Fisher of Men

by Aaron Beardsell

Horrific Scribes Extremity Rating:

I have seen something that should not exist.

I sprawled across my sweat-soaked bed. The stars wandered, and my window rattled against the wind.

Behind my eyelids, it rose up. A gleaming tower, dark as night, yet bright like the sun. Hidden on a cold, wild coast, it hungered.

The tower watched me, and I watched it.

It was a strange year. My king-sized bed was empty. The second pillow went unused. He was gone.

Summer was dying, but winter was not yet born. Liminal. Out with the old, in with the new, but nothing changed much in the world outside. Within me, however, some fierce yearning kindled and burned away the scraps of laziness. It grew into a desperate need to get away from the city and its noise. I ignored this call for as long as I could.

When I gave in, I traveled by foot along the ancient coastline of Western Australia, starting from my home in Fremantle. My goal was to visit the lighthouses of Western Australia. I needed to see them. They summoned me with their majesty and mystery.

The journey freed me.

Fremantle was a great place to start. The town is home to a twinned pair of towers. They stand guard over the port.

I stopped by the North Fremantle Lighthouse, a blood-red thing that stood tall on an artificial headland jutting out into the ocean. The dying light struck the Indian Ocean and painted the sky in strips of orange, purple, and pink. Against this backdrop, the lighthouse glowed in crimson glory, a gore-coated spike driven into the earth. My heart slowed.

If I was free, why did my mind feel torn? Why was I pulled further from home like a fish on a hook?

Whenever I encountered a lighthouse, I imagined a vast chain of them wrapped around the shores.

I headed north along the coast, for Gilderton. I walked most of the day, drinking from my canteen and stopping to eat. The shade of a good eucalyptus was my preferred place to take stock.

On my first night, I set up camp beneath a sturdy tree. Gilderton was still several days away. My tent was cozy, with just a small breeze coming in through the mesh door. At this time of year, I was warm enough with just my sleeping bag.

Placing my backpack next to me, I spread out my belongings on the floor. Three lighters. Cigarettes. Water bottle. Rope. Notebook. Pencils. Knife. Hatchet. Binoculars. Polaroid camera. Spare film. Wallet. Cash. Fishing line. Six fishhooks of differing sizes. Wedding ring. Walnuts and other staple foods. Aluminum frypan and saucepan.

I chuckled. Aluminum. I’d been in Australia for a while now, but some things never changed. I guess my brain was still American. I thought of the world in miles and aluminum.

The items laid out on the tent floor formed a curve.

It was not much for the trek that I found myself on. I would have to forage and buy provisions along the way.

My eyes avoided the glimmer of gold. Such a small circle. Why had I taken it with me? I rubbed the fingers on my left hand.

I packed my bag, stuffed the ring inside the wallet, and shoved it deep into a zippered pocket. When I was done, I lay down on my sleeping bag. The wind was a howler that night but no match for my tiredness. I sank into dreams and nightmares.

The burning sun made each mile a battle. My socks were the worst part. After just a few hours of walking, they would be rank with sweat. The ground dragged at my feet, trying to hold me back.

I went on.

In the evenings, the air cooled with the coastal breeze. I would set up my tent in grassy parks or near dunes and beaches. The beaches were better. I could watch the stars overhead. My eyes never focused for long on those dim globes that reminded me of the lighthouses. Instead, my gaze would drift to the void that glistened between stars.

I reached the Gilderton Lighthouse a week later.

This one was funny, with its curving walls. It was unpainted except for the dove-white head of the tower. I stood next to it and stared into the sea. In Fremantle, I’d experienced elation; here, I felt worse. The rumble of the ocean did not calm me.

I turned south, and a lightness fluttered in my belly. The next morning, I packed my tent and began my southbound trek.

I followed the Bibbulman track. It was a meandering slog through endless trees, not for the faint of heart or the weak-willed. For over 650 miles it roamed and cut through the deepest bush and forests across a land older than I could comprehend. When it wound east and west, anxiety knotted in my belly, but the tension faded once the path resumed its southerly trend.

