"ParalIel Transitions - Part 1" (An Original Short Story)

“Aspirin… check… beta-blockers… check… Gly.. ce… ryl… trini… trate… check.”

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He struggled to read the large lettering on the lid of his med pack. He knew his eyes were in bad shape. Thin films of milky cataracts had transformed his world into a blurry fog and there was no chance he was going to have one of those fancy “laser procedures” performed on him. He understood that things would take their natural course and that was just the part of life we all had to eventually accept. Getting older. Sometimes a lot older. Nothing ever stayed the same and he was an existential testament to that fact.

Meet Mr. Ray Richardson. World war II veteran, wildlife enthusiast and friendly retired milkman. During his 91 year span on this planet, he had seen everything from the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, Neil Armstrong’s landing on the moon, the union of East and West Germany, the creation of NATO and the craze of The Beatles. He was a living book of history brimming with information and encyclopaedic facts pertaining to how the world once was and had evolved into being what it is today. Who needed the Internet when you had Mr. Ray Richardson, knowledge centre extraordinaire!

He snapped out of his momentary trance. “If I’m so great, why doesn’t anyone listen to me?” he said in a hushed, gravelly voice to himself. Devoted husband to the late Mrs. Richardson, they never planned any children and followed through with that decree to the letter. Now he had regrets though, too many to count if you include the atrocities and hell he bore witness to on Nazi soil.

The youth of today never take heed of the old. Never plan ahead. It’s like a vision of the future too far away for them to care about. Something the young may “get around to considering” someday. How little they disregarded the fact that time could be your greatest ally as well as your worst enemy.

"Time and tide wait for no man.", as his wife used to say, he thought.

Ray attempted to focus on the window pane of his small apartment block flat. A vague outline of light reflected upon his tired old retinas. Whilst lifting himself slowly from his exceedingly comfortable armchair, the arthritic pains seized him like a vice. He moaned in agony as he steadied himself mid push. Bone rubbing against bone, the pains of aging surface like a relentless monster intent on making you suffer. Carefully, he straightened himself as best as he could and shuffled his way over to the window. The familiarity of his surroundings were now his only navigational aids. As the dull light began to increase in size before him, he held out a feebly hand, feeling for the edge of the pane.

He rested his head on the cold glass, looking down into the street. Shapes of differing colours moved this way and that. Some objects larger than others. Cars and people down below. Oblivious to an old man looking down at them, busying themselves with their routine of daily life. Many of his friends had now passed on. Visitors were all but non-existent save for the bubbly home help that would call on him twice a day to bring fresh meals and clean clothes for him to wear.

We grow from being small and vulnerable babies to becoming responsible and capable adults, only to revert back to being small and incapable. Yet this time filled with pain and no future to look forward to, life’s final cruel trick. “Memories are the only treasures you will take with you when old age sets in.” his colleagues back in the army would say, “So let’s start making some good ones now, shall we?” He smiled as his eyes moistened. All of them dead, all of them memories themselves now, his personal collection of mental artefacts residing in his mind.

However no one could have ever guessed the other side to his existence. The infinite thrill of looking forward to the end of each tiresome day. The metaphysical wormhole he had stumbled upon by sheer chance. For Mr. Ray Richardson had an extraordinary gift. That of being able to construct and interact with his own dreams.

From an early age, he had learnt that if he concentrated hard enough on a mental image or vision and manifested it within his mind’s eye just before sleep, his pictorial representations were realised into a glorious dreamscape where literally his dreams became a real reality. Any environment, any setting, any creature in fact. If he could envision it consciously, he could live it out in the unconsciousness. Free from the laws and limitations of the so-called “real” world, unconsciousness for Ray felt as real as if he were still wide awake. Ray would be under no false pretences once asleep, as he would be fully aware of where he was and how he got there, adding an element of fear and mystery to this remarkable gift.

Once discovered, it made Ray question everything he had learnt in life. Are dreams just a collection of subconscious details filtered into a vague movie when we sleep? Was he being deprived of actually sleep because of his strange nocturnal altered states? One thing he was sure of. He was proof that there was so much more that we as humans had yet to tap into. Our brains, our soul, our very existence was still an anomaly to mankind but he had the good fortune to come into ownership of just a few pieces of that puzzle. The questions never ceased.

What were we before we were born? Where did our consciousness come from? Are there really parallel universes like the famous Mr. Stephen Hawking believed there to be?

It really put into perspective just how much intellectual evolution we still had to achieve. But all this was just an oversight, an afterthought. All that mattered to Ray was that he had been blessed with an unbelievable gift and he was going to explore its potential to its fullest extent.

Every night would be a brand new adventure as over the years Ray had learnt to hone his ability, to perfect the art of mental projection and creation. In his world, he was God. Inevitably there would be some missteps along the way, minor tweaks and alterations to the various templates he had amassed in his collective mind. But during adulthood, he could have called himself a downright professional. Action, adventure, drama, you name it, he had a template for it. Ray crafted his set pieces as precisely as he possibly could to escape into his own, private bubble and experience life on this earth as no one else could. Well, that’s what he assumed anyway.

He would be able to meet up with fallen comrades from the battlefield. Have drinks with them in their local pub, converse into the early hours, stagger through the street singing and being merry. It had taken years to perfect and now he was able to socialize outside of the depression of the physical world. Ironically, waking up was almost a nightmare in itself! The one template he wished he could recreate accurately was that of his dear Margaret. He missed her ever so much and try as he might, could never get it just right.

Ultimately, this proved to be the one fatal flaw in his perfected design. A flaw that would unravel the entire gift all together and only let Ray know about it when it was too late. The process of aging. Ray’s physical state had deteriorated rapidly over the last few years, especially after his beloved Margaret had passed. His mental faculties just weren’t what they were when he was a lot younger and he relied on them absolutely to use his gift properly. Thoughts had slowed down, focusing became a constant issue and the gradual breakdown of the body that served him so well all these years was grinding him down to an eventual halt. What lay after that was anyone’s guess but he so desperately wanted to be able to break free of the shackles of this mortal decay before it was too late.

Ray had been devising a plan of action that may just have been the solution to all his woes. It was a long shot, but if successful, would change not only his life, but the world as a whole. Tired of staring into nothingness beside the window, he slowly manoeuvred back around and painfully made his way back to the comfort of his favourite armchair. A faint smile worked its way across his creased lips.

Not too long to go now, just a few hours more…