Aren't We Already Living in Paradise?

Michael Brownstein

Episode 5 from Must Not Sleep, a new novel which takes place in shamanic space, a realm of shapeshifting and trance. Check out episodes 1, 2, 3, and 4. A free download of Michael Brownstein reading from the novel is available on Podiobooks.com.

Hammered down into my bones from everything that had taken place, when I finally moved into Georgia's apartment all I wanted to do was rest. I spent my waking hours meditating and fasting. I took a break from riding that old blood-sugar roller coaster.

Eating nothing, drinking only water, following my breath, I felt centered again. And Georgia joined me. She loved the bright transparent space which opened up when her monkey mind subsided.

We stayed with it and after a couple of days our hunger disappeared. And the weather changed dramatically too. Frigid cold gave way to days of record warmth, allowing us to open the windows and wear t-shirts indoors and making it easier to abstain from eating.

Parked on the sofa in the living room, I saw the same luminous, cloudless sky outside the front windows that I'd seen in my big dream. My body filled with crystal light, I merged with that sky.

Before long, on the top floor of the building on Bedford Street, we made another heaven: no jobs, no clocks, no family. No newspapers, no television. We disconnected the phone. The apartment became a secret chamber where we remained autonomous, awake, free of attachment.

Or so it seemed. Because one night while we were sitting cross-legged on the bed, I realized that this state of serenity was beginning to bore me.

"There's no way around it," I announced abruptly. "We can meditate forever but if we don't face our issues, when we re-enter the world we'll still be other-directed. And the Goddess will keep her distance from us."

"Other-directed?"

"Acting out our unconscious patterns."

"So what are my issues, Isaac?"

Disregarding the steely note that had crept into her voice, I said, "The most negative things you can remember from your childhood. That's the only way out. Everybody assumes the present is determined by the past. And since the past can't be changed, we're stuck. But instead of trying to overcome the past, why not just erase it? Release whatever comes up. Meet images of abuse or insufficiency with acceptance--for your mother, your father, whoever."

Her face tightened.

"My father was a motherless bastard. He thought he owned the whole world. Whatever he wanted was his. He didn't care about anyone or anything else. No questions or compromises. The companies he controlled dumped chemicals into rivers and lakes. That didn't bother him at all. He was greedy and ruthless. But money didn't mean much to him except that the more he had, the more power he possessed. So he got richer and richer without any passion for what wealth can buy--beautiful homes, fine furniture. He was only happy subduing people, forcing them to submit. Worst of all was how he treated us, his own family. He never tired of abusing my mother, not physically but mimicking and denigrating her in front of my brother and me, in front of dinner guests, taking this totally perverse pleasure in her humiliation. She was trapped, you know, unable to leave him in spite of all that. Scared to death of him, scared of her own shadow. And he seemed to like destroying her, only little by little, over the years. Toying with her...Toying with all of us..."

She sat on the bed empty-eyed, her body rigid, no longer connecting with me. I tried to comfort her but it was like talking to a statue.

Sharpen your intention like a knife.

"Who is the third that walks beside us?"

I repeated this while she swayed back and forth, her eyes unseeing, until finally she locked in.

"So who is the third that walks beside us?"

"Your fear, right? Just like for me it's my anger."

I went into the kitchen and returned with two glasses of water. After she drank hers, I said, "There's more to this. You have to face it. Your father--"

"Isaac, I can't go there. It's too painful."

"Yes you can. Tell me what happened."

She sighed. "That's the problem, I've never been able to remember when I was little. Only later. Like by the time I was a teenager and I could talk back to him, I remember doing that. It was weird growing up in our family because there were times when he was affectionate, the caring father. Taking us kids to softball practice or horseback riding or the movies, sometimes even buying flowers for my mother, although with her it was always like first drive her to the medicine chest where she'd fumble for her antidepressants, then go and buy her something nice. But when I got interested in dance he was supportive, paid for ballet classes. He sent my brother and me to the best schools. And every summer we went somewhere, Italy or Greece, we'd rent a house, always a villa in the hills overlooking the sea, and we'd swim and read and go for walks, it was wonderful. Even then, though, he'd disappear for days at a time. Like what's an American businessman who can't speak the language going off and doing in a foreign country? We learned not to ask. That'd be an instant mood-changer. He'd go from super-Dad to monster, insulting my mother, telling my brother he was never going to amount to anything. But vacations are rewards and by the time I was a teenager I was wondering, like, rewards for what? Because the more I saw what he did, the more appalled I became. He hid most of it from us anyway, we only found out about things by accident. Each year he made more deals. Always bigger and bigger deals."

