Oblivion_ stories - By David Foster Wallace Page 0,122
might say]) a sudden, aggrieved and high volume accusation of ‘snoring’ on my wife’s part.
Whether seemingly somewhat forebodingly or not, both all exterior or extraneous noise and my own neglected pager itself—as well as the swart, handsomely dressed Medical administrator’s audible imbibation or ‘slurping’ of his hot tea (a personal pet peeve of mine since childhood, followed as it was by the somewhat affected knuckle across the upper lip)—appeared at this point in time to cease, producing a sudden and somewhat dramatic or unsettling silence or distended ‘pause.’ Meanwhile, on the room’s Monitor, the video recording, which formed or comprised a diptych or ‘Split screen’ image, showed Hope and myself’s darkened Sleep chamber in a low amber light which was evidently distinctive of the appearance of low light film, the screen’s upper left and right corners displaying both the relevant date and ‘0204’ (or, 2:04 A.M. in scientific or ‘Zulu time’) along with each successive second and decimal increments of same, with the (from our perspective) dextral or right hand side of the video display being comprised of a sustained, Infra-red close up (or, ‘tight shot’) of myself in the bed, deeply asleep, supine on my back with my hands on my chest, and—far more unsettlingly—of my own face, asleep. I myself had, not, of course, surprisingly, never seen or observed my own ‘unconscious’ face prior to this time; and, in the Monitor’s diptych’s recto or, as it were, right or ‘starboard’ portion’s unblinking close up, it was now revealed as being not a face I in any way recognized or ‘knew,’ with its slack jaw and protrusive jowls, hands on my chest spiderishly twitching, lips fishily loose or agape; and, although there was (to the Sleep team’s consternation and whispered colloquy among the aides and technicians at the Monitor’s rear, with which there was evidently some technical ‘glitch’ or malfunction) no audible sound (Hope, gazing in rigid fascination or horror at the dextral display right along-side myself, herself was silently ‘frozen’ [or, ‘paralyzed’ (“or hurt you if”)] in mid gesture, her pupils quite large and liquidly black), the flaccid mien, gaping mouth, slack jaw and puddled and quivering jowls I’d never ‘envisioned’ lying down (for, as with most husbands, I had, of course, only seen my face when seated or standing erect at the mirror, as in shaving, removing unwanted nasal or auricular hairs, masturbating with a saffron scented under-garment, tightening the knot of my tie and so forth), as well as, despite the recording’s defective audio portion’s absence of sound, the variably changing shapes and contortions of my unconsciously open mouth in the close up sleeping shot or wee hour ‘scene,’ as Hope and myself watched in rigid fascination (as when passing the wreckage and prone, twisted figures of a vehicular accident or ‘Crime scene’), signifying or ‘meaning,’ in other words, that the distinctive, alternating shapes of my image’s mouth’s slack lips, as well as the small bubbles of saliva or spit which alternately formed and dissolved at my open mouth’s corners (there was labial ‘film’ or paste in those corners, as well, gummy and sepia colored, distending slightly as my mouth changed shape), signified undeniably that sounds and noises of which I had no conscious or ‘voluntary’ awareness were in fact escaping my throat and mouth—no one with eyes could deny it—and, as the video camera’s focus ‘tightened’ or closed further in on my wholly unfamiliar, inhuman, unconscious visage, I either saw, hallucinated, ‘imagined’ (Hope at this juncture still rigidly or foetally ‘frozen,’ open mouthed and saucer eyed, as both the forbidding technician and Latin executive began to peel their respective faces off in a ‘top down’ fashion or manner, beginning at each temple and pulling downwards with sharp, emphatic, peeling or ‘tugging’ motions, the Cuban’s foreign wrist watch and hands a mass of amber lesions) or actually watched or literally ‘witnessed’ one sleeping eyelid open just a crack, ever so slightly, allowing a minuscule sliver or ray or ‘blade’ of light—as in, for instance, under a dark bedroom’s closed door when the hallway light outside is illuminated or ‘turned on’ as a heavy, familiar nocturnal tread slowly ascends the Victorian staircase to the bedroom door—from the rapidly moving and unconscious eye below, seeing as well in the Split screen’s right- or ‘off’ side’s shot my own wet mouth and slack, soft and spreading cheeks now begin to distend in a ‘grinningly’ familiar and sensual or even predatory facial ex