The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII

THE POWER OF ONE by Nancy Kilpatrick

Mira counted the checkered squares that made up the deep pile on Dr. Rosen’s waiting room floor. A row of sixty black and sixty white lined the cardiologist’s broadloom from the door to the window. Seventy of each across. Sixteen thousand eight hundred. She felt sure the space taken up by the desk held twenty and twenty. Those plus the three blacks and three whites under every one of the six chairs meant the floor should contain, altogether, sixteen thousand eight hundred seventy-six. Only base numbers from one to nine held meaning. She had to reduce that large total.

Quickly she added the individual digits that made up that number horizontally. One plus six plus eight plus seven plus six. The muscles of her chest tensed. She considered using the calculator her dad had given her but felt guilty, as though that would be cheating. After all, she thought, he wouldn’t use it, although the gift implied that she would.

Twenty-eight. Two plus eight equals ten. One and zero. Uh oh… One. A paralyzingly unlucky number. The number of sacrifice. Her chest constricted further.

Dr. Rosen’s nurse stood and walked down the hall. Mira watched her, twisting a Kleenex into a corkscrew, more of a nervous wreck than usual. The test results would seal her fate, the predestination that she had been struggling to avoid since birth.

The three other patients waiting and Mira made four: a stable, balanced number, but not good enough. There had to be a way to annihilate that one.

She sighed and glanced around the room. A Wandering Jew hung in a macrame hangar near the window. The first vine had thirteen leaves. One and three makes four again. She took a deep, relaxing breath. Her chest muscles eased some. The second vine had ten. One plus zero. One again. Her pulse escalated as neck muscles cramped. If she added the four and one she’d have a five. Even numbers were safer but this was midway. Adventurous yet solid. She felt a dull ache beneath her rib cage. If only she could stop now. But she’d have to count the other vines; she knew she took after her dad in that way: compelled, as always, to finish what was begun.

She multiplied the fifty leaves by the number of vines: twenty. One thousand. One plus three zeros. The horror of one was just slicing into her mind when the nurse said, “Ms. Jacyk? Doctor will see you now.”

Mira stumbled across the room and down the crisp white hallway with the chain of mini Monet prints—ten of them, or one—clinging to the walls. The ache in her chest had increased to a steady throb. The nurse led her to the examination room at the end of the hall. Still unsteady, Mira sat in the white chair next to the small desk.

Dr. Rosen followed her in. He carried a red file folder with her name typed across the flap. She already knew that by assigning the letters of the alphabet numbers from one to twenty-six, the letters of her name added up to one. And she’d been the only child of a single parent. She’d been trying to pay off that solitary karma all her life.

“Mira.” He smiled, a bit crookedly, and she counted seven upper teeth. She wondered if he had all thirty-two, like her father. Three and two. Five.

“We’ve received the results from your EKG.” His mouth was tight but not nearly as severe as her dad’s. Her heartbeat accelerated and the ache intensified. “I don’t want to frighten you, but it looks as though you’ve suffered a myocardial infarction. A mild heart attack.”

He paused. The silence made her aware that she was shaking. To keep from falling apart completely, Mira concentrated on counting the pencils and pens in his tray. Six pencils, five pens, plus the ballpoint in his hand. One plus two. Three. The number of change. Amidst the fear she felt a glimmer of elation.

“I think we should look on the positive side,” he said. “Take this as an early warning. Now’s the time to make lifestyle changes. I’ve reviewed the results of your cholesterol test and the cardiovascular evaluation. There’s room for improvement in both areas. Here’s a diet that’s worked very well in cases like yours.” He handed her one sheet of daily menus: three per day for seven days. Twenty-one. Two plus one. Three. “High in fiber and carbohydrates, low in fatty foods. We’ll also get you on an exercise plan, walking, swimming, easy at first and gradually we’ll have your pulmonary status to where it should be.”

Mira had stopped listening. She’d been studying the numbers on his large day planner attached to the wall. One plus two plus three plus four, all the way to thirty-one. Adding each of the digits together produced four hundred and ninety six. Adding four, nine and six gave her nineteen. One and nine equaled ten. One. It would be unfair to add in the number values of the word December to try to dilute that one. Her father always said what goes around, comes around. He’d never blamed her for her mother, never said a word. Not one word.

