The Atrium

By Solitaire Parke

After a horrific car crash on his way to a celebration, a man finds himself trapped within an
atrium that is lined with a series of framed pictures. He soon discovers there is no choice but
to relive a sequence of traumatic events which have shaped his life up to that point. He is
faced with the confrontation of self, undisputedly the hardest issue a human being
can forcibly encounter.

The Atrium causes him to examine and confront his own inner turmoil, leading to a discovery
of both morals and motives and their application in each situation, casting an entirely different
light on the treatment of those around him. There is a realization that we have the capacity for
change and the ability to create an existence filled with compassion and purpose beyond self.
He struggles with life and death decisions that could determine his future on earth or in the
great beyond.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Oct 27, 2022
• ISBN: 9781387523290

Solitaire Parke

Solitaire Parke is an author of Science Fiction/Urban Fantasy, Poetry and Larger World books. He is a lover of dragons, the poetry of Edgar Allan Poe, and has a large collection of science fiction books and movies. After becoming an award winning photographer and earning a degree in music theory, he worked in graphic and web design, but he always returns to writing.When he is not writing, you can find him reading, watching a sci-fi television show or movie, or researching a new “techno gadget” on the internet. He now resides in Arizona with his family and two very spoiled dogs!

Book preview

Solitaire Parke

THE ATRIUM

Solitaire Parke

Copyright © 2022 Solitaire Parke

All rights reserved

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the permission of the author.

ISBN 978-1- 387-52329-0

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to anyone strong enough to hold dear the concept that self-confrontation is the first law of survival.

Solitaire…

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

A very special thank you goes out again to Brandiwine Parke and Kimberly Gippert for all the editing and support they provided on this project. It would not have been possible without them.

(This project, is by design, rooted somewhere between fact and fiction. There are no names given for any characters within these pages, which was my attempt to protect the guilty, myself included.)

Solitaire…

INTRODUCTION

The Atrium

An empty hall that leads to nowhere but oblivion.

Just pictures on the walls that tell my story.

Heartfelt but only three emotions speak with real persistence,

As love and hate impersonate existence.

The fury builds and veils what feels so near

A cerebral nightmare unfolds as the photos disappear.

Just an empty path drawing me to neither fame nor glory.

The faces of the people fade and blur.

Each one ceases to exist and becomes an empty wall.

The hallway lengthens into the distance,

As the images grow with patient insistence.

Only the future holds the life that was

And crashes to the ground because

Only one can stop the endless fall.

But as the hall grows claustrophobic barren

And time slows to a dismal crawl,

Lights shine brightly to the hopeful decision

As the faces become the twilight’s derision.

Till only one countenance is what I see

That pulls at the heart strings and sets it free

To stave my life and create the morning’s thrall.

There is one picture I cannot ignore.

Combining all the frames that I have wanted to see,

Into what was, present, and futures to pass

Out of the night and into the daylight at last.

Like the blind awakening to perceive the light.

Just one picture, just one image a true delight

Where it’s incept and the ending painted me.

Chapter 1

What if the end was the beginning?

Life, with all its monotony, happens at a breakneck pace and very seldom gives us a second chance. It only takes a moment of hesitation or the lack of observation for it to come to a screeching halt. No apologies and no recriminations for deeds done or undone.

This thought train is undeniably one of the worst debates in the history of debates because the only way to empirically prove its authenticity is to experience it first-hand. If it happens to someone else, then the debate takes on so many variables that nothing can be proven without valid arguments getting in the way of proof.

Once it becomes your reality, the scenario renders itself moot and the best that can be said for the predicament is usually an utterance like Oh Crap or worse. The proposed debate will be hammered out by those second party bystanders who wish to examine the endless sea of variables that might have made the outcome different.

Having cleared the stage for another round of eternal deliberations, I was running behind schedule, a problem of late and a known recipe for disaster. In scant minutes from now, a party would commence in my honor, so it would not behoove me to be tardy at a function for yours truly.

I had recently finished my latest book and family & friends had planned a party for its successful completion. It was not needed but certainly appreciated, and my mind was on everything but my safe arrival to the festivities. The blame was my own. I had been trained better than to overlook what in hindsight was so obvious.

I wonder what would’ve transpired had my exit from home been five or ten minutes earlier? What are the chances for the same set of events taking place while the timing being so crucially altered? Another one of those what if moments that defy argument or debate.

The Arizona speed limit sign said sixty-five miles per hour, so an extra ten is not that much and it would go a long way to expedite my punctuality…or so I thought.

A car up ahead began to slow and then braked hard. I could not see what caused the maneuver and checked behind and next to me preceding a slide over one lane. When I glanced back, my heart leaped into my throat, as the vehicle in front of me had turned sideways and was in progress of rolling over. It was also dangerously closer than a scant moment before. Oil, or what I hoped was oil, was spraying out of the jagged frame like someone’s lifeblood, and I shuddered.

