The Tulpa
Zomibies will eat you. They will never, ever try to conduct
a conversation with you. And there’s hope, good lord there’s a chance you might
get away from them. Nut one straight between the eyes before it gets a chance
to bite. Break their bones with animal ferocity and stamp the sinew right into
the floor. Go down in a cocktail of adrenaline and fear. Beautiful. Heroic.
Nobel. I’d kill to be in a tank full of bull sharks right now. A lamp glimmer
hope that I might make it.
Nothing
lives in this dead green box. Hooked fish lined up for slaughter. Conveyer belt
bringing us all closer to God. Here, in this snake coil queue we give thanks,
we break bread. We tell the woman that we haven’t worked in a month. We sign
the blue slip. We leave after our communion. Feet dragging over white and black
tiles. Dirt caked in grids. That same empty feeling as we sit back at our pew
and wait for it all to end.
Thanks
be to God.
Another
welfare cheque.
I’m
that damned demographic. We had it all, every sauce we wanted. College
admissions handed out to every IQ over seventy five. And if we couldn’t do it?
Don’t worry your tiny forehead. Drink father’s money, indulge in fuck and
drugs. If the weed makes you anxious take a hit of the Xanax. It was the
renaissance and we were the artists. Smearing shit on the canvas and calling it
modern. Part time job be fucked, we were going to own it all until they went
and burned down Rome.
Ah
sure. The reason we’re not all burning out cars and throwing pipe bombs into
the Dail. Ah sure, that stupid Irish sentiment rendering us useless as fuck. No
jobs, neo-feudal system and blatant corruption. Ah, sure.
I take
the one eighty eight. Should I be out there with a no-to-austerity-sign? May as
well be denouncing the moon landing or pulling a Corr on it and talking about
the shadow government. Us Irish are so deluded we think it’s weird to protest.
Fionn
is waiting for me in the field just like he said. Standing around the football
like a goth in P.E. Astrophysics. Ask him how much the moon weighs or the
trajectory of an asteroid and the chap will give an answer autistic-spectrum
fast. Good banter but no one wants to pay for that shite. Fionn’s been on the
nat-king-cole for two years now. Family are all minted but the ‘wow’ factor of
a Trinity degree got stale fast.
“Have
you heard about the ancient aliens?”
That’s
another thing about Fionn. Aimlessness got his mind wandering. Fifth dimension
ghosts, hollow earth theory, lizard people. That’s the tip, take it with a
grain. There’s a leftist view in psychology: when one reality becomes
inhospitable we create another reality. Often times resulting in delusional
thoughts or fantastical ideation. It’s harmless until you turn schizophrenic.
Big pharma cites chemical imbalance as the problem but that just helps them
sell the tablets. Jesus listen to me I’m starting to sound like him.
“The
pyramids and all that shite?”
“And
all the stone carvings of lads on rockets and how current architects wouldn’t
be able to build anything like that.”
“Sure Newgrange
is the same.”
He half
laughs.
“Anyway
fuck all that, you ready for this?” I continue.
“You’re
sure it’ll work?”
“I
think so.”
“And
what about your man?”
“He’s
loaded, doesn’t have enough life left to spend it all. It’s barely robbery.”
The
Dalai Lama says life is suffering. Every moment in Samsara, no matter what
you’ve got on the end of your erogenous zone or how many of them you’ve got
plunged up it, is suffering. It would make sense then that we have to go
through a bit more suffering-suffering to get some happiness-suffering. Injury
is the name of the game. If you’re willing to go down in the veg isle and snap
an ankle the reward isn’t all that bad. Fionn’s an astrophysicist and I’m an
armchair philosopher, psychologist and critic of esoteric essays. Or graduate
of Arts to dress it down. People like us do not steal. We plot.
Right
now we’re standing by the Devil’s Tree. Every town’s got something like it.
Comes in all sorts. Chairs, cliffs, rocks and roads. Wiry-spider-tree in the
middle of an otherwise empty field. Nothing grows on the branches. Village
whisper stories about a woman giving birth to a winged baby under the tree.
Stay out past late and you’ll see it perched on the branches. Red eyed and
sharp of tooth. East of the field is an old house with an old man and an old
dog. People tie up oldies and rob their shit left and right these days. Few
back hands, what have you. That’s the activity of a morally bankrupt
individual. The old man’s on death’s doors, no next of kin and the dog’s practically
blind. When the old man dies the state is going to inherit all his money.
The state...
Fuck
that.
“So
just the same as we talked about then?”
“Yeah,
just wait for Mrs. Driscoll to go by on her walk.”
“We
should kick around a bit then?”
“No
harm, have it all set up for when she goes by I suppose.”
We’ve
been at this for about three months now. Passing the ball back and forth.
Fionn’s actually getting alright at the taps. Can do that thing where you catch
the ball on the back of your neck and everything. Mrs. Driscoll takes the
Yorkshire thing for a walk everyday at ten a.m. We get to the tree at least
four days a week. She sees us and waves. We wave back. In court she’ll say
something like ‘They loved the old football, always at it.’ And she’d be right
for three months we were.
