Rhapsody: The First Volume of the Muse Chronicles Read online

  “This would go a lot easier if you would talk to me,” the woman whispered in her ear. Annette’s eyes shot open to find the woman sitting next to her in the passenger seat looking slightly frazzled. “I’m here for a specific purpose that will no doubt change the entire course of your life. Now if you please, hear me out for five minutes. And then I’ll be on my way.”

  “Get out of my car,” Annette managed to squeak, but the woman didn’t budge.

  “Mrs. Slocum, it’s vitally important that you pay very close attention to what I have to tell you.” The woman said this as she opened her jacket pocket, sticking her hand into the folds. Annette felt the granola from breakfast try to pry itself from her stomach. The woman was no doubt going to pull out a gun and shoot Annette, but if that was the case then two questions erupted. Who would want to kill Annette and why?

  Annette certainly didn’t wait to find out. She opened the car door, unbuckled her belt and fled to the parking lot.

  “Mrs. Slocum!” The woman, she could hear, was behind her again. Annette ran to the road to escape her captor. The woman raced after her and they both wound through the traffic. Drivers’ horns blazed in aggravation. As Annette dodged the cars, she wished she was home. Even though it wasn’t much of a life, it was her kind of life. She took the quiet and boring matrimony with Lyle, not for granted like before, but as something she wanted, something she knew, something she feared she’d probably never see again.

  Indeed, it certainly wouldn’t be something she would see again. A blue Cadillac convertible, with its top up, barreled down the road. Annette wasn’t fast enough. With a sickening crunch Annette’s body toppled over the hood, cracked the windshield, and flopped back to the ground. The woman in the pants suit stood aghast. The envelope which she had taken from her pocket fell to the street as all traffic paused. From inside the envelope rolled out a bright orange peg that rotated, then ceased motion, next to Annette’s left ear.

  The day that Annette Slocum died began like any other that had preceded it. Some people would call her death the end of a tragically boring, unfulfilled life. For those who had sent the Woman in the Cream-Colored Pants Suit, it was the exact opposite. For them, Annette’s life finally began. By the time anyone even looked around to see who or what Annette had been running from, the woman, the envelope, and the bright orange peg had vanished entirely.

  CHAPTER 2: AN INSTRUCTIONAL VIDEO NARRATED BY NATHANIEL J. CAULIFLOWER

  Annette woke to the sound of a water cooler belching its bubbles. It was the oddest sound for her to hear since she’d been hit by a car moments before. Or had she? Waking in this small room was like waking from an elaborate dream she’d been having for thirty years. It felt as if Lyle, the house, the rippling shirt fabric in the afternoon breeze and the smell of the ink on the pages of a library book had all been pieces of a fragmented illusion brought on by an overabundance of pizza before laying down for an afternoon nap.

  “That’s impossible,” Annette told herself, certain that two seconds ago she had been splattered all over the road in front of the library like a dismembered mannequin encircled by her own blood. As life had been taken from her, she had detected a swarm of people crowding around the unforeseen misfortune. Now she was alone and completely intact, sitting in a chair next to a water cooler. To Annette, the water cooler was a foreign object with as much charm as a toad croaking unhappily while perched on a lily-pad.

  The waiting room in which Annette found herself had nine chairs in a row, eight of which were empty, and all the same color and shape as the one underneath her. The room was small and windowless and no bigger than a walk-in closet. It had barely enough room for the nine chairs, let alone the water cooler with its irritating belches. A single clock ticked the seconds away silently on the wall before her. There wasn’t even a table with magazines as one would expect from most waiting rooms. There were, however, two doors: one to her right and one to her left, both closed, keeping whatever was behind them at a concealed distance.

  “Who was that Woman in the Cream-Colored Pants Suit, and where is she now?” Annette wondered to herself, shifting to a more comfortable position. Annette was a woman who had an around-the-clock routine and the woman who had ultimately brought her to an end had spoiled it. The fact that her life, which had once had a specific pace, rhythm, and reason, was suddenly thrown into upheaval unnerved Annette even more.