The undercarriage of the person’s car was now less than a car link ahead and there was no way to stop, avoiding a collision. I braced myself mere seconds before impact and was amazed at how slow everything seemed to unfold. Unidentified droplets of a dark liquid undulated sideways across my vision at a snail’s pace, and I was mesmerized by the sluggishness the world had assumed.

The front of my car was swept slowly upward as the other vehicle rolled over onto its top and there was an audible distress, the primal sounds of glass breaking, and metal rending into new shapes. The interior of my car caught a pocket of zero gee, and I would have drifted up and forward were it not for a fastened seat belt. My stomach did not adhere itself to these physical laws, following the already migrating heart, and I tasted bile.

My car’s front bumper must have caught onto something under the other automobile’s frame because it threw the shifting weight of mine forward, flipping it over and slamming it down hard on the mid-section of the now trapped vehicle underneath.

There was no need to wonder if the other person survived, it would have taken a miracle to perform that feat. I hoped it was quick enough to circumnavigate the pain it surely caused.

There was another rending metal sound and my car twisted dizzily over to one side. Turning my head, the world flipped one, two, three times before spinning around and showed me what was left of the other vehicle. Its lights dimmed, flickered, and died, mimicking the person inside.

My radio turned itself on and a man’s voice yelled out, Well that’s all for tonight!  Remember, life is short. You should take advantage of it before it’s too late.  He laughed as the advice ended and the message gave me a fleeting sensation of despair. Why couldn’t he have given me this advice before I left the house?

Oddly, the other car seemed to be extremely far away and was increasing in distance as I watched. It was difficult to know which of us was moving, but then the available light began to dim noticeably, and it was not long before I could not see it at all.

I attempted to reach for the door, but nothing on my body wanted to move and the night air, much gustier than remembered, blew against my face. It felt wet and I tried desperately not to panic. Surely the source was vital fluids from my car and not blood. It could not have been inclement weather; this was Arizona and is not known for an abundance of rain.

The wetness was all I could register and my attempt to maintain a modicum of rationality became lost to abject terror.

From my vantage point, most of the night sky was visible and I spotted an aircraft that was probably on its way to Sky Harbor Airport. It captured my full attention only after I realized it was not moving, and I theorized how fast my visual perception must be advancing for the airplane to have stopped. Perhaps time ceases at the very moment your life ends, and I wondered how it was possible to have an adrenalin rush if the body was dead.

I simply could not, would not admit the possibility of being deceased and stuck in my car. Was this merely a version of eternal hell and my punishment was to stay trapped for the rest of time? No! I wanted to scream but there was no one there to hear me.

If the events had truly stopped then why could I feel wind, and why were the trees along the side of the road not moving? They reminded me of oversized wooden soldiers, lined up in a gauntlet of retribution to keep prying eyes from witnessing my plight. I realize how ridiculous this all sounds to a rational mind, but nothing and I mean nothing registered at a rational level. Glancing around the area outside my vehicle gave me the next plateau of useless paranoia. What if another car approached and did not see the carnage strewn across the road? From my vantage point I could see a wheel severed from its axle, broken glass, and what appeared to be a large section of the other car’s fender. The scenario could conceivably escalate to a disastrous degree and compound my obvious and existing state. Mental Note:  Were there no other cars, and why could I not hear anything?

The airplane had not budged an inch and I noticed the moon was full. The two were not related, of course, but it somehow meant something. I grasped at straws and came up empty handed. The reminder of not having the usual extremities was like a lightning strike and no matter how hard I strained, nothing of the condition concerning my body came into my view. Intellectually, it told me I had gone into shock. Emotionally, it cried out decapitation.

Oddly enough, my brain fixated on the length of time it takes for consciousness to fade after losing one’s head, but the memory was equally as gone as my body seemed to be. There were so many questions that for reasons unknown never manifested or seemed relevant at the time but would have been of greater interest.

I have no idea how long it was between the accident and my eventual removal from the wreckage. The academic part of me said I had merely gone to sleep but there was a nagging section of the corporeal reality that was my existence, that simply could not cope with the events transpiring before me. Eventually, a light began to encroach on my senses that metamorphosed itself into a rural setting, a narrow street lined with houses from a previous era. Indeed, I still have no memory of being pulled from the car, and the lack of that time pocket was having a profound affect on my level of believability for this situation regardless of how it was viewed. There was a sensation telling me time had passed but a total inability to gauge how long. I was, however, pleased to find myself in the standard upright position only occupied by those who are still alive. A thrill coursed through my body at the realization my head was still attached, and I literally reached up to touch the once thought missing body part.

I was alone, standing in a street next to a curb, within the confines of a typical neighborhood and no sight of wrecked cars or dead bodies came to my attention. Maybe this was the afterlife and included visitation rights to places of unknown importance. Maybe I had lost my mind and it was manifesting itself as potential memories whether good or bad, not that either was possible to determine with so little data. I was neither hot nor cold, but my thinking process kept introducing thoughts that gave me chills, a sensation that abruptly ceased the second it became a conscious notion.