“The
Montauk Monster is another one...”
Fionn
starts clammering, I nod and throw the occasional ‘yeah’ his way. It’s been
four years now since I graduated. Second class honours and all I did in third
year was get high and sleep. Get high and sleep.
“...maybe
prehistoric, but maybe just a badly decomposed racoon...”
The
getting high and sleeping was as important as the studying. Not in a hedonistic
way but to help you think laterally. You can’t learn anything in school you
couldn’t get from the internet. Everyone thinks you need a PhD if you’re going
to have an important opinion but that’s bollocks. Anyone with a PhD is as
brainwashed as any religious zealot. You shouldn’t believe anything.
“...but
it might be a manifestation of our own belief in crypto zoology...”
But
then you can’t whole heartedly believe in not believing. It’s like one of those
koans the Zen chaps are mad about. If a tree falls in the forest and no one
hears it can I have a biscuit?
“...like
if there’s a news bit on UFO’s and then everyone starts seeing them...”
“You
mean a tulpa?”
“A
what?”
“Thought
you’d know all about this. Alex Jones head on ya. It’s a being that’s
constructed from pure discipline.”
“So if
you’re constantly thinking about something you’ll eventually create it...”
Fionn
goes glassy as Mrs. Driscoll turns the corner. The dog bobs in front of her and
tries to grab at the lead with its jaws. Fionn’s holding the football, his eyes
focused on the devil’s tree. Drifting into a parallel universe.
“We
can’t do this.”
“Sure
we can, get your shit together, it’s happening now.”
“But
the tulpa...”
I grab
him by the arms. Look straight into those teal eyes. Something like warm jam
breaks in the middle of my chest. My heart gets tight. Crush. Breath, exhale.
It goes away. Me and Fionn weren’t friends in secondary school. I didn’t really
bully him, nothing like that. But...he was kind of...
Shut
the fuck up.
“It’s
just bollocks. God, Allah and all those boys would be casting spells left and
right if that was real. A tupla is just an idea, not even a good one.”
“I’ll
be the keeper then?”
He
tries to hide his fear. That childish, magical fear. He’s still the same...
The
wall is about seven feet high. That’s about the height of a crossbar.
Professional football players put them over the bar all the time. I toe bog it.
Send that fucker for the satellites. The ball lamps off the side of the old
man’s house. Mrs. Driscoll looks around. She sees I’ve knocked it wide.
Goal.
There’s
this disease called misophonia. It translates to ‘hatred of sound’. Youtube it
sometime and look what these poor bastards have to put up with. Chews, coughs,
snorts and sneezes. Mildly irritating for the rest of us but not for the
diseased. For them it’s like nails scraping down a chalk board. Chipping
further and further as the red mist rises. Now a human’s been civilized by
society. Taught to walk away, cool down, look objectively at their own emotions
and blah. So a human with misophonia can handle the agitation. Breath it in,
breath it out. Dog doesn’t have all that. Dog’s got instinct. I’m hoping a
blind dog’s instinct is a little more frayed. For five euros and sixty five
cents I ordered a custom dog whistle on eBay. Guess what it does...
We get
to climbing the wall. I used to be better at this stuff. Monkeying around trees
and what not. Gut on me’s growing exponentially. Arms barely have the strength
to lift me over. Leg hooks the edge and I shuffle across like that fat kid you
used to make fun of. I land on my feet and quickly fall to my arse. Fionn is
standing up. Food flavouring and malt hops haven’t affected him the way they’ve
affected me.
He used
to be so weak.
The old
man’s gotta be as blind as the dog. No one would want to look at an animal like
this. Hair is matted together like a dread locked homeless guy. It’s big, not
sure the breed, maybe a cross. Shuffles, looks our direction, shuffles on.
There’s a gate in front of the drive. Every now and then a car speeds by. It
shuffles over to the fence and lies. Those non-seeing eyes staring out.
Listening to the Doppler effect come and go. Waiting on something.
“You
have the whistle?”
I take
it out of my pocket. It’s about three inches long, silver. A small chain
hanging from the end. I snigger, no idea why. It’s cold against my lips. Fionn
looks at me and nods. No turning back. We were going to take some sedatives
before we tried to carry out this plan. Fionn said that they might ask
questions about why we’re doped up when we get to the hospital. People would
get suspicious. Maybe they’d figure out what we were at. I didn’t know how
they’d go about figuring it out but I guess it’s better safe than not. If the
doctors needed to put anymore drugs in our system they might mix bad. Might
even die he said. Just going to be a few stitches I told him. But that’s Fionn
all over. Worrying about the one percent.
I blow
on the whistle. The dog turns. The dog runs. Teeth out, jowls bouncing. Saliva
caught in the wind. A few seconds and it’ll all be over. My teeth grind against
each other. Fionn’s got his eyes closed. Time slows down. The dog gets closer.
