David opened his eyes. He was in a well proportioned sitting room, sitting in a padded armchair facing at an angle a cold fire place on whose mantle stood a number of photo frames.
Opposite him in a similar armchair, separated by a sofa between them was a woman – possibly in her late forties with short brown hair and green eyes. She was casually dressed in dark blue slacks and a big white jumper. She somehow carried her casual attire with a certain elegance and style.
“Hello, what’s your name?” she said.
“David” he replied.
He knew his name was David but he had difficulty in remembering anything else about himself with any clarity. He realised with increasing anxiety that he had no idea how he had arrived at this place or where he had been prior to arriving. He seemed to have a vague impression that he was married with – possible two children? – but he could not recall any clearer details. He was experiencing a rising sense of panic.
“Where am I?” he asked.
“Don’t worry, your OK”, said the woman opposite. “My name is Juliette by the way”.
“I can’t remember how I got here”, David said feebly.
“Yes. No-one can. It’s normal. You’ll get used to it” said Juliette.
Her answers didn’t seem to make any sense
“Where am I?” he asked again.
Juliette let out a weary sign. “Well that’s not easy to answer” she said “let’s just say that you’ve just arrived and still need time to settle in”.
David looked at her blankly. She wasn’t making any more sense and he was beginning to feel somewhat annoyed at what seemed to him to be evasive answers.
Juliette seemed to sense his unease. “Would you like some tea” she asked. “The British like tea don’t they?”
This statement suddenly took David by surprise and calmed his mind by providing a temporary distraction
“Tea, yes” he said.
In between the chairs was a low coffee table on which there was a tray with teapot and two tea cups filled with milky tea, just the way David liked it. He was surprised that he had not noticed the table. Had it always been there?
The reference to being British aroused David’s curiosity which in turn helped to calm him – now at least his mind had something intriguing to work on.
“Juliette, that sounds French. Are you French?” he asked.
“Yes, I’m from Lyons.”
“Your English is excellent” he said.
Juliette hesitated. “I’m not speaking English, I’m speaking French,” she said “you just hear it as English”.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“Well it’s difficult again to explain. But whatever a person speaks here is heard as the native language of the person listening”, she replied.
“That’s not possible”.
Juliette let out a muted chuckle, “well you will find out that not much makes sense round here.”
David’s hand instinctively picked up a cup and saucer (best quality Wedgwood) and took a sip of tea
“I don’t understand” he said almost plaintively.
Juliette looked for a moment as if she was going to answer and provide some reasonable explanation for all that was going on, but then appeared to change her mind and asked “are you cold? You can warm yourself by the fire”.
David looked at the fireplace to see a glowing log fire that radiated a soothing warmth. However it had the opposite effect on David’s mind for he was certain that there was no fire there a second ago.
Suddenly he felt angry and said yet again but this time in a firm and perhaps menacing tone “where am I?”
Juliette heard the tone and knew that she would have to try to explain the situation but was worried that the effect of the truth would have on him. She decided to ignore her natural concern for him, throw caution to the wind and said bluntly, “Your dead. Alright – you’re dead. I don’t know how but you’ve ended up here with us.”
“Us?”
“Yes there’s more than me. People come and go. They arrive like you, stay awhile and then …”
Her voice trailed off
“What?”
“They go”
“Where?”
“Out into the nothing”
“What do you mean?”
“Can’t you hear the wind?”
Suddenly David realised that there was the sound of wind howling outside the room. He wondered why he hadn’t notice it before.
He looked around the room how to see if there was anything that could provide him with more understanding and a firmer grip on reality. As well as the two upholstered armchairs there was a couple of old wooden chairs by a table along one side of the room which was panelled from floor to ceiling. The ceiling itself appeared to be plain white plaster with a single electric light in the centre covered by a cheap shade. The floor was covered with a patterned red carpet like the kind you often find in cheap hotels.
There were two doors. One door was quite heavy with substantial architraving and David somehow knew that this door led outside. The other door looked much more lightweight as if it led into some further room. David looked round and saw that behind him was a window. It was covered with thick heavy blue velvet curtains
David returned his attention to Juliette
“What are you talking about” he said angrily.
“I know, I know its hard to understand but you’re dead and this – well I suppose this is the after life. It’s not what I imagined believe me – well I didn’t imagine anything. I thought death was – well you know – the end”.
A sudden surge of outrage overtook David. He dropped the cup and saucer to the table stood up and said “I don’t know what you’re talking about but I’m getting out of here”.
Juliette looked at him with pain and resignation in her eyes but said nothing.
He walked purposefully over to the main door and pulled it open. Behind the door was a small enclosed square porch only a few feet wide with coat hooks on either side. At the end was another door. Daniel took two steps forward to the door grasped the round door handle and pulled the door open.
