could perform the same ritual, make the same sacrifice, feed the same beasts, and leave your failing body behind to rise, whole and young, once more! Needless to say, your eternal soul would not be returned to you. But, then again, who needs an eternal soul when one can summon eternally youthful flesh?

(I will no longer appeal to God.)

Judge me not, Doctor, lest you be judged by the same terrible creatures that have confronted me here. It is fair to say that they are the true judges, as they have revealed my true character in all its iniquitous wants and desires. I also know now why they did not destroy me last night. Don’t you see? They wanted me to find this alternative. That is, they want my soul along with my skin, and I would be lying if I said I don’t plan to give it to them.

After all, hasn’t the Actor already made this same trade multiple times? His otherwise twin ghouls in various states of decay confess as much. It’s an interesting side effect of the invocation, actually. The first time they consume you, they eat you nearly whole, hence the uncollasped mound I dug into containing nothing but stinking, indeterminate leavings. But every subsequent time, less of your discarded corpse can be used to feed the beasts. What’s left must walk the earth, rising at night from its moldering, dirty home to feed.

Finally, the mystery of the absence of animal life around the house is solved!

Of course the Actor must have known this. He — or some other depraved English speaker — has made notes around this second, darker part of the invocation in satiny red ink. How many husks can I shed? he has written. How many can the land around the house support before they must go further to eat? How long before I or some ravaged version of my past self am discovered?

Valid questions, to be sure, but not ones I need bother with. I am not famous, at least not yet, and my first “husk” — what a delicious euphemism! — will appear to be no more than some trash in the mud to anyone who finds it. I can leave this place whole and young and ready to publish a shocking albeit carefully selected version of my studies of The Key. Then I can take up a position as an honored chair at a fine institution of higher learning in enviously rejuvenated physical form!

I will still need your sign-off, of course, Doctor, but I trust it can be secured for a price. In this case, the price will be my revealing the means of achieving eternal youth to you. No. The chance to return to eternal youth again and again, each time more joyous than the last as your cheating of grim death compounds. A hideous pleasure, to be sure, but an undeniable one. Think on this proposal hard, my head-shrinking friend. And, remember, you only need to shed your soul and leave a scattered remnant of yourself in the ground.

Incidentally, I can’t help but wonder, even at this late date, about the college’s sending me out here in the first place. Does the Board have some secret understanding with the Actor about how best to deal with troublesome, tenured, loner professors? Far-fetched but, then again, what are the odds one of them would have the knowledge to not only recognize The Key for what it is but also to use it for what it can do? Infinitesimal, I think, and I imagine there are more than a few well-chewed remains of ornery scholars scattered about the roots of the surrounding yucca. Angry, tenured fossils are a liability for any school, and, of course, those husks need to eat...

Ah, well. I should still send them a Thank You. Perhaps I will do it in my new, young, strong hand...

Oh, and as for Hannah... at least I will be up to being vigorous again, won’t I? Next time we meet, she will be looking at me and thinking of, well, if not fresh berries and plucky birds, then hopefully something else springy. Maybe she, too, can be persuaded to accept this bounteous dark gift. Then we can be together in our maleficent, youthful secret. One can only hope!

But now full dark has fallen across my desk, and I am once again due in bed. In fact, I have already removed my clothes in-between typing these paragraphs as a courtesy. In this case, the bird can (un-)dress itself! I think I will “sleep” in the room next to mine tonight — after, of course, I have performed the necessary ritual spelled out before me in words black as a tomb and bounded in a bloody sheen that would make the Devil horny. The words themselves are surprisingly few. Would you like to know them, Doctor? Hah! You will have to come and see for yourself.

But wait. Is that a tap tap tap I hear from down the hall? Apparently, my eternal summons has arrived. Let me quickly attach this file to a message. Let me quickly fill in your address. There, it is all ready to go...

Adieu, Dear Doctor (at least for now).

* * *

Case file #: 6116: (Client name redacted at request of next of kin)

Attending Clinician: Armaru, Hannah, NM DPHHS Mental Health Diagnostic Board

Entry Date: 6/15/16

Title: Closing entry report (Client Suicide)

(Excerpted at request of New Mexico District Court for Probate Proceeding)

Notes:

Client was found half-interred by Taos PD on the morning of June 7, 2016 after I called in a wellness check. I had received a troubling email from client the night before. Client had also seemed unusually agitated at our most recent bi-weekly check-in held at the local MacDonald’s. At that check-in, Client had expressed several new manifestations of his long-running delusion regarding being a “professor of the occult” at “the college.”

Specifically, client told a story about a psychotic break he had supposedly suffered that had caused his being sent to Taos to “recuperate” in the home of the famous actor he has long fixated upon. (Client’s own home.) Also, he claimed to have discovered an old book he referred to as “The Key” that was important to his supposed studies. Lastly, he made repeated reference to a “Dr. Armaru” whom he claimed was treating him while continuing to make romantic advances towards me, a.k.a. “Hannah.”

Apparently, our most recent backstory was that we had a previous professional and romantic relationship at “the college” in which I shared his scholarly interest in the occult. (For reference, this type of identity bifurcation transference toward a clinician is not unusual. At our previous check-in, I was both his wife and mother).

As usual, I did not challenge any of Client’s delusions, as the Board has determined that, while untreatable, they pose no threat to Client’s health or public safety. (In such cases, it is generally considered preferable for Client to live independently with frequent monitoring check-ins rather than undergo institutionalization.) Despite recent events, I am confident that neither I nor the Board will bear any legal liability in this case.

However, I do deeply regret Client’s suicide. He was, to put it mildly, an interesting man, and it is my hope that the Department will convey my sincere condolences to his family. The more traumatic specifics of Client’s suicide (e.g., his corpse being discovered in a shallow hole after being considerably compromised by local wildlife) only further strengthens this hope. No one should die alone like that — all chewed up in a pit of his own making.

Signed: Hannah L. Armaru, LSW, LCSW

New Mexico Department of Health and Human Services

P.S.: Department supervisors should feel free to redact the last sentence of my report if it is deemed to be too graphic for a sensitive audience.

* * *

To: hannah.l.armaru@nmdphhs.org

From: hiraldo.a.cruz@hotmissive.com

Date: 6/16/16

Subject: Meet up?

Hello, Hannah (or should I say, Doctor :),

I’m thinking you might be a little surprised to hear from me! Suffice to say, I wasn’t in the best shape when we last spoke and, believe me, I was in even worse not much later. But now I’m doing just fine. In fact, I’m doing (and looking!) better than ever...

With this in mind, I was hoping we might “meet up” again (you know, like how we used to!). Except, rather than at that dreadful Pink Casita cum MacDonald’s, how about my place? There’s something out back I’d like to show you. I really think you’re going to like it (if not sooner than later).

I realize this proposition might seem strange to you, so please take your time to think it over. (Believe me when I say I’ve got nothing but time on my hands, and I can always keep busy writing!) That said, just to prompt you along, I’ve attached what the kids like to call a “selfie” to this message — just to keep you abreast of recent developments. Pour over it at your leisure, my Dear, and know that I am always and eternally yours...

Sincerely,

H.A.C.

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