“… but the main difficulty I see,” Dr. Rosen was saying, “is that you’ve got to learn to relax. Are you worried about anything in particular, Mira, because if you are…”

“No. Nothing. I’m fine.”

She counted the value of each letter of his name. Hal Z. Rosen. One. She felt her left eyelid spasm uncontrollably.

“Tomorrow is the first day of a new year,” he reminded her.

Day one. The first. The last. The beginning of one life, the end of another. She was born on January 1st, the day her mother had died of heart failure.

“Many people make New Year’s resolutions. Why don’t we think of this as a time for you to make some healthy changes in your life. It wouldn’t hurt to study a relaxation technique. Yoga might be helpful.”

Mira stared out the window. One car went by. A 1990 Chevrolet. Everywhere she looked the message blared, indelibly imprinting itself on her soul. All her life she’d known things would have been different if only her mother hadn’t died giving her life. Her father had said that often enough. If only she could reverse this perverse fate. But again her dad’s words rang true—“nobody cheats God.”

“… we only have one heart. We have to take care of it. Even when a weakness of the heart runs in a family, there’s a lot one can do to reverse what seems inevitable. Make another appointment—say in three weeks—we’ll see how you check out then.”

By the time Mira reached home she had convinced herself that the universe was sending her a message. Dr. Rosen was the medium. Atonement was possible, despite the dismal view of life her father had drummed into her head. Change was in store. She began in the kitchen. Mira cut off the broom handle to add a fifth leg to her kitchen table. Four chairs with four legs each made sixteen, plus the five table legs. Twenty-one. Two plus one equaled the fortuitous three. Next she cleaned out the cupboards, chucking a tin of tuna so that the cans numbered nine. There were nineteen leaves left on the Boston lettuce. One went into the garbage chute in the hallway. Glasses, dishes, her mother’s good silverware that she’d begged her dad for when she’d been old enough to appreciate it, were counted. The number of napkins left in the package. The pages of each cookbook.

Moving to the living room she panicked and shredded a throw cushion then, realizing she had miscounted, frantically shredded another. The middle of her chest still ached but she knew she had to finish or there would be no peace. Forty minutes later eight flower pots were left, a dozen magazines, forty-seven compact discs, and just two coasters, but the last didn’t matter because only her father visited, when he was in town.

The bedroom was easy. Long ago Mira had made a tally of the pink tea roses on the curtains and matching bedspread. She counted underwear, socks, hangers in the closet. She checked the bathroom, adding up Stimudent picks, assessing how many ounces of vaginal douche were left in the bottle, checking her weight on the scale in both pounds and kilograms. The model number on the blow dryer totaled six. The shower curtain rod held nine rings.

By the time Mira finished it was midnight. One and two. The eve of a new year. Change was underway, she could feel it. She called her father and left a “Happy New Year” message on his machine, secretly relieved that she didn’t have to talk to him. Especially tonight. Now that she had taken control of her future, she didn’t need any negative influences jinxing her efforts.

Despite the ache in her chest that had turned into a dull pain, she celebrated by brewing herself two cups of Earl Grey tea, using two bags, and bringing them into the bedroom so she could lie down and listen to the radio.

She sipped from one cup, then from the other, and closed her eyes. The broadcast from Times Square was lively. Normally she hated New Year’s Eve and spent the evening alone, except when her father was around. For once she felt in tune with such exuberance. There was a feeling of transformation in the air. Out with the old, in with the new. Dr. Rosen was right. Relaxation was the key. Her fate was, after all, in her own hands, not some crazy numerology system. She’d been pushing herself. The pain in her chest was becoming sharp.

She took in a deep breath. Air filled the pockets of her lungs and she expelled it in two easy breaths. The chest pain dulled a bit. Her arms and legs felt heavy, her neck and chest began to lighten. Tension floated away.