She shuddered.

"God, how I came to hate that word--deal. And then, when I was sixteen, I realized what was going on and I ran away from home. Several times, in fact."

"What was going on?"

"I realized he was doing the same thing to the Earth, to the environment, to innocent people who worked in his companies around the globe, as he did to us. He was forcing himself on the Earth, violating her. He or his proxies, his shadow companies. It was like a Chinese puzzle box, corporations inside holding companies inside banks. But at the end it was him: clear-cutting forests, polluting rivers, selling armaments to whoever had the money, spending his days engineering hostile takeovers. Then the oil business, he got into that big time when I left home for good--you see, I refused his money. I wouldn't let him pay for college, I just disappeared..."

Out of breath, her face flushed, she fell back onto the bed.

"I'm proud of you. You left. Not everyone could have done that. But what about when you were younger, a little girl? What happened then? Obviously it's still inside you."

"I'm afraid. It's like there's a wall between me and what I know."

I got up from the bed.

"The demons have a field day when we they sense we're feeling helpless. Stand up, sweetheart."

We moved into the living room.

"Whatever comes, don't hold onto it, just send it to me. I'm here for you...Breathe...Look into my eyes and breathe...."

"I can't do this, Isaac. Maybe some other time."

"But why put it off? We're almost there. Early childhood is the key."

"No," she said in a small voice. "It's too much for me."

"But-"

Suddenly she was shouting, the tears streaming down her face. "Damn it, I told you I can't go there! Why won't you back off? You keep lecturing me about my issues. I'm sick of it. How about your issues?"

Swallowing hard, I looked out the front windows at the night sky. A watery yellow moon sat just above the roof line.

"You know what, Georgia? You're right. I apologize. I was pushing you. That's definitely something for me to look at. After all, what's the rush?...Some other time, like you say..."

She dried her eyes. We faced each other in silence until finally an impish grin transformed her features.

"Thank you. For a while there I thought we were going to have our first fight. Besides, what do you really know about the Goddess? You have no idea when and where she'll show up again. You're just another guy, after all."

Then the day came when we ventured out into the Big Apple.

"This is so wild," Georgia said as we stepped into the hallway. "It's the middle of winter and here I am wearing nothing more than a t-shirt!"

"Global warming. Or maybe the universe was listening to us."

She rolled her eyes.

"Go ahead and laugh, but what if that explains it? What if the spirits heard us and responded? Imagine what else we can bring into existence besides warm weather."

"Like what?"

"Like the money necessary to survive. The sky's the limit. There's enough space for everything to manifest."

By this time we were passing the apartment directly below hers. On the other side of the door I could hear the sound of the television again.

Thuds, explosions, sirens wailing, then a muffled voice:

"Once upon a time after 9/11...Claustrophobic and inflamed...Omigod, what happened to Butch?...There is no Butch...Butch is dead...A transplant, a cypher, our mole."

Suddenly irritated I said, "Jesus, I'd like to pound on this sucker's door and ask him why he's wasting his life."

She looked bemused. "But nothing's supposed to make us angry anymore, remember?"

Her eyes, sea-green flecked with gold, instantly carried me away. Standing there in the hallway, the TV droning on the other side of the wall, I felt my cock get hard. Her fingers brushed lightly against my pants, back and forth, back and forth. Then she stopped.

"Let's go outside. Now's not the time or the place."

By the middle of that afternoon--Sunday, January 19th, according to a newspaper I glanced at--the temperature had climbed into the sixties. It was like Mardi Gras on the streets, everyone giddy with the sudden release from winter's grip.

After days of fasting we floated through the city, drifting without destination. Luminous beings, the light streaming from our eyes, we drew riveting stares from passers-by.

We gaped at the endless stream of faces and bodies. The unprecedented change in the weather was a challenge for some folks. Stubbornly refusing to adapt, they trudged along in their winter coats, swaddled in down, fur, and wool, perspiring and unhappy. But others jogged by wearing nothing more than tank tops and running shorts, earphones securely in place.

