The Viewing

No one showed up late and everyone accepted their invitation. The crowd mulling before the auditorium emitted vague staticky noises; the contact of smooth bottomed shoes with polished stone floors, the brushings from the crotches of freshly pressed slacks, the click-scratch of nervously lit cigarettes trembling between fingers and pallid lips. Yet even the background noise was somewhat muted, softened by each individual's private battle to minimize the sound arising from their person. Every nascent sneeze was talked down as cautiously as a lunatic at cliff's edge and let heaven damn anyone who should drop a bit of spare change, for the sharp metallic ringing would desecrate the area as surely as the slaughter of cattle in a Jain temple, blood stains spidering on milk-white marble as the priests watch on in speechless terror, one frozen amidst the delicate motions of ushering a gnat struggling between his eyelashes to the safety of open air. 

Mostly they were male, distinguished-looking gentlemen with thick beards and firm handshakes, upstanding citizens, Freemasons, city council members and their ilk, bearing visages ever poised as if modeling for a sculptor who would transfigure their likenesses into busts destined to sit on daises in the forgotten hallways of their familial mansions. However, there were a smattering of women peppered about. Not the young pretty ones currently engaged in child bearing and rearing, for this sort of lurid display couldn't be suffered by their unblemished minds and fragile demeanors. The men that stood here now in their stead did so happily, granting their spouses a spurious image of tranquility accepted by their fashionably womanish ignorance. The females that did attend were matriarchs casting sagacious looks about, flourishing noble locks of gray hair crowned by elegant hats and enveloped in a haze of expensive perfumes which trailed behind them like an ethereal surrogate of the wedding train they had worn decades before.

A tuxedoed man unlocked the glass doors of the building from inside and with a polite gesture invited the crowd within, checking their embossed invitations and two forms of identification. The group entered in single file and found their seats in the same auditorium where they had appeared for innumerable benefits, reward ceremonies, school plays and concerts given by touring orchestras. All was familiar except for the stage, upon which an imposing structure had been built, rising flush from its edge to about 12 feet high, with a wide dark window spreading across it. A few medical types stood in front, smiling and nodding to each other, clutching their leather doctor's bags filled with hypodermic needles and ampules of clear liquid labeled with incomprehensible polysyllabic names which could have been lifted from the incantations of a spell-book. At their feet a straitjacket was unceremoniously cast before two expressionless police officers equipped with riot gear and holstered pistols.

Suddenly, lights flashed on from the interior of the cell which could now be seen clearly through the window of one-way glass. At a table facing the audience sat a man of about thirty with long hair and an ethnic background, a glass of water with pitcher beside, a bowl of fruit with a pinwheel sticking from it and a large microphone. He looked nervous or a little giddy. A stern voice sounded from the numerous tan megaphones arranged about, sprouting from the ceiling like inverted mushrooms, “Do not feel any sympathy for the man you see before you, he has committed deleterious crimes against both society and his country for which he will pay, in part, with the demonstration you are about to witness.” The commentator paused portentiously. “Forty-five minutes ago the man you see now ingested 1000 micrograms of lysergic acid diethylamide-25, commonly know as LSD, a dose which can fit on the head of a pin with room to spare.” Hushed gasps escaped the mouths of a dozen people scattered throughout the auditorium like the unwanted hiccups of small children. “Ladies and gentlemen,” continued the authoritative voice, “This is what it looks like to see a man trip.”

Screeches of bliss or delirium or wisdom or insanity reverberated into the audience or thudded echo-less against the padded walls of the viewing chamber, depending on which set of ears one listened through.