Where Oblivion Dwells Read online

  Where Oblivion Dwells

  Lorena Franco

  Translated by Laura Romo

  “Where Oblivion Dwells”

  Written By Lorena Franco

  Copyright © 2017 Lorena Franco

  All rights reserved

  Distributed by Babelcube, Inc.

  www.babelcube.com

  Translated by Laura Romo

  “Babelcube Books” and “Babelcube” are trademarks of Babelcube Inc.

  WHERE OBLIVION DWELLS

  Copyright © 2017 Lorena Franco

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior and in writing permission from the author.

  Violation of the above rights may constitute a crime against intellectual property (Article 270 et seq. of the Criminal Code).

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Copyright Page

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 1

  “Something as small as the flutter

  of a butterfly’s wing can ultimately

  cause a typhoon half away around the world.”

  LONDON, 2003

  Ever since he was a child, Tom Levy had experienced strange visions that convoluted his existence. In his twenty-five years of life, he couldn’t remember a single night in which his dreams weren’t haunted by butterflies. Butterflies whose fluttering was powerful and energetic. Such fluttering could rule the world, and tear it to pieces if it wished so. But it was not just butterflies that regularly possessed his mind. He would often go into a trance, visualizing death, blood, violence, pursuit, rage, evil... and water. Water, stained with a multitude of colors... specially red. The color of blood. Of pain.

  When he recovered, he used to feel chills, and even the sunlight bothered him.

  Tom Levy had a complicated childhood because of his gift. A terrible gift that his parents knew nothing of, and which they ignored even when his teachers told them that his son was not ‘normal’, and that he did not relate properly with the other children. Roger and Clara Levy simply never payed heed. At home, Tom’s behavior didn’t give them reason for concern, and that was enough for them. They preferred to live blindfolded than to acknowledge the truth, because of some events of the past that they preferred to forget. Life hadn’t been kind to the Levy marriage, and the last thing they wanted was to accept that their child was troubled from such a young age.

  Nevertheless, Tom was always alone. At recess, no other child would get near to him. The only exception was the small and sweet Amy Campbell. Amy shared her lunch with Tom, ignoring what everyone else said. She didn’t care if the rest of the kids turned their backs on her for being close with the class “weirdo”. Amy made Tom laugh by telling him jokes or funny stories that she came up with just for him. For the sad and lonely boy, for whom the girl with blonde hair and lovely blue eyes felt great compassion. Amy was the only person that made Tom feel a little bit like the other children. The only one who managed to make his days nicer, who made him forget about the terrifying pictures that accompanied his hours. Both awake, and in dreams.

  With the passing of the years, Tom and Amy became great friends. Amy always protected him from the gossips and attacks from other kids. She would never abandon him. Never. They went to the same high school, and even when they chose different career paths in college, they kept seeing each other daily, and thus... love bloomed. Amy was the only person who knew about Tom’s problem. She knew everything about his gift, which also happened to be his curse. Every time she noticed he was paralyzed, she waited for him. And she waited... patiently, showing absolutely no fear. She knew that it would pass, that Tom was strong and would manage to get away from the images that didn’t allow him to be a normal person. Maybe that was what had made Amy fall in love with him since they were children. Tom was different, special. A unique human being who, despite his suffering, had become someone irreplaceable in her life.

  But everything would change one October morning in 2003. Tom had started working in an architecture firm, and began to behave even stranger than usual. Amy didn’t think much of it at first, because he had always been that way. Complicated. But when three days passed without her knowing anything from him, she went to his apartment to find out what was wrong. She rang the bell a dozen times and, when he didn’t answer, she used the spare key she always carried in her bag. When she walked into Tom’s apartment she noticed everything was dirty and messy. It had a stale smell, it had clearly been a long time since the last time the apartment was ventilated. She walked into the bedroom silently and found Tom fast asleep. He was haggard and pale. Sweaty. He was having another of the recurrent nightmares he was already, unfortunately, used to. Once again, she waited patiently by Tom’s side, who had been so profoundly asleep he hadn’t noticed the presence of his girlfriend. Half an hour later, he opened his eyes... just a little...

  “Tom...” Amy whispered with consternation, caressing Tom’s naked back.

  “Go away, Amy... I don’t want you to see me like this”, answered Tom, covering his face.

  “No, I won’t go. Tell me what’s wrong.

  Tom got slowly out of bed. He was wearing only navy blue pajama pants. His naked torso was not as Amy remembered it. Just three days ago, Tom could be described as a strong and muscular young man; now he seemed too frail and thin. His ribs were noticeable under his skin, as well as every bone of his deteriorated face. His green eyes were too bright and showed evident symptoms of fever, his auburn hair was greasy and dirty.

  “Tom, please, what’s going on?” insisted Amy, standing right in front of Tom.

  “No, I can’t, I can’t...”

  Tom began pacing around the room hurriedly. Amy was seriously concerned now. She had never seen him so distressed.

  “Tom,” she approached him. She caressed his bony cheek and kissed him. “Take a shower, please...”

  “Amy... something strange is happening.”