Strolling arm in arm, we were overwhelmed by the sexual energy surging around us. Women decked out in springtime finery glided down the sidewalk, their eyes remote and guarded. Men crudely harassed them, as fixated as bloodhounds straining at the leash.

On Broadway now, we stopped dead in our tracks. The sheer prodigality of legs and asses and cheekbones, of skin and hair, of silhouettes dying to connect.

A lean bronzed lady in a silver spandex body stocking swept past us wearing wraparound sunglasses and clutching a Walkman. In spite of the sunglasses, we could see the skin drawn taut across her forehead and cheeks.

"Botox," Georgia whispered. As the woman passed, I heard the dry, hardshell whispering of insect music.

Then she said, "Wow, can you imagine how great it would be to embrace these people after they've been liberated from their stories?"

Two heavily perspiring men in cutaway shorts and tight sleeveless t-shirts came jogging up the sidewalk, each smiling sedately at the other while listening to his own Walkman.

"9/11 blasted open a black hole and it's huge," I erupted, my voice louder than I realized. "Why not take advantage of it? Why not start loving one another right now before it's too late? What are we waiting for? Aren't we already living in paradise?"

A little girl stopped, tugging at a man's hand. "What's he saying, Daddy?"

A young professional in Yankees cap and carefully pressed Docksiders, he jerked her back into the flow and, glowering at me, muttered, "It's idiots like you who are giving the Patriot Act a good name. You probably even voted for Ralph."

I noticed the furrowed brow, downturned mouth and defeated slouch of a young man approaching us. Then an anorexic, almost skeletal black woman with exquisite, intricately braided hair. Then a smirking, musclebound blond bouncer. And an awkward pubescent girl with long legs, red hair and frightened celadon eyes. Followed by three prosperous-looking male entities with milky skin, freshly washed ponytails, and identical coin-shaped eyeglasses.

Georgia and I cackled as, erasing the content from their heads by sheer intention, we secretly drew one liberated lover after another into our arms.

Then she grabbed my arm and said excitedly, "Listen to this, Isaac. When I was a little girl we had an old brindle cat who lived outside. He wouldn't let you touch him. We'd leave his food on the back porch and then have to chase away all the other cats that showed up at his bowl. And one day--I'll never forget it--I suddenly realized like what's the difference between our cat and these creatures we're throwing rocks at? Only one thing: our definition of the other ones as stray cats. But isn't that what we all are? Stray cats!"

At that moment a golden-skinned man approached, moving right into the middle of the sidewalk to block our way. He smelled rank. In his thirties, he had a trim, muscular body and long, dirty blond dreadlocks. Around his neck he wore a cowrie shell necklace on a leather string. His hands were filthy, their fingernails broken and chewed down to the nubs.

He looked from one to the other of us with probing, sarcastic eyes and said, "My name's Adonis. What's yours?"

"Isaac," I replied, but Georgia immediately moved away from him.

He turned to her. "I feel like I know you from somewhere. Maybe Tulum? Were you down there with us last year?"

He squinted at her, his smile invasive, proprietary.

"Yeah, Tulum...You're Dandelion. You were hanging with that guy selling reds. Rodney. The one who tried to break up our scene. But you and I connected in spite of him. The full moon, remember? We went for a walk on the beach."

"Isaac, let's get out of here."

"It's OK, Dandelion," he persisted. "I'm not the kind of person to hold a grudge. Peace and love."

His eyes lost focus for a moment, then came back again, fastening on her. "You were gorgeous then but Christ, you're more than that now. The light's just spraying out of you. Amazing."

He stepped back. "Spraying out of both of you. White light. And the colors of the rainbow, leaking out around the edges..."

Touching my elbow, he pleaded, "Take me with you. Please. I can see you're for real. I need you. I need both of you. I'll do whatever you say."

"This dude smells like my butt," someone passing by erupted.

"Isaac, I'm leaving," Georgia said.

She turned and walked quickly down the sidewalk. Adonis started after her but I raised an arm and said, "Not so fast. You scared her. That's no good."

I couldn't help smiling as I added, "Maybe we'll run into each other again. If we do, hopefully you'll be out from under your poison cloud. You're too hungry now, you're trying to control everything, and all because of the fear underneath. Underneath you reject yourself. You hate yourself."

Suddenly his eyes filled of tears.