  If only she could see that woman one more time, she would . . . Annette wasn’t quite sure what she’d do. Silently stare at her in fury? Would she reach beyond her insecurities and spout a monologue about how her life had been ended unfairly? Or would she do something drastic like whack her assailant over the head with the water cooler jug? Annette didn’t have to wonder very long as, within seconds of these thoughts, the door to her left opened. There, in the doorway, stood her enemy.

  “You . . .” Annette seethed. She was hardly one for histrionics so, as a substitute for jumping from her chair and strangling the woman, Annette sat and simmered.

  “I’m afraid so, Mrs. Slocum. Can you follow me, please?”

  Annette spied the other closed door to her right. If she could make a quick escape, she wondered where it would lead. Unfortunately for Annette, it seemed that the woman would follow her even now, after death, wherever she fled. Annette figured she was already deceased so what harm could it do to follow her? She stood, brushed the wrinkles from her faded floral house-dress, and faced her fate. The woman released yet another smile, perfect teeth beyond her Barbie doll veneer, and held the door open. The woman wore pearl earrings, the surfaces of which glistened in the waiting room light.

  On the other side, Annette found a rather long plain hallway with doorless offices. Annette could see from a quick glance that each office had their own interior designs specifically installed for their occupants. The woman walked fast and Annette struggled to keep up, therefore did not have time to investigate the offices further. Annette did see that each office had a private post box. Each one varied in color, size, and shape; some post boxes even had different languages written on them. Annette followed the woman to the very end of the hall where there was a tenth door.

  A rather skinny man in an argyle sweater and tight-fitted jeans stepped out of the doorless vestibule. He was in his late twenties. His hair was a maintained crew cut with highlights. His eyes were hazel-green. He held in his hand a plate of chicken Marsala fettuccini topped with steaming mushrooms. To Annette, the pasta dish smelled divine. As she didn’t know this man and didn’t feel comfortable speaking to a complete stranger, Annette kept this thought to herself.

  “I was hoping you’d get a chance to try the new dish, Mr. Richardson,” the woman said to him. She then made introductions. “Mr. Richardson, this is Mrs. Slocum. She’ll be staying with us for a short while.”

  When Mr. Richardson smiled Annette spotted dimples. “New to the afterlife, huh?” he asked Annette, offering a handshake. Annette looked at Mr. Richardson’s hand. She nervously shifted her eyes to the woman.

  The woman then said, “You’ll have to excuse Mrs. Slocum. She’s a bit frazzled from having recently collided with a Cadillac.” But Annette wasn’t frazzled. The woman was simply trying to be polite in lieu of Annette’s lack of response.

  “I see,” answered Mr. Richardson who seemed intrigued on Annette’s last moments.

  “You two will have plenty of time to talk later, I’m sure,” the woman told Mr. Richardson and Annette. “In the meantime, keep up the good work, Mr. Richardson.” With that, Mr. Richardson respectfully ducked into his own doorless office.

  The contrast of the simple hallway where Annette stood to the aesthetic cedar balcony of Mr. Richardson’s office was breathtaking. A star-filled night sky could be seen beyond his balcony. There was also a comforting spring breeze that brushed its way through the door to Annette’s cheek. It was as if the hallway was an actual gateway to Mr. Richardson’s private world rather than to his office.

  Annette whispered, “Th
is isn’t Heaven, is it?” To this, the woman laughed, leading Annette into the tenth office at the end of the hall. Annette took that as a “no.”

  “I’m afraid Heaven will have to wait for you, Mrs. Slocum. Besides, I’d much rather be here than there any day.”

  The tenth office was a conference room. It held a long rectangular table surrounded by nine swivel chairs and another water cooler. Serving dishes had been placed on the conference room table. The dishes were virtually empty save for a spot of vegetable oil in one, a lone mushroom in another, and a bowl that housed one single piece of discarded lettuce. There were used China plates, glass goblets, and also silverware that were waiting to be bussed.

  “Please excuse the mess, Mrs. Slocum,” the woman told her. “Our chef, Mr. Cauliflower, should’ve taken care of these dishes before your arrival.”