  “What else is new?” answered Amy, showing her uneasiness by means of a nervous giggle.

  “You have to stay away from me,” said Tom sadly.

  “Never.”

  “Yes, Amy. Otherwise you will also be in danger.”

  “Nothing will happen. They’re just nightmares, they’re just...”

  “They’re fucking real!”

  “Tom, don’t... don’t confuse your visions with reality. They have nothing to do with each other.”

  “They got me, Amy. They’re going to kill me. They haunted me, and they have found me. You have to stay away from me. Leave, please.”

  “No...”

  “LEAVE!” shouted Tom, enraged.

  Amy left Tom’s apartment in tears. She didn’t have any gift. Her mind didn’t toy with her, it didn’t show her horrible images. But still, she had a bad feeling. This would be the last time she would ever see Tom. And there was nothing she could do to avoid it.

  “Dreams are extremely

  important. You can’t do it

  unless you imagine it.”

  (George Lucas)

  HOURS LATER

  Tom’s half-naked body appeared on the banks of the Westbourne river. He was found by a policeman at fifteen minutes past four in the morning. While they took the body to perform an autopsy on it, they did a quick check of the young man, who didn’t carry any kind of identification with him. After a c
ouple of hours, they discovered he was called Tom Levy. Twenty-five-year-old, from London. His parents were notified. And Amy. Broken with grief and refusing to believe it was Tom they had found, they arrived to the laboratory. Clara, Tom’s mother, passed out after seeing his body. Roger, his father, cried disconsolately, still unable to believe that the body laid on a cold metal plank, already so decomposed, was his son. Meanwhile, Amy waited, as if from one moment to the next Tom, her Tom, would wake up from one of his visions. But it wouldn’t happen. He would never wake up again. His body was bruised, destroyed, and the coroner had informed them of something Amy had been unable to assimilate.

  “We have concluded that he died three days ago,” he informed them. “And even though we determined that he suffered a violent death, we can’t know for sure exactly what happened to him.”

  “How on earth is that even possible?” asked Roger, enraged by the coroner’s ignorance.

  “The body is in a very advanced stage of deterioration. Most of the bones are broken, and we can only speculate that it was a strong blow to the head that caused his demise. But we can’t risk venturing what caused it. We believe there is even a chance that Tom might have committed suicide,” continued the coroner.

  “With broken bones and a blow to the head? Are you kidding me?” insisted Roger, holding Clara.

  “He might have thrown himself out of a bridge, or hit himself in the head somehow. I’m very sorry.”

  “Excuse me but, did you say he’s been dead for three days?” asked Amy, barely whispering. The coroner nodded. “No... it can’t be. I saw him only a few hours ago. No... it hasn’t even been a day,” continued Amy, her voice shaking.

  “That’s impossible, miss. As I said before, his body shows he’s been dead around three days.”

  How could she defy him, and make all of them think she was crazy? Amy remained silent. Two days later his funeral was conducted, the reasons for his death still unclear. Amy saw the love of her life, her biggest friend since childhood, vanish from the world. Just thinking about being with him drove her mad. She stopped caring about the rest of the world, now that the “weird” boy with beautiful green eyes and horrifying visions was gone.

  CHAPTER 2

  LONDON, 2015

  (Fall)

  Like every morning, seventy-two-year-old Ms. Clark left the apartment 1A to go to the corner pastry shop to buy a delicious brioche for her beloved husband. It was a tradition that they had held for thirty years, and both of them ate breakfast together, while reading the paper and drinking a stimulating cup of coffee, every day exactly at nine o’clock.

  Stuart Thomas was a thirty-something frustrated writer, who lived in the apartment in front of the Clarks’. He worked as a clerk from nine to two at a supermarket, and spent the nights writing. That was probably the reason why he always looked haggard and tired.

  A happy couple lived in apartment 2A. They were in their early thirties and were expecting the birth of twin girls, who would surely flood the building with joyous laughter, nightly crying and other lovely noises. 2B was unoccupied. The delightful Pamela Harrison had died in her sleep inside that apartment, in which she had spent sixty-three years of her life. That had happened three months ago. Her five children were trying to sell her apartment, but they hadn’t had luck with it yet.

  Laura Thompson lived in 3A. She was a single mother in her forties, whose son Charles liked to play loud music. Laura didn’t look like the smiling woman whose face appeared in the photographs in her living room. She had been a model in the past, who now worked as a hairdresser in a small beauty parlor in Chelsea.

  Finally, in 3B, estranged from her neighbors’ lives, lived a lonely thirty-seven-year-old Amy Campbell, and she possessed a beauty no one could ignore. She had decided, for convenience, to cut her beautiful blonde hair short a long time ago, though unconsciously she had figured she would get less male attention with short hair. Her blue eyes weren’t as lively as before, and her angelic face, previously smooth and velvety, was now covered with wrinkles.