His dreaded hair rising and falling like anxious breaths. My heart beat
fragments and I think of the cash. Money from pain and suffering...can it be made
any other way? I picture the dog dragging me to the ground. Imagine the breath
on my throat before those canines bite down. Spit and blood pooling in the
curve of my collar bone. His paws come down on my chest, my feet slip away. I
try to bless myself as I fall to the ground.
And
then...
Nothing?
The dog
loses interest almost immediately and starts dragging its dagged arse around
the grass. Tongue hangs gaudy, the thing looks at us the whole time. Those
useless eyes stare. Fionn grabs my forearm and pulls like you see soldiers do
in the movies. I hand him the whistle.
“You
want to give it a shot?”
Like
absinthe fixing anxiety our fears diminish. Fionn blows on the whistle. I blow
on the whistle. Neither of us hears even a modicum of sound. The dog keeps
dragging his woven fur over the cement. He moves away from us but watches all
the time. Tongue hanging, head turning. His body moves further and further, his
back is almost facing us. Somehow his head will keep staring. Somehow it will
turn fully around. Lips curled in Cerberus smile, tongue hanging languid. The
white of its eye becomes black. His pupil strains to see us.
Finally
the dog looks away.
We keep
blowing the whistle but must accept the ruse has failed. Then relief bursts out
with laughter. Between angina inducing hysterics we blow the whistle. Suddenly
the animal lifts its arse off the ground. I can almost see its hairs stand up,
the body becomes tense and it runs.
Not
towards us.
Fionn
is still blowing the whistle. And I see it all. Chronologically and with
devastating clarity. Fionn’s life flashes before my eyes. All the parts I’ve
seen, one by one.
One of
the kids on the street jumps on a carton of milk in his porch.
Barry
O’Reilly clocks him with a head butt in senior infants. Fionn gets in trouble
for bleeding on the desk.
Someone
makes a joke out of him walking the corridors alone at lunch. I laugh but not
because it’s funny.
Our
French teacher makes me sit beside Fionn. His copy book is full of pencilled
dragons.
On a
school tour Paddy Murphy sits beside him and loudly says “What the fuck do you
do of a weekend?” Everyone laughs.
I
laugh.
Not
because it’s funny but because I’m afraid.
I’m
afraid of what everyone will think of me if I don’t ruin this kid’s holiday.
I
always assumed gun blood would mist out of the body. Whenever you see someone
getting shot in a movie the blood shoots out like vapour. Fionn’s chest opens
like an over ripe banana. Red and gray meat zip-pop out. Blood trickles down
his belly.
“Stop
with that fucking sound!” The voice is gravelled and tired.
Smoke
rises around the codger as he lowers his rifle. Fionn tries to speak. The dog’s
eyes catch mine and I swear to god I see it smile. The flesh underneath its
dreaded fur bounces, the skin on its face contorts. The dog is running towards
me. Seems like he just realized some asshole was blowing a dog whistle.
I hear
Mrs. Driscoll screaming somewhere in the distance.
You
never remember waking ‘up’ in the morning. It seems very gradual. Like warming
the engine of a car. I usually keep my eyes closed for some time after I’m
conscious. Abstracted thoughts come and go for a couple of minutes before
you’re really ‘up’. On a quiet morning you can hear the birds chirp before
you’re even aware of it.
There’s
a sound right now. It comes from everywhere like a series of high pitched
explosions. I try to open my eyes, they’re stuck together. When I was a kid my
eyelashes were so long they would crust up as I slept. Mornings my da would use
hot water to give my back my sight. I use my thumb and forefinger to wipe them.
My eyelids open slow, it feels like air is blowing through a small part of my
left eye. I put my hand over it and try to figure out what I’m looking at.
Garda
cars and ambulances tetris the road outside the codger’s drive. The dog is
barking like a bell tolls. The old man is screaming and firing rounds. I can’t
feel my arm. Isn’t that what happens when your spine is fucked?! The panic
comes on strong until I realize my spine’s fine. My left arm on the other hand
isn’t. I’m not sure if it’s broken or about to fall off.
Until
it falls off.
I black
out again.
When I
come to again Fionn’s head is lying on my chest. I run my fingers through his
hair and cough some blood onto my bottom lip.
“I’m
sorry.” I manage.
The old
man takes one to the shoulder. Must be a detective, they’re allowed to carry
guns. The codger fires back then takes two to the chest. Fionn turns his head
towards me.
“What
do you think happens when we die?” He asks.
“That’s
where the tulpa is really important.”
The
paramedics rush the gate. The guards check the body. The dog drags its ass on
the grass. They tie us up with tourniquets and mineral bags before laying us on
the stretchers. The dog stares at me as we’re hauled off. They open the back
doors to the ambulance. One of the paramedics is carrying my arm out of the
garden. I get a fleeting phantom pain.
Everything
I’ve created has led to this point in my life. Maybe those tulpa’s aren’t horse
shit after all.
From
here I can see the Devil’s tree. I’m sure I can make out that small, winged,
demon perching on an arthritic branch. It might just be the friendliest thing
I’ve made all day.
