The Postcard

30 Apr, 2023

Unfortunately for Sterling, he inhabited a mind which was for the most part, devoid of solitary, pleasant thought—those being of course the benign little memories and stories that we collects from books, Autumn days, boxes from one’s parents. Instead, what he had was more akin to canisters of film than anything—reels of silky, gray film, perpetually watched and re-wound at the cameraman’s pleasure. The ends, frayed and stitched at odd intervals, made for a film that never seemed to quite start or finish. Yet Sterling was an archivist of sorts, and was inclined to indulge in this world; hacking away at vast archives, he made it a lifetime pursuit to catalog and organize, all the while growing intoxicated by tumultuous clouds of ink and fumes and dust. And so there he sat, squarely in his seat, 33B, filing away, mindlessly and longingly.

The slow whirr of the engines was audible still, and turning to his left, peering over his neighbor’s shoulder, a gray column of steel jutted out from underneath his window into the deep blue atmosphere. A thin line of fiery red marked the edge of the earth, and the two passengers in front of him were fast asleep, their screens still running movies for their closed eyelids. To him, not a soul on board, barring himself, seemed to be aware of the precariousness of their situation; all had faith in the captain, a mysterious concept locked behind a bolted steel door.

Still, an innocent-sounding bell range, the small orange light above his head went out, and passengers got up and began to traverse the cabin. Stewardesses followed, trailed on either side by boxy carts, and with unconvincing facial expressions, handed out meals and served drinks all too generously.

Although worried, Sterling was largely unaware of his surroundings, instead enraptured entirely by one thought after another, not unlike the toppling over of an endless trail of dominoes, or a chain reaction with infinite reactant; his life was comprised chiefly of this singular spectacle—seldom was he granted reprieve from it. In this manner he went about his days, months, and in brief moments of stunning, terrifying clarity, he enjoyed a drink or three. When the stewardess arrived at his aisle, he was present in a number of places and times, the stewardess’s not included; after a few tries at his attention, she reached over with her thin hand and tapped ever so lightly on his shoulder.

“Sir—would you like something to eat, or to drink maybe?” She blinked once or twice in the forceful, fully-conscious way a person desperately deprived of sleep, or in her case, disoriented from days lost between time zones, would do, and once again brandished an unbelievably wide grin.

Sterling awoke to his surroundings, and briefly looked over at his neighbor, who already having hastily rapped through his meal’s plastic coating, was gleefully cutting into a slice of a very red-looking meatloaf. He paused for a moment, transfixed on the stork-like manner this man loomed over his pray. It was a gross, animal display of hunger, this man and his shrink-wrapped dinner; Sterling shuttered, as if only at thirty thousand feet in the air—travelling in a metal marvel of human genius—could the vulgar maladroitness of man be fully appreciated.

Deciding consciously that he could, no, not be hungry on this flight anymore, at least not while sitting next to this man. Maybe if the meal were changed; perhaps if the airline company was inclined to serve a more sterile, elevated meal, one fit for consumption at six hundred miles an hour. Something non-assuming, he mused, like a dish of chrysanthemum petals, or a reaction flask full of swirling, bubbly nutrients. There was a mismatch here, without a doubt—and with another look at the meatloaf, Sterling decided faithfully.

“I’ll have a double vodka,” he again came to this conclusion through a complicated series of irreproducible functions and desires inside his head, the temples and sinuses of which were now swimming in the churning, pressurized cabin.

The stewardess began to pour the drink, touching the lip of the miniature vodka bottle to the edge of the plastic cup, so that in the case of turbulence (at least this is how Sterling reasoned), there would be little room for spillage. He watched the maneuver intently, thinking that this was the most wonderful display of pouring he had ever seen. He likened it to the inverse of that Moroccan way, where they raised and lowered the spigot feet above the cup, splashing, showy, unnecessary—once again, the nature of his position in the sky, separated from certain death by mere inches of aluminum, bore heavily on his sense of right and wrong, what was perfectly acceptable or irreconcilably abhorrent. He signed, thankful that at least the one meal (already having resigned to a dinner of alcohol) he was going to have on this flight, he had deemed, was of the former type.

She cracked another miniature vodka to pour, and Sterling took note of her face again—small, thin features, dusky straw-colored skin, large black irises. She was no longer smiling, nor pretending to, rather. Instead, the curls of her mouth arced downwards and inwards, as if she were recoiling after having just bitten into an unripe grapefruit or a clod of dirt. He appreciated this new expression, still, much more so than the prior.

It lasted only for a brief moment, however, and with her soft, amiable “enjoy,” she resumed her pay-per-view, concierge-like smile. She placed the drink onto Sterling’s now-unfolded tray table, and began to approach the next aisle, but not before Sterling’s neighbor, either taking note of the stewardess’s heavy handed pour, or wishing for something to wash down his meatloaf, had asked for a double vodka as well.