  Annette wasn’t worried about the dishes. Instead, her attention was on one of the walls where a brilliant mural had been hung. The mural looked as if it had been painted sometime during the Renaissance. It featured nine beautifully naked women dancing in a garden, each wearing laurel leaves around their heads. Annette studied it with fascination as the woman took her seat at the head of the table. The woman placed the blood-spotted orange colored peg before her then took a cup from the dispenser and filled it with fresh water. Bubbles brought Annette’s attention from the mural. Like the other woman, she sat down.

  “You’re no doubt wondering what this place is, Mrs. Slocum,” the woman assumed. “It’s a very special office for a very special function. You, Mrs. Slocum, have been hired by Management as a muse.”

  “A muse?”

  “Exactly.” The woman dunked the orange peg into the water rinsing off the blood. Once the peg was cleaned she squeezed the cup in the palm of her hand and, as if by magic, the cup disappeared into thin air or imploded in on itself, Annette wasn’t sure. “My name is Fiona, and I’ve been instructed, due to the unexpected circumstances, to train you.”

  “Train me?” Annette still wasn’t sure she grasped the concept of being a muse. Fiona produced a remote control from her jacket pocket and pressed a button. As the florescent lights in the conference room dimmed, the mural was covered by a movie screen that lowered and clicked into place. As the movie started, Annette was reminded of a black and white news reel. Big words made of block letters popped on the screen. The movie was then narrated by a male’s booming voice.

  “‘Musing and You’ brought to you by Management. Narrated by Nathaniel J. Cauliflower.” Annette turned to Fiona and noticed she was shaking the orange peg dry, inspecting it, and wiping it clean with a cream-colored handkerchief. Annette turned back to the movie and the narration continued. “Since the beginning of time, muses have been inspiring the world around them - painters, writers, sculptors, dreamers and lovers: you name it, they have done it. According to Greek mythology, there were nine. Born of Zeus and Mnemosyne, they each had their own private field of expertise: Terpsichore was the muse of dance; Urania, muse of Astronomy; Thalia, muse of Comedy; Melpomene, muse of tragedy; Clio, muse of history; and the four muse poets: Polyhymnia for sacred poetry; Euterpe for music and lyric poetry; Calliope of epic poetry; and Erato of love poetry. Each had worked tirelessly, for centuries, criss-crossing backwards and forwards throughout time until, one day, they hired replacements and retired. These replacements had been randomly chosen, given offices after their deaths, and trained by the very first muses in the universe’s history. As time progressed, these ‘First Generation Muses’ had filled their quotas and hired the next generation of replacements, and the Second Generation progressed to the Third. The Third passed it on to the Fourth, and then they passed it on to the Fifth, and so on . . . which means if you are watching this training video, you are now one of the elite. You, dear muse, are one of the Ninth Generation.”

  “So basically, I’m replacing you?” Annette asked Fiona who, in turn, said nothing. She simply kept her eyes on the training video. Annette followed suit. Nathaniel J. Cauliflower continued.

  “Now we know what a muse is, so let’s talk about what a muse does and, more specifically, how they do it.”

  It was at this moment that a poorly drawn animation filled the screen. Annette suddenly remembered why she preferred books over television. She had been raised in a house that encouraged imaginative thinking. Her father had only kept a television for special occasions such as weather reports and presidential speeches. Even then, the picture on their television had been mostly static. In her youth, Annette’s father had encouraged his children to go out and experience life or read a book and discuss it over dinner.

  The instructional video went on. “First introduced in the year 1967 by Hasbro, the Lite-Brite board had been created to allow artists to create pictures by the use of translucent colored pegs when inserted into a grid covered by opaque black paper. A light bulb inside the device, once activated, had caused the peg colors to illuminate. A muse in training,” Nathaniel J. Cauliflower preached, “is given an empty Lite-Brite board but for a slightly different purpose. You see, dear muse, envelopes are delivered to a muse’s post box and inside each envelope is a colored peg. Whether it’s blue, green, yellow, purple, pink, red, white, orange, or cream with bright red polka-dots, the peg is then taken from the envelope and placed into the Lite-Brite board. That’s when things for the muse become quite complex. The office folds and unfolds like an elaborate pop-up book. The colored peg transports you into the corresponding life of a specific person, place and time. Once there, it’s up to the muse to decide how to proceed. Your job, as the muse, is to inspire the person in that specific page of his or her very own story. Once the inspiration job is done in the allotted time, the book is closed and the muse is returned to the office to await the next peg. This process repeats itself until the entire Lite-Brite board is full. Then, and only then, will the muse retire with a replacement starting a brand new board.”

