Avant-Pop Literary Magazine

Short Story: The Wake by @writeyourname97

because you have another copy of what you just gave away, here, somewhere.

You believe abstraction is only good if there's meaning behind it. You hate clarity more than anyone, but you want the meaning behind something unclear to be clear. Your former friends had a way of describing the books you like to read as 'weird for the sake of weird' and that always rubbed you the wrong way. No, because of course there is another sake behind the weird. Of course there is meaning behind what appears to be nonsense. Of course that is exactly what postmodernism was all about. But postmodernism has come and gone, and in its place now stands the literary movement of indecisiveness. Are we taking a classical route, or are we still going for the avant-garde?

But you didn't need to worry yourself much with these issues, not until you'd finished reading all available postmodern books; not until you digested everything there was to digest, until you expanded your subconscious to stellar levels. And what better time to do that than right now, these very days, locked inside your library? With the world at war with an invisible enemy for at least one year, this is your god-sent chance to get all that reading done, and finally be the person you aspire to be since you were seventeen.

So then what are you doing at 4 A.M in the corner of the room with a bottle of whiskey trying to crack Finnegans Wake?

The knocking seems to be getting more persistent, consistent, insistent. But deep down you know it's always the same, nothing's changed. Knock. Knock. Knock. A half-minute pause. Knock. Knock. Knock. And so on. You take another sip and look toward the backdoor. It's still dark out there—it will be a couple of hours before the sun comes up—but the moon still sheds her light over the mystery. Or maybe it's a streetlight; you're not entirely sure. It's been so long since the last time you opened that door. Or the front door. Or any door. Or anything that isn't a book or a bottle. You take another sip; you flip through the pages, you catch a whiff even though your nose is far from it. Three knocks again. You look back to the backdoor. The moonlight shines through the frosted glass door, and the alien's shape is clear against it. You can't keep your eyes on it for too long, your insides quiver. You take another sip followed by a hiss. You can't help but glance at it again.

The head so oversized and elongated, you feel it's looking right through that door, as if it can see you inside, and it sees the insecurity in your own eyes, and it gives you a look of pure pity. But it's your imagination, you know. You can't see the alien's eyes, you don't even know if it has eyes to begin with. All you know is its head is unsettlingly huge. And the right hand, which it always has propped up against the opaque glass, is even bigger than its head. It gets a bit smaller for a while, and then it's gigantic again, knocking against the glass three times, always with the same rhythm.

You get up in a dizzy fashion, you walk toward the backdoor, toward the alien, the bottle in one hand, the book in the other. You stagger. You reach the door and you stop, your nose inches away from the frosted glass. It didn't occur to you until now how tall the alien is compared to you. Knock. Knock. Knock. It sounds even louder now, like it's right into your ears, into your mindhole. The palm of your hand is on the glass, over the silhouette of the alien's own hand. You're an infant all of a sudden. Your right eye wants to close. Your hand is trembling and it makes the door's glass shake. Knock. Knock. Knock. You're tempted to remove your hand, but you force it to stay there. You pat the glass like you're patting the alien's hand. You want to speak but only a burp comes out. You give the alien a look of excuse me; you remember you can't see its face. You give it another try.