  Amy worked in a small local newspaper near her apartment, in the bohemian neighborhood of London, Chelsea. That way she avoided using the public transportation and seeing more people than she cared to. She got up every day at seven every morning, and started her day by drinking coffee and smoking a cigarette in the kitchen. After a quick shower, she dressed up and ran down the stairs as fast as possible to avoid meeting a neighbor. When she arrived to her job she greeted Mel, the receptionist, with a curt “Hi”. Amy used to think that, in a world were Tom was still alive, Mel would surely be her friend.

  After that, Amy locked herself in her cubicle. Today, it was messier than usual. She had a number of pending articles, and she needed to finish them as soon as possible, so she turned on her computer and began to work. Writing was a lonely job, and she enjoyed it. She barely had contact with her coworkers during meetings, and that was all. She had been working for the newspaper for five years, but she had never attended to any of the company’s event. She rejected every Friday night invitation: usually her coworkers went out to drink and sing in a karaoke. They had a very good work environment because of their manager, Steve Bentley. He was very amiable and every female writer had a crush on him, because of his evidently attractive physique. However, he had always felt some curiosity for Amy, especially since he divorced his wife, two years ago. Amy was always discreet, shy and reserved. Steve hated that a woman like that didn’t have a relationship with anyone. She always seemed cold and distant, apparently uninterested in social relations. What had happened to her? He felt curious. But it didn’t matter, she was just another writer. Maybe the most efficient of his team. Her articles were always extraordinary and well received by their readers.

  That day, half an hour before Amy left, Steve called her into his office.

  “Hi, Amy. How was your day?” he asked with a smile on his face.

  “I’m done with the articles,” answered Amy curtly, as usual.

  “Perfect. Yes, I just got them,” answered Steve, looking at the screen in front of him. “They’re probably perfect, as usual. I want you to begin with the next article. It’s a little creepy. They found the body of a woman floating in the Westbourne River. Can you look into it?”

  Amy went suddenly pale. She couldn’t breathe. The memories returned to her mind, daggers that slowly pierced her heart.

  “If it’s okay with you, Steve...” she managed to say after a couple of seconds, “I’d rather not. Thank you, and good day.”

  It was the first time Amy ever rejected an article. Steve felt concern, and wanted more than anything to ask her why, but he just nodded. He assumed that Amy, like everybody else, had her own demons, and maybe they related to something similar in the past. That was why Steve, naturally curious, looked up similar accidents in the Westbourne river, and found the answer in a story from the year 2003.

  Amy went back to her cubicle, did a little clean up and minutes later went back to her apartment, repressing the tears that struggled to burst out in any moment. She felt like she was asphyxiating, and barely made it up the stairs to lock herself in her apartment, finally freeing herself from having to speak with anyone other than herself and Tom... in dreams. Always in dreams.

  She lit up a cigarette and prepared a tea. She needed to calm herself after Steve’s request for an article. She could imagine Tom’s body, floating in the Westbourne river, and felt nauseated. She could remember his last words so clearly... how anguished he sounded, how protective he was of her, the danger that stalked him... Amy never knew what had happened and that drove her mad. How was it possible that he had been dead for three days when she had just seen him a few hours earlier? Everything was so confusing. But then again, Tom’s twenty-five years of life had been very confusing. And strange. Effectively, he had never been a normal person, but even knowing that, Amy had never imagined such a tragic, macabre and unexplainable end for his life.

  Amy had also suffered the death of Tom’s pare
nts in a traffic accident. It happened in the outskirts of London in 2010. They collided with a truck and died instantly. She had developed a relationship with them after Tom’s death, as if Roger and Clara needed her after losing their son. Their death had afflicted Amy almost as much as her own mother’s, a year later. She had no one left in the world, she was completely alone. Her father had abandoned them when Amy was five and they never heard from him again. It was Hillary who took care of Amy and acted as both her mother and father as best as she could. Finally, a heart attack had ended her life too soon, and even if that had hurt Amy, truth be told they weren’t even so close by then. Amy had locked herself in her thoughts at such degree that she had even stopped talking to her own mother. When Hillary died Amy felt immense regret, of course... but her heart was still trapped under her gray and lonely demeanor. If she had learned something of life, it was to accept the lose of her loved ones... law of life, she told herself. One day, it will be me... she thought. Shi didn’t want to suffer. She didn’t want to cry for anyone else. She didn’t want to love... that would make everything easier.

  She looked through her window. The aloe vera she had planted a week before had died. She exhaled. Amy would’ve wanted to be a mother, but if she couldn’t even keep a plant alive, what would she do with a baby?

  She took a drag on her cigarette. Took a sip of tea. Suddenly, she noticed that someone was looking at her from the street. Watching her. Staring. He was a short and thick man; whose face she couldn’t make out because he was wearing a black hat. Amy stared at him, trying to figure out if she was imagining it. But the man kept looking at her. There was no doubt in her mind, his head was slightly tilted in her direction. Amy hid back inside her apartment rapidly and shut the curtains. She was scared. She had a bad feeling once again, the same way she had the last day she had seen Tom. She knew she wouldn’t see him again, and it had turned out to be true. She learned that day to listen to her intuition. Who was that man? Bah... she was being silly.