Her eyes snapped open and her heart slammed hard against her chest wall. How could she be so stupid? She raced to the tool box for the tape measure. The floor. Ten by nineteen. One hundred ninety. One and nine. A small cry burst from her. Double that for the ceiling, but the height of the walls had to be counted as well. She climbed a chair with two phone books on the seat. The rooms dimensions totaled a number that, when the digits were added together, produced three. But Mira knew she had to count the dimensions of all the rooms or it would be cheating. The living room, the kitchen. She totaled them on her calculator. Only the bathroom was left.

Pain stabbed her chest every few seconds. She placed the chair with the phone books in the tub for a little extra height. Her breath came in shallow warning gasps. This last set of numbers, she thought, will be final. She added the bathroom numbers in with the dimensions of the other rooms. The total of everything added together eventually broke down to the number three. She was in physical pain but emotional relief.

As her foot felt for the tub rim, Mira glanced at her digital watch. One a.m. The phone books slid apart and she toppled sideways, twisting, grasping, finding nothing concrete to grab on to. Her face smashed against the sink. She heard a crack at the base of her neck. The side of her head slammed onto hard floor tiles.

Consciousness returned slowly. Time blurred. Images flowed by: dragging her body to the phone… ambulance attendants in deathly white… police officers in mourners black… a light dazzling enough to usher in those being born… or to draw out the dying.

She tried to cry out for mercy, but a clear plastic mask over her mouth and nose silenced her. “Count backward from ten,” a voice commanded.

Ten to one…

Later, another voice. “A shame. One vertebra, damaged irrevocably. Paralyzed for life.”

And her father’s face, smiling.

Mira could not see her useless body, but she sensed her cells beginning the long, torturous process of decomposition. They would break down first in large groups then individually until finally the last would dissolve. A fitting offering to the god of one. The stem god of sacrifice. A demanding god who had finally been paid off. Or had he?

She needed to know for sure. A sign. A number would indicate whether or not he had been appeased once and for all. But Mira’s head was locked in place. Forever. Her field of vision limited to the ceiling. Blank, empty whiteness. Cold terror burned through her stomach and up her chest and stabbed the back of her throat, ready to spew from her mouth. There was nothing to count! No way of ever being certain.

She squeezed her eyes and mouth shut to contain the dry ice wail. Frost on the inside of her eyelids condensed into a face. Her father’s face. It swirled and shifted and became someone else’s face and that one melted into someone else… This was the sign!

Mira counted the faces, starting with her father’s. Then her four coworkers at the office: Mary, Lucy, Jason, Betty—and the twelve tenants in her apartment building: The Fairwells, Mrs. Owen—Wait! She’d better count that woman who only worked one week then quit… what was her name? And the couple who sublet the Andrews’ apartment: that made nineteen, one and nine… one! Her two cousins and three aunts and one uncle and two grandparents still living, her father’s friends: twenty-three… Yes, there were plenty to count: five people at the laundry—And what about the woman walking out the door as she walked in…? Twenty-seven worshipers the last time she’d attended church… or was it twenty-eight—?

The total was fifty-six… No!… fifty-seven… five plus seven… twelve… one plus two… three… the faces changed so fast! The supermarket, the subway, Christmas shopping, she was on the up escalator, how many were coming down? Four customers in line at the corner grocery, two at the dry cleaners… Did she get them all? The three men who empty the trash cans every Thursday… No, wait: six shoppers at the corner store… that totaled what?—the people who read the news on television—

Eventually she would reach that final number… The hair stylist and shampoo girl at the salon—Why couldn’t she keep track?… she’d have to start over: her father, Mary, Lucy, Jason: four… and Betty: five… Doctor Rosen’s three patients and her dentist’s patients—

—and ultimately when she saw that final, conclusive number—Oh! a snapshot of her girl scout troop—If only she could use the calculator… she’d have to start all over: her father, Mary, Lucy—

—that final number would—the boys on the high school football team—faces sped by—the thirty-three hundred seventy-two students pictured in her graduating glass photo—start again: her father, Mary—

—would seal—her college roommate Virginia and her parents—and Virginia’s brother’s girlfriend—and her parents—and—

—her fate—the paperboy—and his—

… She’d better go back: her father—