The two had exchanged pleasantries early on, as one is required to do at the beginning of a long flight, but soon after they retreated back into themselves, Sterling to his phone and his neighbor to his laptop, of which he, for the last few hours, had been furiously typing and clicking, smacking the keyboard in the clunky way a child would fist a stick of chalk and etch innocent, kiddish scribbles onto the asphalt—his wrist inverted, elbow contorted, and shoulder—appearing to operate independently from and unbound by the laws of physiology—hinging dangerously loose out of its socket.

Sterling took a small sip of his drink and let the bitter warmth spread over his tongue and palate. They used to drink together; Mariam never did like vodka though. Coffee too. Where had those postcards gone? Her name was scribbled on each one, yes, especially poorly on the one with the ripped corner. I sent them last April. It was April again, almost May now. And why did she have to move so far away? She never did like coffee—and I wonder what she’s done with my postcards? About two feet away is the whole of the night sky, negative temperatures, instant suffocating death. And Mariam did really have poor handwriting, nearly illegible at that—had I misread something? She liked to write at my desk while I was sleeping… instant purple death. Oh, I better make sure to find a taxi when we land, and I’ll have to make sure I don’t get home too late, work tomorrow will be painful. I’ll quit, I’ll quit is what I’ll do—send them a letter tomorrow, Mariam, maybe I should write her one—

“What are you headed to New York for?” 33A washed down a piece of red meatloaf with his drink.

The engine was humming again. “Oh, no, I’m from here, I was visiting a friend in Seattle is all.”

“Oh that’s wonderful—just great. Busy place to live, hmm?”

“Sometimes, yeah. I like it though.” I like it, Sterling repeated in his head, mocking himself for his triteness.

“Seattle isn’t like New York at all, of course I’ve never lived in New York, but one imagines.”

“What are you headed to New York for?” Sterling spoke mindlessly.

“There’s a conference here, I’m presenting my research. Actually you may have heard of me. I believe my work’s been in the news lately. Of course depending on the kind of news you read, but you look like a smart enough guy to be reading the type of news I do.” Sterling looked to down at the saucy mess on his neighbor’s tray table, and then again out the window over his shoulder. He wondered what kind of news that would be.

“My name is Dr. Alexander Rousseau—pleasure to meet you, mister…” “Sterling, nice to meet you, Dr. Rousseau,” Sterling extended his hand to meet Dr. Rousseau’s, which was a large, hairy appendage that reminded him of the hands of a barber—calloused and wrinkled but without a doubt still nimble—and when he shook it, was slightly taken aback by its clamminess. He wondered if it was his own hand that was clammy, and if he in fact was the one repulsing Dr. Rousseau. It was an unnerving thought.

Dr. Rousseau didn’t seem to notice. “You can call me Alex,” he replied, chuckling and wiping his hands on his coat pocket, which neither confirmed nor refuted Sterling’s worry. Sterling was always worried about these types of meetings. And although he hated anything that approached the realm of small talk, he always found himself captive to it in a way that defied him. First impressions, as it were, troubled Sterling to no end, as well as second impressions, and every successive impression thereafter. A vague set of symptoms accompanied these meetings: sweating, flushing, occasional dizziness, nausea. He was much better at, mostly to his detriment, the re-meetings and re-introductions of people and things in his mind, where he, as the chief arranger and artist, could line up sequences of events in perfect, irrefutable harmony.

Sterling nodded, and took another small sip of his drink, hoping Alex would turn back towards his meal. He continued to explain his business in New York, however. “This year I’m the keynote speaker,” and emphasizing this word with almost inhuman-like exuberance, must have forgotten momentarily to breath, and coughed loudly, causing him to sip his vodka hurriedly in order to shove out the rest of his sentence. “I’m the keynote speaker of the American Psychiatric Association’s yearly national conference. I wouldn’t expect you to know that, per se, but I’ve been on news station after news station for the past few months since my research was published in Nature. Once again, Dr. Rousseau almost shouted the word “Nature,” afterwards pausing to either catch his breath, give Sterling the opportunity to congratulate him, or both.

Sterling, growing increasingly uncomfortable sitting within arms reach of this man, acquiesced. “What do you study?”

“I’m glad you asked.” Dr. Rousseau exhaled. “I am the lead researcher at the Seattle Center for Consciousness Studies, you may have heard of us,”—he did not—“and over the last decade or so have been working exclusively on the centers in the human brain that have to deal with attention and conscious thinking—recently I’ve discovered a brand-new, never before identified neuronal pathway, as well its associated, regulatory gene locus, that corresponds exactly, almost one-to-one, with the uniquely human tendency to both generate and fixate on intrusive and unwanted thoughts.”

Sterling rubbed his eyes with the tips of his fingers. He was never really much of a scientist, the last biology class he had taken being in middle school, taught by a thin, emaciated-looking man—a teacher named Mr. Graff with enough white facial hair to be a dandelion—who reprimanded Sterling constantly for not paying attention, and who on more than once occasion told Sterling that he was dim-witted. Still, this strange doctor’s declaration had caught him off-guard.

“What do you mean by intrusive?” Sterling heard himself ask, and shifting ever so slightly in his seat, now busied his clammy hands with another sip of vodka.