  “To fill an entire Lite-Brite board, that’ll take forever,” Annette thought to herself. In her post mortem denial, she was eager to return to the safety of her library books.

  “There are several things to think about before venturing forth, dear muse: the first is the water cooler. Water is a conduit, a necessity for traveling from place to place. Drinking the water lubricates the transition of traveling through these passages. Without it, the journey would be excruciating.” Annette wasn’t too thrilled that the water cooler was imperative. She had to get used to the obnoxious gargling bubbles each time she took a drink when all she wanted to do was be rid of them.

  “Second,” the narrator marshaled, “time for the muse is circular, which means that you can travel both forwards and backwards through time. Remember that past, present and future exist both harmoniously and simultaneously. Therefore, don’t be surprised if you’re inspiring a person suffering from vertigo to bungee jump with his friends one moment and, then, inspiring the painting of the Sistine Chapel the next.

  “Third and most importantly: Do not, under any circumstances, leave an envelope unattended. The window of time, or the page of the person’s pop-up book, is only open for a limited interval and can only be opened by you: butterfly wings and earthquakes, dear muse! First finish one job before moving onto the next.” Annette had read enough science fiction to know that changing one thing in a past timeline might result in a greater change in the future. She hoped a colored peg wouldn’t send her to the Jurassic period, where she might accidentally step on a twig. Then, when she would come back, the human race would have evolved into something like a jelly-fish. “You now play a vital part in humanity, dear muse. No one you inspire is too great or too small. No task is ever out of your control. You, by yourself, hold the reins to inspiration. You can and will inspire anyone.”

  The instructional video ended, the screen receded into the ceiling, the lights brightened and Fiona stood. “Well, there you have it, Mrs. Slocum.”

  Annette stayed in her chair, once again peering quizzically at the mura
l. The painting acted like an endorphin as it pulled disjointed memories from her. The memories were of nothing in particular: a mixture of names, faces, and plots of library books. It seemed that now she was dead, Annette’s beliefs and reminiscences, once dormant in life, currently buzzed around her head like a swarm of gnats.

  “Shall we check out your office, Mrs. Slocum?”

  Annette was looking forward to seeing her new office as much as a non-flosser looks forward to a tooth-cleaning from a dentist, but she dutifully followed Fiona anyway.

  “Take it from me, Mrs. Slocum, someone who has been here since the First Generation.” Fiona spoke reassuringly to Annette as they walked. “Orientation can be a bit overwhelming. Everything will make sense in time.”

  Fiona’s cream-colored heels clipped the tiled floor beneath them and the conversation took a different direction. “Now,” Fiona said. “The office is a green one, Mrs. Slocum. The light bulbs used in the hallway ceiling help reduce and conserve energy. Even the envelopes that Management sends us are biodegradable, though Mr. Cauliflower prefers we simply recycle them. It was his idea to modernize. He called it an ‘earth-friendly operation.’”

  “Cauliflower the chef?” asked Annette.

  “Mr. Cauliflower: our chef, our instructional video narrator, our colored peg aficionado – he wears many hats, as you’ll see. You’ll meet him in due time, Mrs. Slocum. I’m sure of it. He was a Second Generation muse. He’s the one who prepares the colored pegs and delivers the envelopes to the post boxes.” Fiona went on with her orientation. “You’ll notice that we don’t rely on clocks in this office. You saw one in the waiting room but we don’t rely on it. Muses measure increments of time by the amount of colored pegs that accumulate in one’s own board. And speaking of the waiting room,” Fiona then stopped and turned to Annette to make sure she was paying attention. “I must ask you not to open the waiting room door until you retire. Mr. Cauliflower uses that door to deliver his envelopes and his gourmet dishes, which Management has allowed him to do for centuries. But a Muse must never trespass back into the waiting room before their board is full. Butterfly wings and earthquakes, yes?”