I went on.

Faces in the night.

Not his, but I wished one was.

They were lit by the moon glow, sunken cheeks and hollow eyes. Hands, pressed against the tent. Shadows crawling across the membrane, seeking entry.

Dawn broke, and orange light spilled over me.

I awoke.

The tent was unzipped.

When I grew bored of the woods, I made excursions to the windswept beaches and cliffs. I told myself I had no other reason for visiting the water.

None.

The salt air invigorated me, filled my lungs with fresh life. I stripped naked, shivering in the blustering wind, then dove into the blue. The cold water washed away the grime of the day.

The purity of those moments.

After weeks of journeying the Bibbulman, I cut west.

I forged my own path, pushing through branches, thorns and bramble, over rugged hills and through deep valleys. The land turned to clay and mud, sucking at my feet whenever rain would strike. I felt like the earth was trying to hold me back.

I went on.

The Blackwood State Forest engulfed me. To the south-west was the Cape Leeuwin Lighthouse, and to my north-east was the Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse. Both were on my list of places to visit.

My journey took me between the two lighthouses, towards Margaret River and the caves and tunnels and a stretch of blacktop called Caves Road. A little on the nose, but who am I to judge? We had honeymooned here, staying nearby in a chalet.

Maybe I intended to use Margaret River as a base camp and strike out towards the lighthouses on two different expeditions. I didn’t know why I was lured off the Bibbulman.

Traversing the Blackwood Forest took weeks. Every night, I had visions. Visions of him and the tower in the dark. It felt right.

I had my compass, map, and the sun overhead, but even without them, I knew where I was. Something like a magnet in my brain drew me closer and closer to the coastline.

I saw amazing things. Trees that made the tallest building of Perth look like a shack. Mobs of kangaroos, lazing in dappled sunlight atop golden leaves. Birds flocking across the azure sky, more than I could ever hope to count or name.

The land was alive.

Days went by, and the impulse grew stronger. Louder. It wasn’t a magnet anymore. More like a fishing hook, it tugged and yanked at me. Stretched my mind to its edge.

It was hard to sleep. Dreams were rare, nightmares more common.

I saw him often. The owner of the other wedding ring. His fingers were empty, like mine. Did he dream of me like I dreamed of him?

I awoke before dawn, desperate to keep moving. By the time the horizon glowed with a new day, I was already on the move.

My skin was prickled with fever and sweat. Maybe I was sick.

The land turned to hardscrabble dotted with small shrubs and some gums. The air was heavy with the tang of salt. The temperature cooled.

Patches of bright fabric jutted out from between the woods. The trees were an unusual color. Trunks white as teeth. Explosions of difference jumped out to me. Reds. Blues. Oranges.

Tents. Each color was a tent. Some were hidden, others exposed.

Some had holes or were falling apart from old age. They fluttered in the breeze, half collapsed or left unzipped to the elements. Others were newer. I wondered where everyone was.

Cold ashes were scattered across the ground, remnants of old visitors. Empty beer cans, or “tinnies” as the Australians called them, were scattered like pebbles around each fireplace. Here and there were overturned foldout chairs.

Except for the bristling tents, the area was silent.

I was alone.

In my heart, I knew I had arrived. The place that had called to me, day and night. I could almost hear the distant grumble of the waves against the sand.

Endless thunder.

Untold depths.

Breathing deeply, I felt something shift, like the land moved underneath me, jolted with the explosive force of an earthquake. The longer I looked around, though, the more I knew the world was the same.

Something else had changed.

My left foot rose, then drifted forward and planted itself in the dirt. My right foot followed. Then the left lurched forwards again. My feet moved of their own accord, ignoring my commands to stop. Dull panic gripped me. I was not in control.

I passed empty tents, campervans, and cars that littered the edge of the bush, one car like his.

No one remained.

The ground curved upwards. A dune.

My feet struggled up the loose sand. Gulls flapped overhead, then fled from me. Golden streams of sand cascaded around my boots like waterfalls. The sun overhead beat down upon me. If I stopped moving, I feared I would hear my skin sizzle. My fingers were sage green from the crushed leaves and smelt of woody oils.