"Until you deal with that, whatever you say to her will be tainted. And it won't work anyway because I'll let you in on a secret, Adonis. Whatever you are, she's bigger than that. Way bigger. She can incinerate you in a second if she wants to."

"Isaac!" he called out, lunging toward me, but I was already running down the sidewalk.

Georgia waited in a doorway two blocks away.

"That guy was scary."

"But do you know him, like he said?"

"Are you kidding me? I've never laid eyes on him before. Or does he strike you as my type?"

Cool and distant, she held my glance until I started to tremble.

"No, I guess not."

We resumed wandering through the city, heading west now into the Village, the unprecedented hot afternoon sun on our faces. I raised my glance above the traffic and storefronts and let it rest unfocused in the middle distance. My mouth half-open, my body drained of tension, I floated through a space which felt endless. Soon the atmosphere itself changed. Buildings and sidewalks became transparent.

Then, clearly visible among the clouds, I saw a large Victorian country house, its rambling facade shimmering in space. Attached to it was a modern, nondescript one-story annex, and nearby a different sort of structure entirely: an imposing Greek Revival house surmounted by a cupola, perhaps an observatory. A high fence surrounded this complex of buildings and a gatehouse restricted access. Looking closer, I saw dozens of guards milling on the grounds and stationed at the entry. And the roof of the annex bristled with antennae, microwave receivers, satellite dishes.

Spooked, I lowered my gaze to the figures coming toward me on the sidewalk.

And what the hell was this? On the foreheads of one pale couple I noticed bar codes, flickering black and white rectangles which came and went almost before I could register what I was seeing. Bar codes--those universal price codes on products at the supermarket, the hardware store, the pharmacy, everywhere. The couple sensed me looking at them. Without breaking stride they turned and stared right through me. Their corporality seemed provisional, tentative.

What a kick in the head.

At that moment I became aware of a woman standing beside Georgia. The two of them were deep in conversation. I had no idea how long they'd been talking.

"Isaac, this is Janine."

Collecting myself, I smiled. "Hi, Janine."

I smelled cigarettes and alcohol. Dressed in an expensive black tailored suit, a gold cross wedged between her ample breasts, she was taller and heavier than Georgia. Her brown eyes darted back and forth, quickly trying to assemble a story about us.

"We used to work together, waitressing uptown. How long ago was that?"

Janine laughed. "At least four years. Or was it six? I can't remember. But you actually look younger now, Susan, how in the world do you do it? You look great!"

Georgia grimaced. "That's not my name."

"Not your name? What do you mean?"

"I'm Georgia now."

I touched Georgia's cheek with the back of my hand, running my fingers along her neck until I felt the goosebumps.

"Janine," she said, "give me your phone number, I'll call you soon, I promise. We've been walking around for hours and--it must be the heat--I need to lie down. Don't you, honey?" she asked, giggling mischievously and kissing me on the lips. I put my arms around her and we embraced. I could smell her sweet hair and skin.

Janine's eyes went blank. Her lips, painted fire-engine red, parted involuntarily.

I turned to her and said, "Janine, would you like to join us?"

She started to hyperventilate.

"Georgia's apartment is right around the corner. This crazy weather. I think we could all use a nap."

I opened my arms and looked into her eyes. "Let me hold you, darling. Let me feel your heart against mine. Don't be afraid."

Backing away from us, she said, "Don't touch me. What's wrong with you, Susan? Who is this guy?"

Then she was whimpering, her breath coming in short, tortured gulps. Georgia reached into her jeans and pulled out a scrap of paper and a pen, saying, "Now listen, Janine. This is Isaac. He's my partner. I trust him. He wouldn't ask you to join us without a good reason. But you certainly don't have to, it's up to you. Call me. We'll have tea. Just the two of us."

She started to write down her phone number.

"But Georgia, we disconnected the phone."

She laughed. "Oh, God." Crossing out the number, she scribbled her address and thrust the piece of paper into Janine's hand.

"Come visit us if you like. There's no agenda."

As we walked away from Janine, I could sense Georgia's excitement. When we were out of earshot, she said, "This is so cool! I feel so powerful, so free and easy. It's like we're totally open. Anything can happen and we just make room for it, we just keep drawing the circle wider."

She stopped on the sidewalk, her expression suddenly somber. "But is there a limit to what we're doing? I mean, what if somebody freaks out? Will we have any casualties on our hands?"