What he saw was endless blackness. There were a few steps that led down into the darkness but they faded away after just three steps. David had never seen a blackness like it before. Its intensity was terrifying. He knew that there was nothing out there. He could hear that wind in the darkness and feel its icy rush on his face in the nothingness. He knew that if he stepped out the door would close behind him and he would be engulfed by that blackness.
His body was shaking with fear and a cold numbness overcame him. He closed the door and walked slowly back through the narrow porch to the chair by the fire.
There was an awkward pause broken when Juliette said:
“I’m sorry – but I did try to tell you. Outside there’s nothing – just nothing. People go out there and they never come back”.
“Have other people been here?” asked David quietly.
“Oh yes lots. They come and stay for a while but then – well they all end up walking out into the blackness”.
“How long have you been here?”
“Don’t know. Could be weeks, could be years you lose all sense of time. You’ll find you don’t need to sleep, or eat, so time just drags by”.
David felt the heavy weight of depression fall on him and weigh him down like wet cement.
“This place – its some kind of purgatory”, he said miserably.
“Perhaps, but it’s better than nothing isn’t it. Isn’t it? I mean at least its some kind of existence”.
“Doesn’t seem like it to me”.
“Well I’m staying here”. There was an angry defiant tone to Juliette’s voice
They both fell silent. A heaviness hang in the air like suspended dust. David stared into the fire perhaps hoping that it would bring some relief or solace from the leaden oppression that he felt but to no avail.
Suddenly there was someone on the sofa next to his chair. A young man of perhaps no more than twenty-eight years old with short blonde hair. He was slim built and wore a casual check shirt and brown on-descript trousers. He was wearing trainers.
As David looked at him, the stranger opened his eyes and looked around him
“Where am I?” said the stranger.
“Hi, I’m David” said David. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Edvard” – he spoke with an accent that David couldn’t quite place exactly but seemed to be Scandanavian in origin.
“My name’s Juliette” said Juliette.
“Where am I?” asked Edvard.
Of course David and Juliette knew that this would be the question that Edvard would ask and Juliette appeared hesitant to reply but David, being sunk in his own pit of depression, just said coldly and without feeling “you’re dead and this is the afterlife. You stuck here like we are and there’s nothing outside this place so just get used to it”.
If David imagined that this statement of hopelessness would induce an angry response or even a shocked one in their new visitor he was mistaken.
“Well you might be right on the first point. The last thing I remember is the car skidding on ice on a steep mountain road. But on the second point you cannot be correct” said Edvard.
“What do you mean?” asked David.
“There can’t be nothing outside”.
David sighed “I assure there is, I’ve looked”.
“No that’s not possible, by definition there can’t be nothing because nothing means no thing, so there must be something” Edvard responded.
“I tell you I opened the door and there was just a dark whirling wind” said David.
“He’s right” said Juliette “there’s nothing outside”.
“You seem to be making the mistake of believing in a kind of positive nothing, as if nothing could exist, but if it existed it wouldn’t be nothing it would be something wouldn’t it?” replied Edvard.
David and Juliette stared at him open mouthed unable to respond to his clear logic.
“And anyway” he went on, “if you saw or heard a wind that was at least something and I can’t hear any wind at all”.
David suddenly realised that the sound of wind rushing around the hut had stopped when Edvard had made his statement about the meaning of nothing.
“Wait a minute I can’t hear it either” he said.
“What’s wrong with you” said Juliette “I can still hear the wind. There’s nothing out there I tell you, regardless of what this man says. I been here for .. well I don’t know but a long time and there’s nothing outside”.
“But he’s just pointed out” said David “that there can’t be nothing outside, there must be something. Don’t you see, we’ve been thinking that nothing can exist but it can’t can it, because by definition it means non-existence. And if we were nothing or became nothing then we wouldn’t be able to experience anything, whether it was nothing or something. The fact that we can experience something means that we aren’t nothing, we must exist, and that can’t be nothing outside”.
Suddenly the burden of depression and hopelessness lifted and David felt as if a great weight had been taken from him. He realised that he had been carrying that weight all his life. He had always been concerned about what reality was, what science said reality was and what was truth. But he realised that there wasn’t anything such as truth, there was just choice. That’s all there had ever been. The reality was that he had a choice about what to believe and what to do. His life had been a created life, he had built it step by step, brick by brick and now he could make a choice. He didn’t need to believe in the existence of nothing. The more he thought of it the more the idea of nothing seemed ridiculous.
His sudden insight was broken by Edvard who said “well I can’t wait around here, I’m off to explore” and he walked over to the main door. David followed him and as Edvard walked through the small porch and opened the main door bright light streamed into the room. Without hesitation Edvard walked straight out through the door into the bright light.
David turned and looked at Juliette.
“Look Juliette – look at the light, come on, lets go outside”.
But Juliette curled herself up into a ball on the chair and simply said “you’re mad, you’re both mad, can’t you hear the wind, can’t you see the darkness”.
Somehow David knew that he would not be able to persuade Juliette to come with him so he turned and followed Edvard out into the bright light.