The crest of the dune. It was a few meters away. The wind gusted, and the thunderous applause of the ocean drowned out all other sounds. I could not even hear the blood I felt thumping in my temple.

With a groan, I pulled myself onto the dune’s spine. My hands pushed me up from the floor, and I rose onto shaking legs. I looked out on the land below.

There.

My eyes were drawn towards it. Just as my body had been drawn here for weeks.

It stood alone on the beach. A glittering spire that clawed its way towards the sky and shone a light that blotted out the sun.

The black lighthouse.

I do not know how long I stood atop the dune. Hours. Minutes. Days. I cannot say with any certainty.

The sky turned to dark ash streaked with lightning. Before long, the blue was gone. Hidden by a charcoal skein. A faint glow lit up the thunderheads, the last gasp of the dying sun.

I searched through my pockets and grabbed the map to search for clues. The answer was not possible.

A lighthouse should not have been here.

And yet here it was.

The map slipped from my grip and drifted away on the wind.

The bellowing artillery of the storm was wedded to the tumult of the ocean waves. It was melodic. Intoxicating. I swayed, listening to the world.

The sky darkened again, became pitch.

I could not see the sun. The abyssal clouds extinguished its fiery light.

Only the lighthouse remained. It hurt to look at. It burned like the eye of God.

My legs tingled. I controlled them again. The call in my head was quiet, almost silent. Like it was offering me a choice.

Something wet pattered across my skin. First a trickle, then a deluge. I looked up, into the heart of the storm. I smiled.

It was perfect.

Dark clouds shuddered from horizon to horizon. Rain fell from the sky in great sheets. I breathed deep and held onto the scent of summer rain. The air held a tinge of seaweed, salt, and something else. Rot.

I held out a hand, felt the water slide across my fingers and then cascade to the sand.

The radiance of the lighthouse lit me up, burned through me, then spun away. It left me in the dark. I longed for its touch. The light scoured the beach, went up and over dunes, down a rocky promontory, and out to sea.

The water churned beneath the yellow light that pierced it. I had never seen the ocean so chaotic. It was wild and feral like something alive raged beneath the surface. Something vast. Ancient.

It pulled me. The tower. Hooks and barbs in my brain, it told me to take another step. To look inside. To see what had to be seen.

So, I did. Not because it made me but because I had to know.

Beneath a sky that sang, I approached the lighthouse.

The wet sand streamed down the slope, and I slipped. I fell to my knees, soaking my pants. My backpack slid up and over my head, pulling me forwards. With a gasp of surprise, I rolled downhill.

I landed at the bottom of the slope. The impact punched the air out of my lungs with a hollow whump. I was a mess of limbs. Sand clung to everything, damp and warm.

My lungs heaved, taking in a flood of air. With a groan, I freed my body and tried to rise. I laughed, imagining myself tangled in fishing net. Rain drummed against my skin, and lightning flashed in the distance. I could not hear my own laughter. All I could hear was the hypnotic cannonade of thunder and waves.

The ground was white like sun-bleached bones and crunched underneath me. The beach shifted unsteadily. I slipped off my backpack and rucked it onto the beach. In my tumble, the zips had come open. Out flew my polaroid camera, lighters, and a small, brown square. My wallet, with a faint bulge in the leather.

The wedding ring.

My hand shaking, I reached out and plucked the wallet up. I opened it and pulled out the ring. It was cold and small. Memories flitted by like nightcaller birds. I closed my eyes. His face was always there, just behind the darkness.

The lighthouse spun around again, lighting me up with what felt like holy fire. I made my decision.

I tilted my hand and dropped the ring.

It fell. Hit the ground. The wind pushed past me, whipping up the ground like a twister. The gold band was buried under the bone-white beach. Lost from sight. Like him.

I tucked the polaroid camera into a pocket in my pants alongside the lighters.

I moved towards the thing that had called me. As I approached the lighthouse, I discovered new details.