A house appeared before me that belonged to my mother’s parents, but they had died many years ago. It was identical to my memory of the property, just at a much different age. I remember going there for a family reunion, but not the drive putting me here today. This time, however, the house appeared new rather than old and dilapidated when I had seen it last. That was at least fifty years ago, and the house was several decades old even then. There is a difference between a freshly painted old house and one that is recently finished with vibrantly new colors.

A new car has an unforgettable aroma, indescribable and yet familiar to everyone. The smell of a new house is much the same but with a larger variety of sources. This house should reek of age and mildew. I know that because it did five decades ago, and houses don’t improve with age.

It was impossible to have a wreck in Arizona and end up in Mesquite, Texas. I was sure none of this was real but was equally as sure I could smell fresh cut wood and drying paint coming from the house.

Glancing about afforded me an excellent view of the neighborhood but the homes were in an advanced state of decay, nothing like the one in front of me. Worse, there were cutout standup displays of the people who had lived and died there, each casting shadows of the residents in graves previously dug in the yards. Thankfully enough, my car was nowhere to be seen nor was a grave present for me in my grandparents’ front yard.

I felt myself grimace and chided the lack of observation to think this was a typical neighborhood. With the exception of my grandparent’s home, the rest of the buildings were certainly not typical, unless a decaying tenement is considered normal living conditions. 

My curiosity, morbid as it seemed, was cut short when I involuntarily went from the curb to the front steps of the house with virtually nothing in between. Next, I found myself on the porch in less than the blink of an eye, and before I could draw a breath of surprise, my body had been transported to just inside the front door. It was like watching a film with most of the frames leading from scene to scene having been removed.

I found myself at the beginning of a long, roofless hallway, adorned with large, framed photographs on the walls. It reminded me of a roman atrium without the columns, and above me was a brilliant night sky. The stark white of the area was made more bizarre by the checkerboard flooring that had dipped precariously down along the left wall.

Another image graced the far end but was so badly out of focus it defied any amount of eye rubbing to correct. I imagined it was something to be witnessed when the time was right, and hopefully not nefarious in nature. Had it not been for the car wreck I would be attempting to force myself out of this nightmarish slumber. Alas, it was beginning to feel all too real.

A sense of danger settled into my bones, and I decided to head back out of the door that had so unceremoniously deposited me here but was surprised by the atrium at work making the decision unlikely. The door was shrinking toward a point that was conveniently positioned in the center of the wall, disallowing a way to regain access to the front porch. It made my skin crawl, and I knew making an exit would be impossible until the power that brought me here was finished with its purpose.

My fear was beginning to rise again and there were too many indications of some unknown but imminent fate, like several ghosts of Christmas past. Turning slowly, I cast my gaze upon the remainder of the images that adorned the long hallway.

The photographs, apart from the closest one on my left, had also become blurry, as if I wasn’t supposed to bear witness to them until something else had been performed. I chastised myself for the mental histrionics but could not shake the feelings no matter how I dismissed them. Try as I might, the images had been erased from my memory.

This whole scenario was the last thing my imagination would have conjured, and I feared my loved ones were even now receiving bad news about the accident. How else could I interpret the sequence of events, not to mention the total lack of narrative on the part of the person or persons responsible?  Shouldn’t the deceased be told first?

This must be a drug induced hallucination, I told myself, as the doctors must surely be operating on my wracked body. How much damage was done to my car?  No…that’s not right. This has nothing to do with monetary values or easily replaced possessions. That poor person in the other car had it far worse than me. I wondered if he/she was standing in a long hallway with a twisted checkerboard floor.

That set my paranoid side into high gear. I was sure the other person had died in the accident and if he/she was experiencing something similar, then I might too be existing somewhere in limbo. I resolved to believe the atrium was for those who clung precariously to life and had not yet seen their last day on earth.

I took a deep breath and reminded myself to be logical. I needed to perform an inventory of today’s highlights with a recap of the later events as I recollected them. Point in case: I don’t remember leaving my house.

No one has an accident, and then immediately finds themselves involuntarily in another location unless willing to suspend the laws of physics to achieve the result. Maybe I fell asleep before leaving for the party and none of this is happening, other than in my mind. Dreams don’t require any adherence to the laws of physics, nor do they always allow your body to move in predicted ways.

That brings me to the immediate issue at hand. I could not for the life of me, (no pun intended), move in any direction unless it involved angling over to the first wall mounted image to my left. Any other direction caused my body to seize up, prohibiting even my vision to explore another part of the hall. This image was crystal clear, vividly colorful, and depicted an occasion earlier in my life, one that I now regretted and wished desperately had never happened.

The image depicted a guest house that was immediately behind the residence of one of my aunts. Trees