The Angel Cures

By

Marcus Low

© 2010 by Marcus Low

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Stuart’s extraordinary imagination led him to believe he was constantly being followed in shopping-malls, on common dusty streets of the city, and even by radio in the general traffic. It was not the extent of his beliefs that caused him grief, but the manner in which his family and close friends berated him for being stupid that made him shut up, stop believing in himself and take a moderate stance on everything that he was asked to care about.

Being seventeen, agile and quite pleasant in appearance, he fancied himself to do to others exactly what he thought they did to him. He followed people, stood beside them and made to befriend them, he responded amicably to children as well as to people with dogs. His aunt told him confidentially that she thought him intelligent, and in return he learned to do well at school and was soon focussing on one or two serious trades that would allow him to get a reliable pay.

He made a casual arrangement of friendship with a girl, Janice, who was rather vacant-minded but on the whole sensible and slightly quirky. Janice liked horses and fashion; Stuart liked motorbikes and sport. When Stuart fantasized about taking to the surf or riding at a hundred miles an hour, Janice cocked her head and chuckled. Stuart took her by the hand, led her through malls and together they threaded through the throng of people there and kept each other perfectly sane and happy.

Stuart’s life situation being reasonably tame, the circumstances in which he became ill are rather trivial. It might have been an epidemic such as Sars or just some energetic cougher with pneumonia that spread their disease on Stuart and made him miserable enough to want to die. Janice lost a bit of interest in their relationship, because, as she said, he looked so frail, like a “sick angel”. Janice kept a diary but she never wrote about Stuart – she only wrote shopping-lists and drew pictures of diamonds and little animals. People from her community – elders, the church ministers, adults she met – all told her that her works were beautiful, and that pleased her quite a bit. When she thought about Stuart, she actually grew rather despondent, and then thought about something else.

Stuart’s illness developed and he took strict orders to avoid making physical contact with other people. His body took the effects of delirium tremens, a condition recognisable as extreme oldness and frailty, combined with tendencies to sickness and palpitations. To Stuart’s mind, there was no relief to be found except in fantasizing about the social living that he once enjoyed – following people in public, being athletic and being able to indulge in pizza and movies and video-games. His imagination did not cure him, rather it led him into an appetite for loneliness.

In his creative story for school (he was allotted the task, without obligation, in view of his sick condition), his “self-portrait” showed-up with considerable precision the extent of his own physical transmutations. His nails began to rot almost as if they were sweating into decay, as the affect of frequent washing caused the skin to flake-off; his nails, especially his fingernails, became brittle and easily damaged and dented; there was the appearance of eczema along his arms, and his limbs showed remarkable loss of normal strength and suppleness. On top of this, it seems rather inevitable that his sexual appetite suffered greatly too; he had erectile dysfunction, and his manners of zest were severely reduced.

It would be wrong to assume that people cared about his transformation. His diseased was complicated, treatment was far too expensive and there were too many confusing opinions on what should be done. Event Stuart himself developed a defensive belief against the idea that anything should be done at all.

On the evening of a family Christmas party, Janice came over and throughout the evening Stuart sat despondently to one side and entertained his mundane thoughts in the chatty atmosphere. Janice approached him with slight interest.

‘How are you doing?’ she said mildly.

‘Better,’ said Stuart. ‘Soon I’ll walk out the door and we’ll go somewhere, same as usual.’

Janice looked at him, the sallow face, the indifferent air of hope, and a slight distractedness. She began to think of him as rather ugly – she could see the effect of the disease, and it wasn’t refreshing.

‘I have to mention something…’ Janice started. ‘Some guy told me the disease like you’ve got makes people fade-away fast. It’s like the most-miserable end of someone’s life.’

Stuart looked at her blankly. ‘I don’t know anything about what’s going to happen,’ he said slowly. ‘Maybe it’ll teach me to start doing the things I should be doing, and not wasting my time.’

Janice grew in bitterness. ‘They could put you in a hospital, shut you up in there for as long as they want,’ she said. ‘You have no idea where they take people like you.’

Stuart gave it a thought. ‘Maybe there are many more people going about that they think should be shut-up like that,’ he said. ‘Maybe they don’t care about us anyway.’

Janice mouthed at him. She had no reply, and finally left him sitting there on the couch.

At night Stuart dreamed. Janice appeared as a reproachful angel, and there were other angels nested about the heavenly place. It could have been anywhere where people got shut-up, and Stuart’s imagination morphed the location to appear just as he wanted it – like his own family house. In this manifestation of human existence freed from feeling of grief, objects assumed magical properties. For example, a meal of pasta caused him to become more alert and more sensitive to what the other angels around him were doing. Signs and messages embedded in the walls and rooms all around him had hidden or metaphorical messages. People had inside knowledge about him and talked about him as an object of curiosity. Stuart was made to feel safe and well only when he made a sensible ‘connection’ with these distinct objects under the concept known as ‘objective correlative’. Without this connection, there was a growing sense of imminent doom, like something terrible that he would soon never escape; the fear that everything around him would gradually swamp him and kill his instincts almost as if by sucking his brain dry.

Stuart wasn’t changed. In the morning he made himself a decent breakfast and went to sit outside to watch traces of the morning wetness. The birds appeared like picture out of Janice’s private diary, and when the rain finally came down in bucket-loads he became as still and brazen as some roman statue, arms outstretched, waiting and hoping for more of nature’s incredible works.

In nature there is disease and enmity between creatures; there is suntide and moontide and season; there is mating and replenishment, blossoming and dyign; in my body hides my spirit, and the ability to pass-on my spirithood and be restored in the chemistry of healing.

I know almost nothing about God, because God is a mad creator and I am only one of his creatures. Upon him I rely, but if I must love him I must also take my sustenance out of him. In his works lie the answers of what he does, why he causes me pain and chooses to inflict me with a struggle against my own disappearance. In him can be found logic without compassion, and value without sense. I believe in the true God whose identity was seeded and grew out of my own imaginations, without which I would not be conscious of my own self.

To God, my true God, be the glory of my existence.

The End

Comments by the author to Daniel Daly

In about 2006/07 I wrote a similar short story, called ‘The Tempest’, which describes in microcosm the power of imaginative healing. Obviously the great William Shakespeare, and even contemporary popular extroverts such as William Whitecloud, encourage a fascination with the sublimely impossibly or improbable.

The ability of human cognition to ‘trace’ the causes of our existence is perhaps the epitome of conscious talent. I hope you and I can continue to learn more about the nature of existence as we share recognisably similar histories in ‘disease’-like experiences which have led us to pursue health programs and rich ‘mindscapes’ of unlikely friendships. Marcus