The bricks were unlike any I had seen. They glistened, not just from the salt spray. Each brick overlapped another, like the scales of a nautical beast.

Midnight blue waves rocked against the ebon tower. It was half submerged around the base. Like a semi-aquatic creature that refused to commit to life on the land or the sea. Polished stone jutted onto the beach, clawing its way onto land in the shape of a path. The rest of it trailed off into the depths, small tentacles of stone that twirled around the lighthouse and under the water.

I wondered what foundation this structure was built upon. The design was unusual. Abnormal.

Before me was a door. Red paint. Wood. Brass handle and knocker. My fingers wrapped around the handle. It was warm, almost scalding. I turned it and pushed open the door. The hinges were silent.

Shadows claimed the lighthouse interior. My eyes adjusted, and I saw inside.

I entered the lighthouse that was not a lighthouse.

A candle sat on a desk. I lit it, and the flame danced in the wind from the open door.

The space was almost comforting. The room was warm and muggy. Old furniture cluttered it, the fabric decayed from long years of abandonment. Photo frames covered the walls. They were empty.

I turned to the stairs and froze.

They led down.

I leaned against the wall for support but recoiled. The stone flexed like fish skin. My heart felt ready to launch itself from my throat. I eyed the walls with suspicion. Were they moving in and out, ever so slightly?

I could have turned back. The door was open. But I didn’t. His face wouldn’t let me. The one from my memories, dreams and nightmares.

My feet were on the stairs. I looked down into blackness so deep and unrelenting that it hurt my eyes. I considered carrying the candle, but no, the candle would stay, a guiding light for my return journey.

I pulled out a lighter, tore one of the photo frames from the wall, and smashed it against the floor. Glass twinkled in the firelight. I picked up wood from the frame’s remains and held it over the candle. With the lighter’s assistance, I made the wood burn. Thin smoke curled about the room.

Like a caveman, I descended the stairs with my makeshift torch.

The light was dying.

I went down as far as I could but found nothing. A spiral within a spiral continued into the depths. The wood from the frame reduced to ash, leaving me alone in the dark.

I took out a lighter and walked back up the stairs. My legs ached. First one lighter died, its fluid exhausted. The next one fared little better. Its weak flame fluttered against and cast long shadows.

I continued upwards, never reaching the ground floor.

Finally, I fished my third lighter from a pocket. Its little light flickered and wasted away.

The hungry dark encroached and tasted me. I had not found my way out. I could not ascend. I cried out. There was no way out. Or was there a way that was simply barred from me?

I stayed on the steps where my final lighter died. I didn’t know whether I was weeping. Time moved strangely. I was walking downhill.

I grew accustomed to the dark.

The walls were wet. I did not wish to touch them, but I often reached out for stability. My fingers slipped across the stone, feeling bumps, ridges, and grooves. The tower was alive. It moved around me.

My polaroid was the final source of light. Its flash illuminated the tunnel that curved ahead of me. I trudged downwards, clicked the camera, snapped another picture, and continued on. The pictures floated to the ground and carpeted the stone. Each one revealed the same thing. Nothing.

I was not alone. Something lived within the lighthouse. I heard it breathing when I breathed, moving when I moved.

It was not a lighthouse. I was not a man.

Was I a man?

My final photograph. I held up the camera and pointed it towards the dark. I could not see the outline of my hands or the camera or anything. Something in the inky night pressed against my eyeballs.

The darkness was not solid. It was liquid and grew to fill whatever space it was given.

Something slithered and whispered in my brain.

I pressed down on the button and took my final picture. The flash blinded me one last time. I saw the end. His face was there, in the dark and in the light. The one I had tried to forget. My love.

The tunnel convulsed, shifted, and closed around me. The damp stone refused to let me go.

With the final polaroid flash, I saw it. The thing in the night, coming closer. It hungered. I saw foulness and the truth of the thing that had hooked me so long ago. Lured me down into a place no one was meant to go. I had followed a false light burning atop a spire that could not have existed.

I saw teeth.

SPECIAL EXHIBIT FIVE: Return to “Red Thread”

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