“Well,” Dr. Rousseau’s eyes lit up. “I mean to say thoughts, images, memories, these things that seem to come out of nowhere, or that don’t seem to be yours. The type of thoughts you are hopelessly unaware of, and yet can’t stop yourself from thinking.”

It seemed to Sterling that this man, as acclaimed as he purported to be, was mixing up quite a few important terms. Aren’t images and memories themselves thoughts? And how can one particular thought come out of nowhere—where are the other ones coming from? And if they’re not yours, whose exactly are they?

Dr. Rousseau’s eyes were nearly bulging out of his skull at this point. His hairy arms—Dr. Rousseau had rolled up his sleeves to around his elbows—were bright pink. He continued to speak.

“The implications of our findings, my findings, I should really say, are frankly, quite groundbreaking. If we were to create a drug to target this circuitry, or a therapy to target the gene locus,” (Sterling was confused as to why Dr. Rousseau was talking about locusts, and what flying insects had to do with his thoughts), “we could cure practically every shade of mental illness there is! It’s a simple matter, really. Just think about it—depression? As trivial as the common cold. Schizophrenic hallucinations? Gone! Even your garden-variety generalized anxiety disorder—a drug of this caliber would simply wipe the slate clean!”

Sterling wondered what Dr. Rousseau thought about, or if he even had thoughts of his own at all. Still, he decided it best not to ask any more questions of this man; better to leave it up to the doctors at the conference, he thought. It was above his pay grade.

Dr. Rousseau continued to speak at length about the specifics of the research, all of which eluded Sterling, or would have, had he been listening. While Dr. Rousseau recounted vast lists of genes and neurotransmitters, Sterling, once again gazed straight through his neighbor and into the window behind him, now nothing more than a black porthole pasted like a poster against the gray wall of the cabin. He had finished the vodka, and was thinking about Mariam and her postcards, the last forty-eight hours he had spent with her in Seattle, and how it would likely be the last time he would ever see her again. She never wanted to see Sterling again, she had said the night before he left. Sterling was too thoughtless; his constant worry and confusion had caused her to become hopelessly unsure of herself, she had said over her kitchen table—the room still showing no signs of having been lived in, replete with bare walls, unopened cardboard boxes, and half-constructed furniture—she needed to figure out who she was without Sterling or his callous indecisiveness.

Who exactly did she need to figure out? And how did one go about this figuring? These were the types of questions he considered as the remainder of the flight transpired, occasionally asking a placating question or two in order to feign interest in Dr. Rousseau. He never knew how to end a conversation politely, but neither was he listening, nor for that matter in his seat, 33B—Dr. Alexander Rousseau, unaware of Sterling’s absence, elaborated all the way until landing.

The stewardesses came by one or two more times to collect trash, still with their tired grimaces, and the seatbelt lights went on, passengers returned to their seats, and the cabin eventually and finally lurched with the heavy assurance of wheels touching down on runway.

Dr. Rousseau was the first of the two to extend a hand in farewell, and the two followed the rest of the crowd out through the airport onto the busy arrivals gate. A light rain, almost more of a heavy mist, hovered in the air. Taxis skid through shallow puddles, hissing with the sound of wet, spinning rubber, and their headlights flashed momentarily in the periphery of the eye before fleeing to some dark, unknown corner of the wet city.

Sterling managed to hail one mid-stream, and rode back to his apartment in a near perfect, drowsy trance. He had no clue when or where Dr. Rousseau parted ways with him, and only when he opened his front door, the familiar smell and look of his room, not nearly as comforting as he would have liked it to be, did he even remember the conversation he had had with this strange doctor. He dropped his luggage at the front door, immediately made his way to his writing desk in the darkness, sat down, and turned on his desk lamp. A copper glow washed over his desk and spilled onto the floor. Sterling’s lonely shadow arced over him on the opposite wall and it began to scribble:

Dear Mariam,
I imagine you’ve…

He stopped himself, afraid to realize something he couldn’t know; instead, he was content to lie his head down in his arms and watch her waver in between beams of light and shades of dust. Soon his eyes were closed, and he watched her, now filled in with fleshy tones of bluish blood and cream-colored skin, walk about his room like she used to, lie down on his bed, sit at his desk and write while he slept. She was in all of these places at once, and if Sterling tried to focus one in particular, he would find himself lost in the middle of another image completely—or was I the one who wrote while she slept? And where did I put the postcards she wrote me? The ripped one with the poor signature—her handwriting really was atrocious—and is it May or April? It must still be April… and maybe in May Mariam will change her mind about me. Or maybe I could change… and she’s thinking about me now I bet, and she’s actually right there next to me when I open my eyes. But my room is so dark; I should turn my lamp off before I fall asleep. What an odd flight today and that time Mariam and I—and suddenly Sterling’s thoughts were all but one—along with Mariam’s too, and Dr. Alexander Rousseau’s and the stewardess’s, and no one knew exactly whose thoughts were intruding on whose.